Chapter 32
A Night of Counting Stars (6)
The flying fish in some novel at least had a staircase leading up to it.
An aerial warship had no such thing.
And humans did not have wings.
Therefore, even if the ship was simply floating motionlessly in the sky and had completely lowered its guard in the middle of the night, infiltrating an aerial warship was still an extremely difficult task.
And now they had to infiltrate that very warship, threaten its captain, and confront the entire crew without causing a single death.
“A battleship at sea is often compared to a fortress. An aerial warship could rightfully be called a fortress in the heavens.”
Oswald said this with a gentle smile.
He was not wrong, but it was still irritating.
“That bastard really thinks he’s a genuine elf now.”
“I am a genuine elf. Can’t you see my ears?”
“Wow, even your soul has been corrupted into a knife-ear. Big Brother! I have a brilliant idea!”
Eugene raised his hand while grumbling.
When Ivan motioned with his chin, Eugene proudly squared his shoulders.
“That knife-ear can cast Feather Step!”
“How many times must I tell you that I specialize in mind sorcery? Is your ability to learn inferior because you are human?”
“Wow, this bastard really has become a complete knife-ear. What good is a magician who can’t even use Feather Step? Big Brother, let’s grab some random student from the Department of Magic instead. Preferably someone from Destruction.”
“Mind Shatter.”
Purple mana swirled around Oswald’s fingertips.
Eugene’s pupils immediately lost focus.
He lowered his head, drool dripping from his mouth.
Silence descended upon the clubroom.
Useful.
Ivan nodded.
“We only need to wait until evening.”
“Is the warship suddenly going to land tonight?”
“No. The people who need to board it will appear.”
The Krasilov monarchy had given the warship three days to withdraw.
That had been yesterday.
And yesterday evening, Elizaveta had threatened to shoot it down unless it withdrew within a single day.
From the captain’s perspective, the situation had to be nerve-racking.
By tomorrow, the entire monarchy might launch military action.
Even if that did not happen, the captain would assume that Elizaveta intended to attempt something before the end of today.
Therefore, the captain absolutely had to contact the crown prince today.
It was the only means of reversing the situation.
They would not be able to move during daylight.
As long as the Counterintelligence Command existed, all of Pritchenkaya remained within Elizaveta’s sight.
That left the evening.
At the very least, sometime after sunset.
“Even if the crown prince’s faction contacts the warship, how are we supposed to slip in with them?”
“They will use a carriage enchanted with levitation magic.”
“That’s what I’m asking. Are we going to politely request a few seats?”
“No.”
Ivan looked over Oswald, who was watching him suspiciously, Yuri, who remained terrified and cautious, and Eugene, who was still mentally absent.
Then he addressed Yuri in a serious voice.
“If you had to carry one of them on your back, whom would you choose?”
“What...?”
“Excluding me. Which of those two would you carry?”
Yuri looked at the two young men with trembling eyes.
One was a blond delinquent.
The other was a narrow-eyed hypnotist.
Worse, the narrow-eyed hypnotist had just demonstrated his ability by casting a mental spell on the blond delinquent.
Yuri bit her lip tightly before barely managing to answer.
“Y-Eugene... I would rather carry him...”
“Rather...?”
Ignoring Oswald, who flinched with a wounded expression, Ivan nodded readily.
“Then I will carry Oswald.”
“Why are we suddenly carrying people?”
“Because we will be hanging underneath the carriage.”
The warship floated roughly eight hundred meters above the ground.
That was absurdly low compared to an ordinary aircraft on Earth, but in this premodern world, it was a height impossible for a person to reach.
Even with Earth’s highly developed civil-engineering technology, eight hundred meters was around the height of the Burj Khalifa.
In other words, only the tallest structure ever constructed could reach such an altitude.
Any attempt to climb that high using another levitation-enchanted vehicle would inevitably be detected in advance.
Therefore, if they wished to infiltrate while avoiding observation, their only option was to hide beneath the carriage sent by the crown prince’s faction.
The problem was whether they possessed enough stamina to remain suspended beneath it.
Oswald obviously could not.
Eugene was hardly trustworthy.
Even if he was skilled with a sword, was he not ultimately a theology student?
Yuri, on the other hand, ranked first in the Department of Knighthood.
With the exception of Mord, she was considered the strongest freshman in practical combat.
Carrying one person while hanging beneath a carriage for approximately ten minutes should be within her capabilities.
“You speak as though you have infiltrated a ship while suspended in midair before.”
“Fortunately, I have done something similar.”
“What kind of life have you lived? Actually, I’m not particularly curious.”
Ignoring Oswald, Ivan rose from his seat.
There was much to prepare.
“Bring warm clothing, arm yourselves properly, and come to the astronomy spire of the Department of Magic.”
In Krasilov, every season except summer was not much different from winter.
The sequence was little winter, summer, middle winter, and godforsaken winter.
In other words, it would be bitterly cold to fly at an altitude of eight hundred meters in the middle of the night while hanging beneath a carriage.
The transmigrators shuddered as they considered what Ivan’s words implied.
***
Ivan and the other transmigrators had been lying flat on the roof of the spire since evening.
Only after the sun had fully set did they rise and stretch their stiff bodies.
Their hands had gone numb from the cold.
While the transmigrators sighed and worked movement back into their hands and feet, a considerable amount of time passed before Ivan finally raised his head.
Once darkness had settled over the surroundings, a tiny light briefly flickered among the streets, which appeared even darker beneath the enormous shadow of the warship.
“Prepare yourselves.”
Ivan rolled one shoulder, then drew an axe.
He spun the axe, which had a rope tied to it, before extending it straight ahead to judge the distance.
