Chapter 245: 130. Feudal Lord Jenald -1 (Part One)

Translated by: A Passing Wanderer

Edited by: RED

**

‘It really is His Highness.’ Charlotte smiled faintly after seeing Allen’s face.

The rich emotions waking up deep inside her chest made her body react on its own. But before she could get up and approach him, someone grasped out in stupefaction first.

“Y-Your Highness? The Seventh Imperial Prince?”

Charlotte turned her head towards the source of the voice.

It belonged to her adoptive father, Gril, who was currently standing near the fortress gate.

However, his seemingly small muttering caused an avalanche of shock.

“It’s Lord Saint! The real Lord Saint has shown up!”

After one person cried out, everyone’s attention instantly focused on Allen.

“L-Lord Saint?!”

From the common convicts to the regular soldiers, even the newbie convicts who had arrived in the northern region not too long ago, they were now all staring at the Seventh Imperial Prince!

Allen flinched in surprise and quickly looked around.

Everyone in Ronia was now staring at him with gazes filled to the brim with awe and respect, but that only caused a flustered expression to form on Allen’s face.

It was kind of unsurprising, really, considering that complete strangers began crying out, “Lord Saint!” while looking at him, even though no one had prompted them to do so.

There should be something else even more fluster-inducing for him right now as well.

‘…Most of those who received His Highness’s healing can now wield divinity.’

The Seventh Imperial Prince had asked Charlotte a favour: investigating the ongoings in the northern fiefdom, Ronia.

It had turned out that the investigation itself wasn’t difficult at all.

That was because the top commander of the northern frontier tasked with managing this hostile land, Count Jenald Ripang, had already concluded the investigation!

He didn’t hold back and every bit of data collected was made available to Charlotte. After she had a look at the intel, though, she ended up getting greatly shocked.

Around eight hundred men had awakened an ability to wield divinity!

The Seventh Imperial Prince should be feeling quite confused after reading her follow-up report, and flustered after personally witnessing this sight with his own two eyes.

The fact still remained that this was another of the miracles His Highness had performed so far. As such, she needed to be more on guard than ever before!

Charlotte tightly gripped her sword and glared at the feudal lord of Ronia, Jenald Ripang, who was currently staring at, and walking over to, Seventh Imperial Prince Allen.

Despite the emergence of all the ‘divinity awakened’ present in his fiefdom, he had hid this fact from the rest of the empire. That meant he must’ve been cooking up a scheme of his own!

In order to guard Allen, Charlotte quickly made her way over to him.

**

(TL: In 1st person POV.)

The unified roars of the convicts were ringing out loudly.

Every single one of them was chanting out my name and calling me the ‘Lord Saint’, but too bad for them, I couldn’t even recognise most of them and I certainly had no inclination to care about this Saint business or whatever you wanted to call it.

I turned my head to look at Harman, who was still up on the outer wall. He bowed his head slightly in greeting.

Okay, so. Where is my older brother, then…?

I couldn’t spot Ruppel nearby.

I had entrusted Ruppel to Harman, but as the situation right now was critical, he probably had no time to mind my brother’s well-being right now.

Besides, I never gave him a direct order to keep his eyes on Ruppel, anyway. He was probably leaving Ruppel to his own devices, like how he largely left me alone back then.

My Bone Wyvern landed near the outer wall, allowing Alice and Hans to dismount.

“Is anyone injured?” Alice asked Harman, and he guided both her and Hans over to where the injured had been gathered.

In the meantime, Lord Jenald was quickly walking up to me.

The lord placed his hand on his chest, bowed his head, and offered a simple greeting, “It’s been a while, Your Highness.”

His greeting was quite short, probably due to the urgency of the current situation.

It was also around that time that Charlotte reached my side as well. Her alert eyes were locked on Lord Jenald while she assumed her duty to provide me with protection.

She must’ve been suspecting Jenald as well…

“Yes, it’s been a while,” I lightly greeted him back, and put my helm back on before slinging the musket over my shoulder. “However, right now doesn’t seem to be a good time for a relaxed catching-up, wouldn’t you agree?”

More undead were stepping over the rapidly-disintegrating corpses of their fellows strewn around the open gateway, slowly marching on our position.

