yemalu

The drawing showed two lines with a square in the centre that represented the stronghold in between the pass while a circle behind the square to represent the cave.

Ugh… This isn\'t ideal…

I was expecting a small stronghold of maybe about fifty Orcs or so, not three times that number… This isn\'t a small quest anymore…

Now I\'m not even sure if I can fulfil my initial plan of having Chamie and Harge act as my healing assistants during the fight… I forsee myself being too busy healing to provide any guidance during the fight.

Whatever, they\'ll just need to learn by watching.

"A… A hundred and fifty?" Harge gasped.

Chamie started looking at her fingers, "That\'s… That\'s… Err…"

"About sixteen orcs for each of us," Emilia calculated for her.

Obviously that didn\'t make her feel any better.

Lisa pointed at the two lines at the sides of the fort, "The cliffs here are quite high up and too steep to climb. We also found no suitable location to attack from these sides so I believe our only option is a frontal assault. The good thing is that this applies to the Orcs as well so they won\'t have archers perching on top of these cliffs and nowhere to run after we take the fort, assuming there isn\'t a tunnel system in the cave."

Tiara tapped her chin thoughtfully, "What about the interior of the cave?"

Katsuki shook her head, "We were not able to scout that far in as it was quite closely guarded. I believe either that cave is where their actual base is or that it serves as their storage for their most valuable things."

Chamie looked up, "What would they even consider valuable?"

"Captured Mahuns," Lisa answered as a matter of factly.

I got reminded of the Orc orgy that I came across the first time I went to subjugate them. Ugh… Bad memories.

Hmm… As Katsuki had said earlier, this place is seldom visited by anyone so I guess if the Orcs did capture someone, they would be quite a big prize for them.

Then again, the cave might just be some storage cave for their food or something.

I nodded, "I think a head on assault would be best for us as well."

Odeta grinned, "So we\'re just going to bust in through the front door? I can do that!"

Tiara thought about her suggestion seriously, "I suppose… If we assault the stronghold at night, we\'ll have the advantage of surprise and if we manage to break into the stronghold before the alarm is raised, we could use it to hold back reinforcements coming from the cave as well."

I looked at the map that Katsuki drew, "Are there walls in the fort that face towards the cave?"

Lisa nodded, "There are, surprisingly. I assume that the cave used to belong to someone else and the Orcs built that fort in order to lay siege to it before claiming it for themselves."

Harge was surprised to hear that, "Monsters… Fight each other?"

Everyone aside from Chamie turned to look at her, even myself.

These two sisters really never went out of the city before huh?

"I\'m afraid so. The monsters are not some united entity, so territorial fights between them do exist," Lisa explained.

The two girls nodded in understanding and we turned back to the drawing on the ground.

I gestured to the ground, "So Odeta will break through the front while we follow in behind her. Odeta should continue forward and smash your way to the other gate and barricade it. The rest of us will deal with the Orcs inside the stronghold. How many are we looking at?"

"We estimate at around sixty Orcs, Mistress," Katsuki answered.

"Ehhhh… So little?" Odeta groaned in disappointment.

I smiled at her, "There\'ll be more coming from the cave anyway, can I leave holding those off to you?"

Odeta grinned, "Of course! I\'ll make sure no one gets past me!"

I then turned to the others, "We need to clear out the stronghold as fast as possible. I will be supporting all of you from the back with my magic alongside Chamie and Harge."

""Eh?"" Two surprised voices came from in front of me.

The two seniors were looking at me with wide eyes.

"We\'re… Also going in there?" Chamie asked.

"Well obviously? How else are you going to watch me heal them? That\'s why you\'re here right?"

"But… We never… We have never done something like this before…"

Katsuki gave them a look, "You say that you wish to run away from your Family, but are you aware that the World is not as peaceful as you think it is? I would say even on your journey to the Academy itself, you might face attacks from monsters en route too. If you are not prepared for something like this, then I would recommend the two of you just stay in your House and accept your fate."

