“Finally the cannon has been completed! Let"s start the operation right away?”

◆◇◆◇◆

The huge weapon for the decisive battle, the 『Big Magic Cannon』, which had many people join in its construction, was completed within a month.
All that"s left is to fire this cannon, destroy the magic barrier and suppress the underground fortress with the whole army in one go.
That means the Empire"s civil war will finally come to an end with this.
The cannon has a diameter of one meter and a length of 20 meters. Supporting it is a combination of a cannon mount, aiming device, cooling device, a device that connects the magic gems which store the mana, and Luise who is working as sub-power generator.

“To use the mana acc.u.mulated in my fist as sub-power, that cannon is quite the random construct, isn"t it?” (Luise)

“Isn"t it fine as long as we can win because of that?” (Peter)

“Well, I guess so.” (Luise)

Luise agreed with Peter"s point. These two might actually have similar personalities.

“Wilma, will your side be alright?”

“We tested it several times, so it should be okay. It"s only that the cannon"s aiming device has become rather big.” (Wilma)

“Didn"t you say that there"s no need for precision at the level of the magic sniper rifle?”

“Basically it will be fine if I hit around here.” (Wilma)

Wilma looked through the installed scope and showed a detailed map of the mountainside to me.

“The previously mentioned breath-emitting devices have been set up at places which are marked red.”

Peter didn"t play around in this one month either, it seems.
He investigated the places where we will be able to cause big damage to the underground fortress" facilities at the same time of breaking the　『Magic Barrier』.

“If it"s aiming at this level, I suppose there will be plenty of leeway for you, Wilma.” (Wendelin)

“As long as I don"t become careless. It will be fine as we adjusted the measurement error of the aiming device in the test firing at the beginning.” (Wilma)

“I see. Please do your best then.” (Wendelin)

When I gently caressed her head, Wilma looked very happy.

“Wend, what about me?” (Luise)

“Huh? Didn"t you tell me before 『I"m a grown up woman, so I won"t be pleased even if you caress me』?” (Wendelin)

“Did I really say something like that? Look, being unfair is no good.” (Luise)

When I caressed her head as well in response to that, she looked delighted as well.

“Emera?” (Peter)

“What is it?” (Emera)

“Look at that!” (Peter)

“What about it?” (Emera)

“Nothing…” (Peter)

Peter tried to imitate me to stroke Emera"s head, but there"s no way that she would accept that. With her unapproachable manner, Peter was tragically shot down. I don"t think that Emera will be happy to have something like that done to her anyway, but…

“Well, we are going to fire it soon then, right?”

It"s quite casual, but Peter orders Emera to signal the start of the operation. Once she instructed the magician standing next to her, he released a flare into the sky. At last it"s the beginning of battle.

“Wilma, give us a flashy shot!”

“Roger, flashy it will be.” (Wilma)

Having said that, since it"s just taking aim and pulling the trigger, it won"t be that flashy either way.

“Beginning the mana supply from the magic gem linking device. Current capacity at 57%.” (Wilma)

The magic gem linking device, which caused the most troubles in the building phase, seems to function properly. However, since it"s getting heated up as expected, we can feel the hot air over here as well. It might be difficult to use it for an extended period of time.

“Capacity at 105%.” (Wilma)

“I will start providing mana as well.” (Luise)

Following that, Luise poured the mana ama.s.sed in her fist into a cord, sending it to the magic cannon.
It"s the duty of a sub-power generator, but to guarantee the power output of the cannon, which is a trial product, her mana was necessary.

“Confirmed charging of mana. Adjusting aim, 2 ticks up, 3 ticks right. Aim all set. Fire.” (Wilma)

After Wilma confirmed all of it with an indifferent voice, she quickly pulled the trigger.
Just as she did, the surroundings of the magic cannon were attacked by a trembling as if a major earthquake was taking place.
The huge magic cannon isn"t actually so loud that it would make windows tremble.
Since it doesn"t use gunpowder, it"s not at the level of rupturing one"s eardrums.
Because it"s a primitive cannon, the energy of the firing is released completely to the front.
That"s why no shock wave reached us, but in exchange the cooling device released huge amounts of vapor while suppressing the abnormal heating.
I protect myself and the others from the steam with a 『Magic Barrier』.

“That"s an amazing amount of steam, isn"t it?”

