I Became the Commander in a Trash Game Who Copies Skills-Chapter 103 : Chapter 103

Chapter 103. Attack from the Underground (7)
Al Tener's Holy Water.
As the name suggests, it is holy water made by Al Tener, a saint of the Luark Church who was active a hundred years ago.
Holy water itself is a precious item that not just anyone can make, but holy water made by a saint is so valuable that it's difficult to even put a price on it.
Although I have no way of knowing why such a precious object was buried under the floor of a tomb or a prayer room.
Anyway, I personally had about eight bottles of this precious holy water.
It's a kind of hidden piece that can only be obtained in large cities.
Three bottles from Gunterburk.
Five bottles from Berenburg.
I collected a total of eight bottles and was saving them as they were an essential component for the [Consecrated Cannon] tech tree, but since this was an important battle, I decided to use one.
For reference, there's a legend that for every bottle of this, Saint Al Tener himself fasted and prayed for a week.
Whether it's true or just a 'rumor', the effectiveness itself lends credibility to that claim.
[The hero receives the [Overflowing Vitality] effect.]
If this were a game, a notification window like this would have appeared.
[All injuries and illnesses are cured.]
[Stamina, Mana, and Divine Power are fully restored.]
[All status ailments are removed.]
A window like this would have followed.
My head clears as if I've woken up from a deep sleep.
The muscles in my overworked limbs, which had lost their power, regained their strength.
The true value of Al Tener's Holy Water is that it completely removes injuries, fatigue, and waste products from inside and outside the body, filling the entire body with fresh vitality.
In addition, this holy water also has a hidden effect.
To be precise, it's more of a side effect than a hidden effect.
In the lore, vitality is a kind of life force, so the [Overflowing Vitality] effect is said to forcibly grant pure life force to undead when it touches them, melting them away.
[Consecrated Cannon] is a technology that applies that side effect to cannonballs.
For reference, the Lumer Legion is undead.
- Grrr….
The Legion Commander groaned, clutching his severed arm.
The severed surface of his arm was slowly corroding.
That statue, which is no different from a lump of rock, may have a body of stone, but it can be said to be an undead imbued with the soul of a dead person through necromancy.
In other words, my sword, coated with Al Tener's Holy Water, is no different from a poisoned sword to him.
A deadly poison that melts away skin, muscles, and even bones just by touching it.
[[Holy Aura] is deployed.]
There's no need to drag this out.
While he was faltering, I formed an aura on my sword and leaped.
[[Wind Spirit's Aid] is deployed.]
[[Tuivat High Priest's Swift Sword] is deployed.]
The aura, twice as large as usual with the help of the holy water, struck the statue's hard shoulder.
However, the result was unexpected.
Clang!
“……!”
My sword struck the innocent floor.
He had quickly moved back to dodge it.
With an agile movement unbefitting of that huge body.
- Hoo. Hoo…….
He was staring at me with cautious eyes from a distance.
Is he planning to give up on counterattacking and avoid contact with me altogether?
Not good.
If that giant decides to avoid me, I have no means of catching up.
The difference in our stride is on a different level, just like the difference in our builds.
[[Tuivat High Priest's Swift Sword] is deployed.]
I moved again in a surprise attack.
I slid about ten meters in a single bound and swung my sword.
Slice-
He dodged it again.
By a hair's breadth.
This is really not good.
If I drag this out, I'll be the one at a disadvantage.
The effect of the holy water doesn't last forever.
It also has its own cooldown, so drinking two bottles in a row won't produce the same effect as the first.
“Lumer! Haku!”
To make matters worse, a few legionnaires began to approach me.
They were the ones who had broken away from Randal's side.
Swoosh-!
The tip of a spear lunging at me.
I swing my sword to parry it.
The moment I try to counterattack, another one from the left thrusts his spear.
I blocked it with a shield spell and swung my sword to keep the one approaching from the right in check.
Swish-
The legionnaire in front, who had somehow regained his posture, thrusts his spear again.
I bent my head to dodge it.
The tip of the spear grazed just above my shoulder.
That was close.
There must have been some luck involved.
I quickly moved back to create some distance.
Instead of pursuing me, they formed a loose encirclement, blocking the space between me and the Legion Commander.
“…….”
Right.
There's a reason they once conquered the continent.
Even a mere legionnaire with a rotten body is an elite soldier skilled not only in century-level tactics but also in small-unit coordinated attacks.
What should I do?
I don't like the option of a forced breakthrough.
