How to Live as a Wandering Knight

“That b*stard is heading towards Pelheim Castle!”

As Johan rode off on his horse shouting, the elf king also got on his horse without delay and shouted.

“He’s heading towards Pelheim Castle. Chase him!”

“Achladda, Euclyia, go ahead and evacuate the people!”

“. . .Huh?”

The elf king was confused by Johan’s words and looked at Johan. It was really an unexpected thing to say.

“Why do you say that?”

“Oh, no reason.”

‘𝘛𝘩𝘦 𝘤𝘰𝘶𝘯𝘵 𝘪𝘴 𝘯𝘪𝘤𝘦, 𝘣𝘶𝘵 𝘩𝘦’𝘴 𝘵𝘰𝘰 𝘪𝘯𝘧𝘭𝘶𝘦𝘯𝘤𝘦𝘥 𝘣𝘺 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘱𝘳𝘪𝘦𝘴𝘵𝘴.’

If he were the elf king, he wouldn’t have bothered evacuating the merchants and travelers in front of the castle. Not because he had any grudges or hostility towards them.

It was just that there was no reason to do so.

Above all, there was no reason to waste the knights’ strength on such tasks. That was something for monks to do.

However, if he acknowledged the opponent as a knight, he had to respect even the opponent’s foolish actions. The elf king swallowed his words to himself.

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“I will kill it if it doesn’t die out!”

“Ahhhhh!”

While the death knight was a horror that could appear in stories, the centaurs were a realistic horror. The nomadic warriors that would only appear in the east showing up here surprised the merchants and made them run away.

“Get out from the gate! The undead are coming!”

“Whip those who don’t leave!”

The guards on the walls were confused by the sudden attack but did not dare come out and lowered their heads. They were afraid of getting hit by the centaur’s arrows.

“Ugh!”

The merchant who fell while running away shivered in fear. Now that his legs were tied the scary half-man half-horse creatures will butcher him.

𝐓𝐡𝐰𝐚𝐜𝐤!

The merchant closed his eyes shut. Someone grabbed him by his neck and lifted him up with force. Surprisingly, it was the centaur.

“Did I tell you to smash your head into the ground? Did you break your leg?!”

“Y-Yes? Yes?”

“Run! You dumb idiot wandering around without your mind! Run!”

“Y-Yes!”

The centaurs skillfully herded the people to make space like they were herding horses and sheep.

The people who scattered to the sides and the guards on the walls soon realized why the centaurs tried the clumsy attack.

It was because the death knight was standing in front of the Dogye bridge oozing cold air.

It approached so quietly, so silently that at first people thought the death knight was just another traveler. However, the people who met its eyes instinctively knew that it was a being that refused the natural order.

“S-Shoot! Shoot!”

The guards who did not attack to not provoke while the centaurs were charging took out their crossbows without listening to orders once the death knight approached.

“It’s useless. At least light a fire in front to buy some time!”

The Elf King shouted in a husky voice while running from afar. However, the guards did not listen to him and fired their crossbolts.

The death knight staggered back a few times before regaining its balance and charged towards the gate on top of the Dogye bridge.

Despite the absurdity of a solo charge towards the closed gate, the guards’ hearts turned cold.

“How can that thing breach the gate?”

“It turned into a specter and passed through the fortress’s wall before. There is no law saying it can’t do it a second time. . .”

Johan’s words did not even finish before the death knight disappeared. Then, screams erupted from behind the walls.

Seeing that, the Elf King nodded.

“Thanks to you the number of times it can turn into a specter has decreased.”

‘𝘛𝘩𝘢𝘵’𝘴 𝘷𝘦𝘳𝘺 𝘱𝘰𝘴𝘪𝘵𝘪𝘷𝘦.’

Johan thought to himself. Not everyone could think like that after seeing something like this.

“Let’s go! With the situation like this not even the castellan can refuse our help!”

Angoldolph actually thought it was good in a way. If he had forcefully broken into the gate with his army during normal times it would have been as good as a declaration of war, but it was an exception when monsters were raging.