“No change here.” (Wilma)

“How nice, that"s a convenient protection.” (Luise)

“But it has no use except on such occasion. After all you will get immediately drenched in sweat if you move while wearing this.” (Wilma)

Same as at the time with the large magic sniper rifle prototype, Wilma wore a mithril-coated coat.
Luise acted as if she was jealous, but well, since it"s difficult to use when hunting monsters…

“Did it hit?”

“It looks like it did.”

Because I was asked by Luise, I peeked through the binoculars in a hurry and confirmed that a reasonably big hole had been drilled into a part of the mountainside.
The cannon"s sh.e.l.l smashed the magic barrier, impacted on the mountainside and pierced into it. It apparently destroyed a facility, causing chaos within the underground fortress.
It was a simple c.h.i.n.kapin-shaped sh.e.l.l made out of a tungsten alloy without fuse and without any explosive material, but since that ma.s.s had been accelerated by a large amount of mana, it should have developed a considerable power.

“What terrific output. Wilma, keep shooting as long as you can.”

“Got it.”

While looking on the map, Wilma starts to aim at the next target.
The target points and their order had been noted down on the map of the mountainside.
This is what Peter had his troops investigate for the last month.

“Loading the next sh.e.l.l! Done!” (Armstrong)

“Eh? Dous.h.i.+, you"re in charge of loading the sh.e.l.ls?” (Wendelin)

The tungsten-alloy sh.e.l.ls, which had been completed by craftsmen polis.h.i.+ng the rough shape I had created, are absurdly heavy. It was planned to have several magicians, who can strengthen themselves, handle the loading process, but for some reason Dous.h.i.+ is doing it all by himself.

“To have several magicians carry one sh.e.l.l is quite inefficient!” (Armstrong)

“I"m thankful, but at the same time surprised that you can carry it by yourself.”

“This much is light for me.” (Armstrong)

Thanks to Dous.h.i.+, the loading of the sh.e.l.ls finishes speedily and Wilma fires the cannon in succession.
It is impossible for the aim to be off.
Even if it slightly deviates from its target, it will definitely cause damage to the fortress as long as it pierces into the mountainside.

“The aiming device had a measurement error. Adjusting it, one tick down, one tick left. Fire.” (Wilma)

There are in total 25 sh.e.l.ls that had been produced by me. I couldn"t do any more as I didn"t have enough materials.
It would have been fine to use other materials too, but since the mana stored in the magic gems will run out at that point anyway, it"s all the same.
Besides, if you fire 25 of those huge projectiles, it will consume a huge amount of mana to restore the 『Magic Barrier』 each time.
On the mountainside holes so big that you can see them with the naked eye had opened up at several places.
The interior of the fortress beyond the holes torn open by the sh.e.l.ls should be crumbling by now.

“All sh.e.l.ls. .h.i.t. I think I was able to destroy a considerable amount of the breath-emitting devices as well.” (Wilma)

“That"s amazing, Wilma.” (Wendelin)

As I praised Wilma who finished her task, there was movement within the imperial army.
The elites of the imperial army that seem to be the advance unit were ordered to storm the holey mountainside.
It"s probably because the rebel army couldn"t maintain the 『Magic Barrier』 any longer due to the bombardment.

“Now that it has come to this, they might give priority to the contest for great achievements.” (Ina)

“But they have to be on their guard, don"t they?” (Erwin)

Erw rebuts Ina"s remark.
As a matter of fact the advance guard came under fire from the breath-emitting devices that survived close to the mountainside.
However…

“They should be useless since Emersan is with them.” (Peter)

Peter won"t make such a mistake a second time either.
The discharged breath attacks were completely blocked by Emera who was standing at the head. The other magicians silenced the devices one after the other by launching spells at the locations from where the breath was originating.

“Earl-sama, we have to go as well.” (Burkhart)

“True, let"s go then?”

“I"m charging in!”

“Please don"t fall behind!”

At the same time as the imperial army"s vanguard started its attack on the underground fortress, we also charged in that direction.
The number of soldiers are only 1,000 led by Erw and Haruka, but since our destination is an underground fortress, it should be difficult to command a too big number of soldiers.

“Erwin, relax without stressing yourself too much.” (Philip)

“Nii-san and I will act in concert with the Mizuho army.” (Christoph)

Given that the speed will fall if we move with everyone, Philip and Christoph, who lead the remaining soldiers, were scheduled to move together with the Mizuho army.