However, it seems to be an unavoidable situation.
The moment I was about to break through the encirclement, prepared for injury, the Legion Commander's necklace emitted a purple glow.
Kugugugu….
A huge shadow rose next to him.
The third statue.
The power of the Sacred Relic.
This is bad.
Can he really create more than one duplicate at a time?
As soon as the question arose, the newly created statue stretched its two arms towards me.
Beam barrage.
I have to roll.
At that moment, an axe flew in from behind me.
CRACK!
The axe, which hit right between the eyes.
The one whose neck was snapped back fell backward.
It's Randal.
I glanced back and saw him with his sword stuck in the chest of a centurion, reaching out his hand towards me in an unstable posture.
“Lumer! Haku!”
Not missing the opening, the legionnaires thrust their spears at him.
Wounds appeared here and there on his rock-like body.
The man, who was enduring by using the body of one legionnaire as a shield, soon snatched the legionnaire's spear, then held the sword and spear respectively and began to move freely among the legionnaires.
He didn't say anything to me.
We didn't even make eye contact due to the urgent situation.
‘The Viscount has skill. A tremendous amount of it.’
And yet, for some reason.
Why do I recall what he said at this timing?
‘But he lacks desperation. That's the same as having no talent.’
Randal's back, as he rampages through the middle of the enemy formation, catches my eye.
He is bleeding from wounds all over his body.
But he does not retreat.
I know his past.
He is like a wounded beast.
Behind the facade of a warrior mad for battle, the core of a man who lost his entire family and vowed atonement is hidden.
For some reason, another person came to mind.
A similar person.
Battalion Commander Damas, who lost half of his mercenary band.
Having already lost his subordinates once, he continues to push himself to not repeat the same past.
‘He is on the less skilled side. But he has desperation.’
In a way, it would be closer to a desperate struggle to overcome a nightmare.
I reflect on it.
The moments that appeared in my nightmare.
Since falling into this land, a new repertoire has been added to my nightmare.
A battlefield where swords and spears clash.
Comrades falling, covered in blood.
In Burken, in Wolfskrig, in Gunterburk and Berenburg, in the wilderness and villages, in cities and forests.
I have lost my people countless times in various settings.
It was a repetition of things past, and a fear of misfortunes yet to come.
‘Think about it. How was it when you fought the Beastmen?’
I wanted to survive.
‘What did you feel when you deeply mastered the techniques of the Imperial soldiers?’
Therefore, I wanted to save them.
I deployed the cold logic that saving even one more person would increase my chances of survival.
But to save that one person, I put myself in danger instead.
It was a contradiction.
Far from logic.
I'm not sure which of the two is my true feeling.
But….
‘Let your chest, not your head, wield the sword.’
…Perhaps it's not that important.
[[Imperial Knight Swordsmanship] is deployed.]
I changed the way I held the sword.
Thrust-
Like a hunter chasing a wild beast, I thrust my sword as if curving into the legionnaire's flank.
Crunch!
I pierce and shatter his skull above his shield, then use my foot to knock his body off the shield.
The closing encirclement.
Two opponents.
I swung my aura-clad sword in a wide arc from left to right.
With a loud noise like forcing open an old can, the two legionnaires were split apart, shield and all.
[[Imperial Knight Swordsmanship] is deployed.]
I keep moving forward.
I chase the retreating Legion Commander.
Like an illusion, a memory flickers in my mind.
It's more history than memory.
The history of the sword, written with the blood of countless knights.
Part of it was the blood shed by the soldiers and civilians the knights could not protect.
The Empire was not such a powerful nation from the beginning.
Nor did the three great powers exist from the start.
The Empire was born from the convergence and divergence of large and small lordships.
Originally, the main enemy was other humans.
But at some point, a stronger enemy appeared.
Other races such as orcs, trolls, and ogres attacked humans.
Humans banded together to survive, but they were still weak.
They could not defeat monsters with the tactics and weapons meant for fighting people.
The winds of change blew.
Magic and aura, which had been considered heresy until then, came into the light.
The logic was simple.
In order to defeat beings that surpassed human strength, they had to break the limits of humanity.
[[Imperial Knight Swordsmanship] is deployed.]
Thrust-thrust-thrust…!
The retreating Legion Commander.
I catch up.
The early knights were closer to hunters.
Hunters who tracked giants, orcs, trolls, minotaurs, and the like, and exterminated them before they could harm villages or soldiers.
As the Empire expanded its territory and built sturdy castle walls, their role became defensive.