The ropes attached to the two axes were tied respectively around Yuri’s waist and Ivan’s.
After confirming that Yuri was carrying Eugene on her back, Ivan slowly drew his arm backward.
“It is coming.”
The transmigrators swallowed nervously.
Ivan stared directly into an unseen point somewhere in the dark night sky.
Mana flowed.
Carefully regulated mana traveled along Ivan’s muscle fibers.
Oswald, who was clinging to Ivan’s back, silently marveled at the precision of the arrangement.
“You go first.”
“What? Yes... Huh?! Aaaaaaah!”
Whoooooosh!
Ivan threw the axe without waiting for Yuri’s response.
The hand axe shot across the night sky in a perfectly straight line.
The rope attached to its end snapped taut.
Yuri was yanked away as though caught by a fishing hook.
Her silhouette vanished into the darkness in an instant.
“Hold tightly.”
“W-Wait a moment. I’m not mentally prepared yet... Wait, perhaps we should reconsider this—!”
Whoooooosh!
“Ghhhhhrrrraaaaaagh?!”
The ground rapidly receded beneath Oswald.
Violent wind slapped both cheeks as he screamed with foam at his mouth.
Terror of death.
A sharp ringing that seemed to pierce his ears.
The sensation of weightlessness, as though he had suddenly been dropped into the sky.
I must be insane. How did I ever agree to call this a plan?!
Oswald instinctively clutched Ivan’s shoulders and howled.
“Ghh... Ughhh... Hrk... Huh...?”
The tremendous noise battering his ears abruptly stopped.
Oswald looked around with unfocused eyes.
Right beside him were Yuri and Eugene, both deathly pale.
They were hanging from one of the carriage wheels.
“Huh...? Huuuh...?”
“Wow...”
In the distance, they could see the spire from which they had launched.
He had crossed that entire distance by throwing a hand axe?
They stared at Ivan with renewed disbelief.
“Won’t they notice us like this?”
“Of course they will.”
Ivan could already hear the commotion inside the carriage.
The people within were not deaf.
The carriage had suddenly lurched, gained the weight of four additional people, and been struck directly by an axe.
There was no possibility they had failed to notice.
For the moment, they could not open the carriage door, nor could they look beneath the wheels through the windows.
So it was not yet a problem.
But that would last only briefly.
The moment they climbed onto the deck, they would be surrounded.
Crown Prince Aleksandr himself was unlikely to be inside, but they had ambushed a carriage carrying his secret envoy.
Naturally, they would be attacked.
In other words, this had never been a plan involving stealthy infiltration in the first place.
The transmigrators realized this and stared at Ivan in shock.
“Then what do we do now?”
“Endure.”
“What?”
Ivan stared into a point somewhere in the night sky and slowly pulled his axe free from the carriage.
Beneath the clouds, the aerial warship was gradually drawing closer.
After confirming the lights sparkling across the deck to guide the carriage toward its landing point, Ivan hooked Oswald onto the carriage wheel and suspended himself with one hand.
Then he aimed the retrieved axe straight ahead and tilted his head slightly.
“Come on, no way. Are you abandoning us? Big Brother, are you abandoning the Korean Patriotic Corps? What about friendship?”
Ignoring Eugene’s stammered nonsense, Ivan drew his arm back and circulated mana through it.
A coVer infiltration had been impossible from the beginning.
In that case, was it not proper to create a diversion?
Naturally.
The Extermination Unit had always adhered to the doctrine of throwing the enemy camp into confusion immediately before infiltration.
They were not exactly disposable pieces.
But they could serve as decoys to draw attention.
Moreover, two of the transmigrators were nobles.
One belonged to a high-ranking military aristocratic family, while another was an elf.
Even if attacked, they were not people who would be summarily executed.
If only students appeared, there was a good chance the matter would be dismissed as a reckless juvenile prank.
That was why Ivan had ordered them not to kill any crew members.
It was to prevent the situation from escalating into a battle to the death.
“I will come for you shortly.”
“No, wait, Big Brother...? Brother!”
Whoooooosh!
Ivan hurled the axe toward a point in the night sky.
The powerful recoil shook the carriage.
When the transmigrators opened their eyes again, Ivan was already gone.
He was flying like an arrow through the darkness of the night.
“That lunatic flying Santa Claus doesn’t even need a reindeer.”
“Ahahaha... What do we do now?”
“What else?”
Eugene gritted his teeth while staring at the approaching deck.
“We clear the quest.”
If the quest reward turned out to be worthless, he would find some way to kill the bastard responsible for this status window.
Ivan was hanging beneath the warship’s gun deck, his axe buried in the edge of a cannon port.
The violent wind brushed past his ears.
Below his feet was the sensation of empty air.
Far beneath him, the city’s streets looked like grains of sand scattered across the earth.
A fall from this height meant death.
No—not even fragments of his limbs would remain as evidence.
Crack!
Hanging there with one hand, Ivan twisted his waist to generate momentum and drove his axe into the cannon port.
Crack! Crack! Crack!
Creeeeak!
His body swayed precariously as though he might fall at any moment.
Yet his face remained expressionless as he continued.
Steadily.
Silently.
As though standing upon solid ground and chopping down a tree.
Before long, the wooden cannon port collapsed, creating a hole large enough for one person to enter.
Weee-ooo! Weee-ooo! Weee-ooo!
Warning lights inside flashed madly.
He heard the sound of crew members rushing through the interior.
The diversion succeeded.
Ivan nodded impassively, then threw himself through the dark gap in the cannon port.
Now—
At this place—
The Lumberjack had arrived.