“Start the charge!”

We leave the magic cannon that has no sh.e.l.ls left to be fired anymore to the Mizuho craftsmen and head out towards the deepest part of the fortress.

“Wend, are you possibly targeting Duke Nürnberg"s head?”

Luise asks something strange.

“I don"t need his head. I will gladly give it to anyone who wants it.” (Wendelin)

At this point in the civil war there"s no point in taking something like that and boasting of it as great military exploit. It will only trigger good-for-nothing envy. Rather than that, the destruction of the jamming device takes maximum priority right now.

“As there will be many contenders for it, it"s out of our reach anyway.” (Burkhart)

“If I remember correctly, even a normal soldier will become a n.o.ble as reward, right?”

“Yes. It"s said that they will be appointed to the rank of Viscount, albeit not a landed one. It"s something I frequently heard on the battlefield. Erw-san, let us go at it steadily.” (Haruka)

“Since I will be busy protecting Wend, don"t do anything unreasonable, Haruksan.” (Erwin)

Erw, Ina and Haruka apparently remembered Peter"s previous motivational speech to the officers and men of the imperial army. Since a big number of n.o.bles has died, it probably doesn"t hurt to give a peerage to the person who took Duke Nürnberg"s head.

“What a large-scaled underground base.”

Once I peeked through a hole in the mountainside, a pa.s.sage of the fortress was visible.
Since I don"t think that there had been any construction work done on it since the civil war broke out, the fortress utilizes the underground ruin after all.

“Wow, what a wide pa.s.sage.” (Luise)

Luise, who is searching for enemies while standing at the front since she"s a master of the Magic Combat Style, admired the vastness of the underground ruin.

“It probably was an army base to begin with.” (Burkhart)

It"s likely just as Burkhart-san deducted. If this place is the source of the various magic tools used by Duke Nürnberg so far, all of it makes sense.

“Dous.h.i.+, where are we going to find that device?”

“Considering it normally, I think it will be in the innermost part.” (Armstrong)

While moving, we observed all over battles between the imperial army that charged into the fortress and Duke Nürnberg"s feudal army which defended it. The sounds of weapons clas.h.i.+ng could be heard regularly.

“It"s the enemy army!”

“Sorry, time"s valuable.”

Once I invoke 『Area Stun』, all members of the enemy forces, who rushed in our direction, were paralyzed and stopped moving.

“Don"t bother finis.h.i.+ng them off! We are advancing further in!”

At any rate, since time was precious, we didn"t fuss over taking our revenge by killing the enemies. Erw strictly forbade attacks against the stunned enemies. We pa.s.s through the fortress while creating a large amount of paralyzed enemies.
Once we came this deep in, we couldn"t see our allies any longer nor could we hear any battle sounds.

“It"s quiet here, isn"t it?”

“That makes it all the more dangerous.”

Luise"s premonition came true. The lower we descended, the more suicide-bombing golems and breath-emitting devices were set up.

“The method to deal with them has been already established though.”

It would probably be difficult for normal soldiers to remove them, but for a magician they aren"t such difficult opponents.
The suicide-bombing golems will explode once they receive an impact above a certain, fixed level.

“Earl Baumeister, here are the necessary materials!” (Armstrong)

Dous.h.i.+ creates a great amount of rock lumps by hitting the wall of the underground ruin. I throw those at the approaching, suicide-bombing golems.
Once they hit, the golems explode and we block the fragments with our 『Magic Barriers』. And that"s all.

“Ina, Wilma.”

“Leave it to us.” (Ina)

“I will shoot!” (Wilma)

It"s the same for the breath-emitting devices. Since only the breath-spitting part has been deployed, the device itself can"t move.
Ina throws her spears from a distance. Wilma snipes. With me strengthening their attacks with 『Boost』, the devices were destroyed easily.
Given that they don"t have any function except spitting breath installed, the devices aren"t as st.u.r.dy as the dragon golems.

“However, we are reasonably far in and still haven"t arrived at our destination.”

We stormed in aiming for that jamming device, but we can"t get to it despite being fairly deep inside.
Since it"s necessary for Peter and his forces to finely comb through the fortress, they seem to be fighting a hard battle at a floor that"s far higher than the one where we are.
On the way we found residential areas, where the soldiers and their families are obviously living, under construction.
Because we don"t have the time to explore all of them, we ignore those and descend to the floor below.