If the valiant Count and the honorable King personally took care of the death knight, and if knights had arrived at the outer walls during that time, what arrogant noble would dare be rude?

“Open the gate!”

“Soldiers of Pelheim Castle! See who has come to defeat the death knight! Open the gate!”

The gate did not open. Johan belatedly realized that the guards must have fled. It was certain that no one was left near the gate at least.

Luckily the gate was small enough to lift with a pulley. With that form, it must have been opened once before already in the past.

“We got lucky.”

“. . .What do you mean count?! It seems like all the soldiers ran away?!”

Even the usually bold Elf King couldn’t help but be flustered by Johan’s words. However, that fluster soon changed into incredulity and shock.

𝐓𝐡𝐮𝐧𝐤━

The iron gate lifted up with a scraping noise. Johan’s soldiers rushed in and hurriedly pulled and fixed the pulley. It was skill from having done it more than just once or twice.

“It is done, Count!”

“Come inside!”

“Oh. . . I see. T-Thank you.”

The Elf King ran on top of the Dogye bridge with an enchanted expression. Unbeknownst to him, the people watching from behind also had shocked expressions as they buzzed among themselves.

So he caught ogres like that! No wonder he was able to capture them!

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Within the walls of Pelheim Castle, there was chaos.

The merchants who had laid out their wares inside the walls were screaming and running away, while the guards desperately called for their comrades as they tried to form ranks.

“When are the knights coming?!”

“Shut your mouth and pick up your spear!”

The soldiers had to hold out until the castellan’s knights arrived from the inner castle.

The death knight kept looking around. It seemed to be in confusion, as if not knowing who to kill first despite needing to clear the path.

“Get out of the way, pathetic ones!”

And then the Elf King arrived with the knights. The soldiers were so moved they shed tears of joy.

When they were outside the castle walls, they didn’t know what he might do so they were afraid, but meeting him in this situation, there were no more reassuring people.

“Let’s fight together, Count!”

At the Elf King’s earnest shout, Johan nodded in response. Angoldolph pointed his sword at the death knight and shouted.

“You coward! You are unworthy to be called a knight, pathetically avoiding a duel and running away!”

━𝐖𝐡𝐚𝐭 ■■■𝐝■𝐨𝐮 ■𝐚𝐲?

“Let’s see you try to run away this time too!”

The Elf King’s sword blow rained down on the death knight once more. At the same time, Johan’s crimson sword also slid towards the knight’s nape.

The fierce and powerful joint attack of the two young warriors forced the death knight to barely evade and defend. Over the course of dozens of exchanges, the death knight was pressed into defense.

‘𝘏𝘰𝘸𝘦𝘷𝘦𝘳. . .’

If this was a duel between knights, it would have been their overwhelming victory, but this was a fight against the undead.

No matter how much they pushed their opponent around and injured them, a single mistake could lead to a fatal wound for themselves.

In any case, the Elf King seemed to be really excited. With a reliable knight guarding his back as he faced the enemy, he had an expression of not knowing what to do with his joy.

Because of that excitement, Angoldolph took more liberties. After getting close to the death knight, he swiftly drew his silver dagger like lightning and stabbed between the armor plates.

━■■■𝐡!!!

The silver that penetrated inside the armor certainly had an effect. However, that attack rather provoked the death knight.

As the death knight roared and slammed its sword into the ground, the strange energy that spread from it turned chilly. That chill instantly changed into cold that swept the surroundings.

“!!”

The Elf King was horrified. Looks of pain mixed with distress rose on the faces of the knights who followed behind. It was because they each received a share of the peculiar energy released by the death knight.

Although the harsh, merciless cold made the footsteps of the knights in place slow, Johan gritted his teeth and approached.

The hot energy rising from his heart repelled the cold wrapped around the outside. Teshuka shouted for Johan to put down the sword he was holding. Leaving his frozen sword, he approached with bare hands. As he did so, the cold did not dare approach and fled.

‘𝘞𝘩𝘢𝘵 𝘪𝘴 𝘩𝘦 𝘵𝘳𝘺𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘵𝘰 𝘥𝘰!’