As cannons were placed on the castle walls and doctrines to annihilate enemies with powerful spells were established, the knights' tactics also changed with the times.
Nevertheless, the swordsmanship remembers its origins.
This is particularly evident in the doctrine of charging by flanking the enemy lines when a horse is lost.
Although not as explosive as [Tuivat High Priest's Swift Sword], its swift and steady mobility is hard to find in other swordsmanship styles.
This must be the preserved footsteps of the hunter who tracked his prey.
My prey is a giant stone statue.
The distance between us rapidly closed.
Within 4 meters.
I lightly dodge the beam he shot out in desperation.
Crack-!
I blow off the wrist of the one whose movement was stopped by the backlash.
- Graaaaaaaah!
The one who lost both arms thrashes about.
I evade his attempt to trample me and deliver another sword strike to his ankle.
Crack!
Boom!
Like breaking the pillar of an old building, I begin to dismantle him from the ankle up.
Fwoosh!
The panicked Legion Commander spews fire from his mouth to stop me, but it is only blocked by the barrier I deployed half a beat faster in anticipation.
Soon, both legs were completely demolished.
Only the torso remained.
- Ka Ruftum…!
[[Barrier] is deployed.]
[[Earth Flow Reversal] is deployed.]
After blocking the spear of mana that flew like a dagger with a barrier and a mound of earth, I stepped on the mound of earth and leaped once more.
I soared up to the height of his shoulder in one breath, then dropped down and brought my sword down.
Remembering the sword that must have been wielded by a nameless knight of the early Empire, who defended the peasants of his manor from a giant.
[[Imperial Knight Swordsmanship] is deployed.]
CRACK-!
The statue, whose upper body was split diagonally, toppled over with a loud roar.
“Hoo…!”
I gasped for breath and raised my sword.
It's not dead yet.
A colossus stops functioning only when its head is smashed.
As I approached to finish it off, the two green gems embedded in the statue's eye sockets glared at me.
- You, weren't you a servant of an Outer God's Sacred Relic?
“What nonsense are you talking about?”
- How can a follower of destruction use the holy water of another god?
What's wrong with him?
As if he's never seen a cultist drink holy water before.
Well, it's my first time seeing it too.
Without answering, I brought my sword, overflowing with divine power, down on its head.
As the huge head shattered into pieces, the legionnaires' attacks stopped all at once.
The summoned duplicate statues also disappeared like illusions.
I quickly retrieved the Sacred Relic embedded in its neck and threw it into the subspace.
‘We were short on hands, and now a newcomer! Tick-Tocky, receive the new recruit~’
‘Tick-tock…!’
The subspace, which had been quiet throughout the battle, became noisy.
“…….”
“Is something wrong, Viscount?”
“It's nothing.”
Well, they'll probably sort out their own hierarchy just fine.
“To be over already. A bit of a shame.”
Randal said, spinning an axe on his fingertips.
Around him, hundreds of legionnaires were lying limp like puppets with their strings cut.
While I was fighting the Legion Commander, he had picked out and dealt with all the centurions from among the hundreds of enemies.
He must have sustained quite a few injuries during the battle, but if you look closely, they are all just torn skin or at worst, slightly injured muscles.
A sight befitting his moniker, the Undefeated Warrior.
Crack!
[[Warrior’s Binding] is deployed.]
[The slain enemy has been bound.]
[Lumer Legionnaire (1)]
He split the head of one legionnaire.
The legionnaire also reacted the moment it was attacked, but the axe had already split its skull.
Watching the notification window that naturally appeared in the corner of my vision, I suddenly said.
“Still a shame?”
“Indeed.”
“There are a few more down here.”
The axe that had been spinning on his fingertips stopped dead.
“Viscount, are you alright on stamina?”
Randal's eyes lit up.
I nodded my head.
Thanks to the effect of the holy water, my stamina has recovered sufficiently.
With my spells added to Randal's swordsmanship, it wouldn't take that long to clean up the legionnaires who have lost their reason.
“Let's finish this quickly.”
[[Devouring Pit of Fire] is deployed.]
After wiping out the remaining legionnaires in the burial chamber at once, Randal and I went back the way we came.
The cleanup of over 80,000 legionnaires took a full day and a half.
***
[[Warrior’s Binding] is deployed.]
[The slain enemy has been bound.]
[Lumer Chiliarch (2), Lumer Centurion (41), Lumer Cavalry (29), Lumer Legionnaire (3,662)]