“There"s only machinery! It looks like Duke Nürnberg doesn"t trust people!” (Armstrong)

After a certain floor, there were only suicide-bombing golems and breath-emitting devices set up.
As we advance while destroying those, we ran into an obviously suspicious, huge door. A big number of breath-emitting devices has been placed in front of it. Just before I can destroy them with magic from a distance, Dous.h.i.+ draws closer to them while deploying a 『Magic Barrier』 around himself, and destroys all of them with kicks and punches.
When he was drawing near, Dous.h.i.+ was. .h.i.t by breath attacks of all attributes, but all of it was repelled by his 『Magic Barrier』 .

“Complete destruction with one blow! Doing it little-by-little is troublesome!” (Armstrong)

Nothing but the wreckage of the devices remains in front of the door.

“Now then, this is the innermost room!” (Armstrong)

Once Dous.h.i.+ opened the huge door by himself, Duke Nürnberg and a weird middle-aged man wearing a white tuxedo waited for us there.

“A chief retainer of Duke Nürnberg? Doesn"t look like it…” (Wendelin)

“Earl-sama, look at the ears of that guy.” (Burkhart)

Being told so by Burkhart-san, I look at the ears of that man and discover that they were actually pointed.
He doesn"t look like an elf. Then again, even in my former world elves and dwarves were fictional  races.
They don"t exist in reality.

“Demon…”

Burkhart-san concisely taught me the correct answer. His appearance isn"t all that different from humans. As special trait, his ears are pointed. After the collapse of the Ancient Magic Civilization there haven"t been any precedents of them being sighted, but demons are said to definitely exist.
The actual proof for the demons" existence was helping Duke Nürnberg.

“Now I get it! You borrowed the help of demons to get your hands on the mysterious jamming device and many other legacies from the era of the Ancient Magic Civilization!” (Armstrong)

For a change Dous.h.i.+ had a fit of anger towards Duke Nürnberg.
That"s because the situation couldn"t be simply excused as mere rebellion of Duke Nürnberg.
After all Duke Nürnberg, who said that he was aiming for a hegemony of the continent, proved the fact that he actually had connections to the Demon Country.
In the worst case it was a plan of the demons to divide the humans and suspicions whether Duke Nürnberg has deliberately caused damage to the Empire would emerge.

“Is there anything wrong about that?” (Nürnberg)

“You b.a.s.t.a.r.d!”

“No matter what I use, it will be fine as long as I win in the end. Winning will justify all past actions. Isn"t this the truth of this world?” (Nürnberg)

“Wh-!”

Dous.h.i.+ becomes speechless due to Duke Nürnberg"s reb.u.t.tal.

“However, you did it, Earl Baumeister, didn"t you?” (Nürnberg)

“…”

At this point there"s no need to explain as to what it is I did.
It"s because I did nothing but being a hindrance to Duke Nürnberg.

“I merely moved for my own sake. If I win, the just Earl Baumeister will bring peace to the world by defeating the evil Duke Nürnberg. And it will be a happy end for everyone. Or am I wrong?” (Wendelin)

“Don"t spout such bulls.h.i.+t despite being nothing more than a greenhorn. You keep thwarting all my plans.” (Nürnberg)

Currently more than 200,000 soldiers on both sides are engaging in mortal combat inside this underground fortress.
No matter how elite the feudal army of the Duke Nürnberg household might be, they are in disorder due to the bombardment. It should be difficult for them to eliminate the imperial army that invaded in big numbers to attack the place.

“I guess in the end you are a person to be avoided by me, Earl Baumeister. It"s regrettable, but I have to kill you here.” (Nürnberg)

“What a very arrogant att.i.tude. I don"t remember having become your retainer and thus I have no obligation to be killed by you.” (Wendelin)

I have heard from Therese that he"s a sword master, but in that case it will be fine if I defeat him with magic.
I began to prepare the spell 『Blaze』 in order to reduce him to ash, but right after the spell finished forming, the fire vanished completely.

“Did you cancel it?” (Wendelin)

“You are correct. The forte of this esteemed me, who is a demon, as magic system is 『Darkness』. The strong point of 『Darkness』 lies in its special characteristics the other magic systems do not possess.”

The demon, whose vocal tone resembles that of Dous.h.i.+ 1, apparently cancelled my spell with a darkness spell in an instant.

Translator"s Notes: