Water Magician-Chapter 648 : Lost Ones
Chapter 0648 Lost Ones
Translator: Jay_Forestieri
Editor: Tseirp
Ryo and Abel hurried north at a brisk pace, following the map ‘provided’ by Captain Sonjang.
“That captain earlier—I felt kind of sorry for him.”
“Huh?”
“He looked like he was about to break under your questioning, Abel.”
“Did he now?”
Ryo shook his head slightly and sighed; Abel tilted his head in curiosity.
At first, when he’d seen his comrade frozen in ice, it may have seemed that way, but afterward he had answered resolutely.
He’d seemed determined to do his best to save his companion.
“All of this is because you suddenly froze his partner, right, Ryo?”
“I—I had no choice! <Ice Coffin> worked when I tried it!”
Ryo answered in a fluster.
They both knew that if Ryo’s water completely covered someone with the <Squall> and then he used <Ice Coffin>, it could freeze magicians and sorcerers solid.
But an ordinary <Ice Coffin> by itself couldn’t freeze magicians or sorcerers.
That’s why he hadn’t expected it to work this time either.
The target was a phantomkin, after all.
Half an experiment. 𝙛𝓻𝒆𝒆𝒘𝙚𝓫𝙣𝙤𝒗𝙚𝓵.𝙘𝙤𝙢
And yet it succeeded in freezing her…
“What the hell are phantomkins, really…”
“Yeah. They’re different from the non-human things we’ve faced so far.”
“Totally…”
“The first two… no, should I say the two bodies? When we tried to knock them out, they just vanished.”
“That’s right! Those ‘Vessels’—they were really fragile… But if the captain and his deputy were leading them, then used properly, they must have an effect against humans, right?”
“If given orders, wouldn’t they be able to use spells?”
Abel was recalling a little of the information he’d extracted from General Yun’s head.
“Huh? That was written down somewhere?”
“I think so.”
Saying that, Abel immediately began flipping through the papers.
While still walking briskly.
“See? It’s written here.”
“You’re handy, Abel…”
“Am I?”
Abel pointed out the relevant passage, and Ryo praised Abel’s dexterity.
Ryo’s magic carved a small swath through the forest as the two of them pressed almost in a straight line through the trees.
Yes—even though they had the map Sonjang had given them, they favored the straight path because it was faster…
Of course, they were using the map as a reference.
It showed the Choouchi Empire’s capital, the Peiyu border, and a portion of northern Peiyu—a wonderful thing for two people who had no knowledge of the area.
But if you go in a straight line…
Thirty-six hours later the two of them came out atop a cliff overlooking the road below.
“Down there on the road—isn’t that some kind of checkpoint?”
“Where are we?”
Both Ryo and Abel had apparently arrived somewhere they hadn’t expected…
They checked the map again.
There should have been no checkpoint near where they were supposed to emerge.
“Ah! There it is!”
Ryo found it on the map.
“Isn’t that pretty far off?”
Abel tilted his head.
The checkpoint mark was a fair distance from the place they were supposed to have passed through.
If that was it…
If they were to head for the imperial capital from there…
“We’d have to pass right through the place the captain said the Choouchi Empire’s main force is camped.”
“That’d be trouble.”
Abel frowned as Ryo’s finger traced the map.
Indeed, that finger crossed right over the spot Sonjang had marked with an X and told them, “The main force is here”.
“Better to avoid it, right?”
“I’d avoid it, but I won’t stop you, Abel. If you want to charge in, take care to defeat that Phantom King or whatever’s there.”
“Thanks—but no thanks.”
Both agreed: although it might be a bit longer, they would skirt the Choouchi Empire’s main force and head for the capital.
Another thirty hours passed.
“There are a lot of phantomkins.”
“How did things get like this…”
They had managed to arrive near the Choouchi Empire’s main force.
Strictly speaking, Ryo’s <Passive Sonar> showed they were about four hundred meters away…
“Abel, we didn’t come here to fight a war.”
“Right. We came to rescue the Emperor.”
They reaffirmed their objective.
It mattered.
If they made a mistake here, even a plan that had been going well could fall apart.
They didn’t want a fight.
But battles aren’t decided by one side alone.
Clang clang clang, clang clang clang…
A bell sounded suddenly.
“Enemy attack!”
Voices rose from all around the Empire’s main force.
“We’ve been spotted?”
“We were found out?”
The two of them immediately went to alert posture.
According to Ryo’s <Passive Sonar>…
“From the west… a mounted unit is coming. Oh, and from the south too…”
“Horses? This is a forest.”
“But the readings indicate cavalry.”
Generally, charging through a forest on horseback is nearly impossible.
Even walking through it would be difficult for the unaccustomed.
And yet…
“They’re moving pretty fast.”
Ryo marveled as he observed with the sonar.
How could they dash through the forest at that speed on horseback?
“We can’t get caught up in this.”
“We shouldn’t get in the way of those attackers.”
“Let’s sneak through the side.”
“Agreed.”
It was indeed a band of horsemen that attacked the Choouchi Empire’s main force.
They tore through the forest as one with their mounts and struck the imperial troops with a single blow.
“Shaah!”
With a shout, the attackers fell upon the imperial soldiers—it was the Peiyu forces.
“Get everyone inside the fences, quickly!”
Orders flew from within the imperial ranks.
The imperial main force was surrounded by fairly sturdy wooden palisades.
With those, they thought they could withstand a cavalry charge.
But many of the imperial soldiers were not inside the palisades.
They hadn’t expected an attack inside the forest.
They certainly hadn’t expected mere humans to be able to defeat the overwhelmingly powerful phantomkins…
It was clear complacency.
And at the same time, it was the kind of deep-seated confidence that never disappears.
Even if the enemy took the initiative with an unexpected tactic, they believed their own strength would see them through.
Because of that, the imperial troops were initially thrown into confusion, but they quickly moved behind the palisades and prepared to repel the attack.
If they had wooden fences, they thought they’d be fine.
If the palisades could stop the cavalry’s charge and strip away the force of the blow… then the Vessels’ spells would take care of the rest!
That confidence wasn’t entirely unfounded.
But in that place, there was a magician whom the imperial soldiers did not know about.
A water-attribute magician who had been sneaking around with his swordsman partner, watching the situation.
The instant he chanted in his heart…
(<Water Jet 256>)
The wooden fences all fell at once.
“Huh?”
It must have been an incredible sight.
If anyone had been careful enough to look, they might have noticed the posts were cleanly cut near the base… but no one had that luxury.
The palisades’ collapse surprised the Peiyu forces as well.
They had been unsure what to do if the palisades stopped their charge, and then suddenly the fences fell.
“Charge!”
The commander shouted almost reflexively.
“Wooo!”
The troops charged on with pure reflex.
The battle between foot phantomkins and the mounted Peiyu forces became a chaotic melee.
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