Oof, harsh but true. But the fact that Katsuki knew about their plans meant she was hiding nearby when these two were telling me about their plans.

Thankfully they didn\'t question how she knew since they were too busy contemplating their life choices right now.

Emilia didn\'t seem that pleased by their hesitation and scowled at them, "Hey. I\'m just going to say this but I hope you realise that you two aren\'t the only ones that have a stake on this quest. If you aren\'t going to participate, I\'d prefer that you voice out now instead of later."

For the uninitiated, you can translate Emilia\'s words to \'if you are chickening out of this quest, say it now so that we can cut you out of calculating the quest rewards so that we can avoid a conflict over it later\'.

"We… We will participate…" Chamie declared, albeit with a shaky voice.

Emilia seemed a little disappointed to hear that they were actually going to participate but refrained from commenting.

Right, let\'s go back to planning our attack on the stronghold.

*

"Alright let\'s do this thing!! Leeeeerrooooyyyyy hankinssss!!" Odeta roared, charging towards the wooden gates of the stronghold.

Oh no, it should have been \'jenkins\', Odeta. Oh well, close enough.

Yes, I told her to shout that while she was running towards the gate if you were wondering.

We watched from the shadows as the Orcs on top of the walls got alarmed by the shout and tried to look over the wall to see what was making the noise.

They only managed to see Odeta\'s charging figure for a moment before she slammed straight into the wooden gates and blew them off their hinges to fly off into the insides of the stronghold.

The screeches that came a while later told me the gates must have landed on some unfortunate Orcs inside.

Odeta did not stop and simply charged deeper into the stronghold, causing more Orcs to shriek in pain as they either got thrown or knocked over by the charging Amrap.

"Let\'s go!" I commanded, the others responding immediately by charging towards the open gate.

Emilia and Tiara led the way, followed closely behind by Lisa and Delmare. Right behind them were myself and my two seniors while Katsuki would be sneaking in from over the wall and taking out any Orc that we may have missed.

Already, I could see my Inugami\'s figure leaping onto the two Orcs that were on the ramparts, dispatching them efficiently without either of them even being able to respond.

Emilia was the next one through the gates, the Nekomata finding three Orcs standing in the middle of the road looking in the direction of where Odeta had disappeared to.

She ran in between two of them while slashing out her katana quickly, not even slowing down her charge as she split off to the left.

The two Orcs were in the midst of falling over when Tiara arrived to stab her longsword through the torso of the third Orc, causing the monster to let out a squeal of surprise before she pulled back her blade and kicked him aside.

The Princess then dashed to the right, allowing the rest of us to continue our advance forward through the stronghold where a trail of destruction lay in Odeta\'s wake.

She really is just charging straight through the stronghold huh… I even spotted an Orc that was quite evidently trampled on in the middle of the road.

An Orc leapt out of the shadows upon seeing us, though it was unarmed.

Delmare pointed the rapier at the monster and I realised this would be the first time I am witnessing the Siren in a fight.

I see that she had chosen the rapier as her choice of weapon.

She dashed towards the Orc which prompted the monster to do the same.

He tried to grab at her but she deftly slid out of the way, almost like she was dancing.

Her hand thrusted forward and the blade stabbed itself into the Orc\'s neck from the side, leaving a puncture wound when she pulled back.

The Orc let out a grunt of pain and tried to spin around to grab her again, only to have the rapier stab into its eye.

Oooh~ Delmare\'s pretty good.

Lisa didn\'t even get a chance to do anything unfortunately and stayed in front of us as her backup, looking slightly disappointed.

Chamie and Harge were obviously trying their best to hold themselves together in their first ever battle but at least they don\'t look like they\'re going to be sick yet.

That was when a loud roar cut through the night air, loud enough to even cause the ground beneath our feet to shake.

Almost immediately was the sound of Odeta\'s roar before the ground shook again from some kind of impact.

What was that?