Published: January 12, 2026
"...What? A fortress city? Don't be ridiculous. No matter how you look at it, it shouldn’t have been constructed yet."
Saying that, the scout furrowed his brows and nodded.
"It doesn’t seem to be on the scale of Scudet, but it is indeed a fortress city... There were supposed to be two villages here. Shall we check out the other village’s location?"
"Fool! We came here to conquer Scudet! We can't change our target now!"
"Yes! My apologies!"
Shouting, the officer knight who had received the scout’s report knelt down and apologized. Looking down at him, I clicked my tongue.
"Tch... I heard construction on the fortress city had begun, but to think it’s already finished...?"
I, Unimog Yelinetta, the eighth prince of the Yelinetta Kingdom, personally led this mission, yet what has our intelligence unit been doing?
"Damn it, everyone is underestimating me..."
Biting my right thumb’s nail, I muttered my grievances.
I am already thirty-two years old, yet the orders I receive are only to suppress frontier villages, not important enemy bases.
Though part of the plan, my brothers all have better roles and positions than I do, making it impossible to accept.
His Majesty is aged, and the king’s succession must be near. Yet, I am not even given an opportunity. Grinding my teeth inwardly, I looked around at everyone and spoke.
"...It’s clearly impossible to build a new fortress city in such a short time. Then they must have focused on building walls to give the appearance of a fortress city. We will advance and occupy the enemy land as is."
"Wait! Even if it’s just an appearance, having walls built will make the conquest difficult! We only have three hundred men! For an assault on a base, that number is..."
The knight who had bowed in front of me raised his head to voice his objection. Silently, I lowered my chin and kicked the knight’s head. Pathetically, the knight groaned, nose bleeding.
"How rude. Were you even listening? Those walls are just for show. We must strike before it fully functions as a fortress city. Don’t you understand that?"
"Y-yes... understood..."
Watching the knight bow while covering his nose, I let out a deep breath and raised my head.
"What about the aerial reconnaissance?"
"There were no people in the nearby village. It seems they evacuated to the fortress city further in."
"So that town with the walls is the target village. But Scudet is quite far from here. To evacuate..."
"That’s what it must be. From the reports from the Wyvern, it seems the fortress city is located behind the village..."
Interrupting my words, one of the knights started spinning his own theory. Annoyed by his disrespect, I clicked my tongue in response and spoke.
"Fools. Look at those walls. It must have taken at least a year or two to build. Even if they mobilized people foolishly to shorten the period, it should have still taken half a year. Besides, what’s the point of building another town so close? Answer me."
"...No, there isn’t any."
I admonished the idiots who couldn’t think for themselves, and the knight bowed deeply.
Originally, the aerial reconnaissance report was one-sided and only gave a rough outline.
That’s because of the situation in the air. The puppeteer magicians riding the Wyverns risk losing control and being thrown off if they let their guard down. Hence, they must constantly flow mana above a certain level, making it impossible to give detailed reports.
Moreover, when controlling living creatures, issuing commands against their instincts consumes a lot of mana. In other words, commanding the Wyvern to charge the walls violently for a break-in is difficult.
Even so, these are supposedly some of the kingdom’s top puppeteer magicians, which is useless. It’s unacceptable for commanders to be confused by such fragmented information from those incompetent magicians. The true commander must judge multiple pieces of information, select the best, and always execute optimal actions.
Thinking all this through, I sighed and shook my head.