Even at a quick headcount, there must’ve been well over four thousand of them here! Since the fortress gate had been breached, we probably would have to wage a frontal battle from now on.

Lord Jenald shouted at the convicts while nodding sagely for some reason. “What are you all doing? Barricade the gate, now!”

His loud call jolted the convicts awake, and they hurriedly got moving once more. Wielding large shields, they rushed forward to block the open gateway. Swords were swung and spears were thrust forward in between the gaps of the shields to stop the advancing undead, while a new barricade was haphazardly but quickly being put together behind them.

“Lord Saint has come!”

“We don’t have anything to fear now!”

“Psyche yourselves up properly! We can’t afford to show him something unsightly now!”

The convicts roared out even louder. Their fighting spirit was clearly overflowing now.

That was a complete turn-around compared to their past selves, who grew pale with fright and wet their pants the moment some undead showed up.

They had been polishing up their skills through actual combat situations. Although faint, I could sense divinity coming from them as well.

They were all basically ‘young hatchlings’ who had become ‘Priests’ not too long ago.

Sure, I read Charlotte’s report before coming here, but to think that so many could really use divinity to this extent…

-Man, I can’t tell whether or not it’d be possible to even control all these people…-

“Your Highness, I heard that you can control the undead,” said Jenald.

I shifted my gaze away from the fortress gate and looked back at him. He was currently staring dazedly at the Bone Wyvern now perched up on the outer wall.

“You never saw me Summoning them before?”

“I did get some brief glimpses, but never an opportunity to get a concrete confirmation, sir.”

The middle-aged uncle who was frightened by the appearance of the undead was now smiling brightly back at me with a blood-stained face.

“…Count Jenald Ripang.”

“I’m honoured that you remembered my name, Your Highness.”

I glared at him. “I’ve been hearing that those who have recently awakened their ability to wield divinity exist here.”

“…”

“I will ask you about your reason for not reporting their existence to the Theocratic Empire later on.”

Count Jenald bowed his head while breaking out in cold sweat. “Yes, milord. Of course!”

After getting his reply, I turned around to get ready for the undead subjugation. It was then that his voice reached me one more time from somewhere behind.

“All of that was for your sake, Your Highness.”

I turned my head back to him, but by then he had already dashed off to elsewhere.

I couldn’t help but think about his rather meaning-laden declaration, but then a familiar voice woke me back up. “Your Highness.”

It was from Charlotte, standing tall behind me.

All I could do after seeing her in that pure-white heavy armour was grin wryly. “You know, I sent you on a vacation so that you could get your much-deserved break, but in the end, you are still working overtime like this. Did you get to catch up with Gril, at least?”

My question prompted a troubled look to float up on her face. She then silently pointed at the fortress gate for some reason.

“Just who am I?!”

At the location her finger was pointing right now was a middle-aged man busy roaring at the top of his lungs.

The convicts around him shouted out in unison, “Gril! Gril! Gril!”

“That’s right! I’m the Paladin with a daughter who is also the head of a Marquis House!”

In his right hand was a huge double-bitted axe, while his left held a sturdy shield. He clanged the axe and the shield together while standing before the incoming horde of zombies.

“Yes, I’m Gril Heraiz!”

Convicts blocking the zombies with the shields began withdrawing. When the undead rushed in at the same time, Gril sucked in a deep breath.

The shaft of the axe gripped in his hand made leather-creaking noises. He must’ve been tightening his grip even more on the weapon.

And then…

“Uaaaaaak!”

He let out a loud spirited yell and swung his axe. The huge blade flew around, tearing the limbs of the incoming zombies apart.

Supporting him from behind, spears were thrust forward to stab and shove back the zombie hordes.

“…Huh. That’s really Gril?” It was like I was staring at a rampaging Viking or something.

With a lost expression on her face, she facepalmed, “Y-yes, Your Highness.”

Judging from how she stuttered slightly like that, she must’ve been feeling quite flustered as well.

I recalled Gril’s words. When I thought about him… -Hey, didn’t I use quite a bit of divinity on the guy?-

I did a Blessing on him, and even made him drink my holy water. Back in his house, the combat manuals of the Imperial Family that I gave to Charlotte should still be there.

At this rate, quite literally, I had indeed created a trainee Paladin!