With his feet bound in place, Angoldolph stared at the young Count. It was amazing how he moved within this cold, but he couldn’t even guess how he would defeat that guy without his sword.

𝐓𝐡𝐮𝐝!

Johan took the most straightforward method. Grabbing the death knight with both hands and strangling its neck. Even the death knight seemed quite dumbfounded, its eye sockets trembling.

As Teshuka tore apart and repelled the death energy trying to penetrate inside, Johan’s grip grew increasingly vicious, choking off the death knight’s breath.

Though no one else present heard it, Johan definitely heard it. The sound of its neckbone cracking and breaking.

𝐁𝐢𝐧𝐠𝐨!

With that sound, the aura emitted by the death knight disappeared, and the cold vanished instantly. All that remained were the shabby and battered armor and traces left by the death knight as it rampaged around.

As the fight ended, the Elf King shed tears. Seeing the elf cry, Johan clenched and released his fist, taken aback.

‘𝘏𝘢𝘴 𝘩𝘦 𝘨𝘰𝘯𝘦 𝘤𝘳𝘢𝘻𝘺?’

He desperately wished that the Elf King wasn’t crying because Johan had finished off the death knight. Thankfully that wasn’t the case. These were tears of excitement.

“That was. . .a really amazing fight, Count.”

“I couldn’t have captured it without Your Majesty’s help.”

“Is that really true?”

The Elf King was overjoyed at Johan’s words, like a little child. While he wouldn’t be this happy with a typical compliment, words from the Count who fought alongside him carried special meaning.

“There’s a beautiful forest in my homeland, Count.”

As he sheathed his sword, Angoldolph spoke up. Johan wondered what he was talking about.

“In that forest lives a very old monster. I’ve tried to defeat it before, but I won’t recklessly fight it alone. I’ll wait until the Count comes to join me.”

“Oh no. . .”

Johan was dumbfounded by the Elf King’s sudden invitation to hunt some monster he’d never heard of.

The Elf King spoke as if he was tempting Johan with hidden treasure, but Johan wasn’t thrilled at all.

“I’ll. . .think about it.”

“Of course! I knew you’d accept! The Count is nothing like that schemer Abner!”

‘𝘏𝘢𝘴 𝘩𝘦 𝘨𝘰𝘯𝘦 𝘥𝘦𝘢𝘧?’

🔸🔸🔸🔸🔸🔸

Angoldolph and Ulrike despised each other, but they agreed in this situation.

Since they had already opened the outer castle gate and entered, they decided to pressure the castellan to come out.

It was rude to enter someone else’s fiefdom and make demands, but they had a valid argument after defeating a death knight-level monster inside the castle.

The knights who entered took positions in front of the inner castle gate and controlled the surroundings. The remaining soldiers didn’t make a peep and obediently followed along. They didn’t want to lose their lives to the elf knights after barely surviving against the death knight.

“Shout louder.”

“Yes.”

Some soldiers with good voices stepped forward. They shouted in succession.

“The honorable knights fought against the wicked undead, yet the castellan still refuses to show his face?! How shameless!!”

“If this continues, they will mock the honor of this castle!”

They weren’t shouting for the castellan to hear. They wanted the other people inside the castle to hear.

As a feudal lord, face was more important than anything. No one trusted a cowardly feudal lord who broke promises. Even though they had already entered and defeated the death knight, if the lord continued to not come out, those inside would also distrust him.

Sure enough, it had an effect. A steward came out from the castle. The steward spoke carefully.

“The castellan said he will greet the guests.”

“Finally! He should have done that sooner!”

The elf king shouted harshly. His blood was still hot from the earlier battle with the death knight. Ulrike didn’t stop Angoldolph’s words either. She agreed.

“However, there is one condition.”

“What is it? Don’t even think about unreasonable conditions. If you tell us to disarm, I’ll break your neck like we broke the death knight.”

“Um. . .?”

At the elf king’s words, Ulrike tilted her head.

What is he saying?

“Ah, no. Of course you may enter armed. It’s just. . . he wants to meet Count Yeats first.”

“!”

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