969: The Illegal City of Sarthe

『I see it! A titan-type!』

「The town is…」

「Woof…」

After several breaks along the way, the second division finally found its target.

A giant antidemon had risen up and was currently rampaging within the walls of the city in front of us, the illegal city of Sarthe. Since he’s as tall as a huge skyscraper, I’m sure he scaled those walls with ease. Maybe like 200 meters tall…? The sheer size made it difficult to estimate.

The titan wrecking the city looked about the same scale as a child flailing about in an inflatable pool.

Naturally, no soldier or adventurer could do anything to stop him.

The sight of such a huge creature spreading destruction was more powerful than we had imagined.

Our fellow knights and adventurers, who were supposed to be a select few of elites, stopped dead in their tracks as they gasped in awe.

Izario and Fran, however, were not intimidated at all. As aloof as ever, Izario even sighed.

「Oh boy, this guy is gonna be a pain in the neck.」

I worried that the adventurers might lose morale at the sight of the Rank S complaining, but it seems the opposite occurred. The adventurers managed to calm down after seeing Izario’s usual behavior.

「We’ll take him down this time.」

「Grr!」

Fran and Urushi were really fired up, so much so that it spread to the others around us. She was already pumping herself for a fight. Seeing Fran’s attitude helped the adventurers recover too.

After a glance at the faces of their two leaders, Izario and Fran, the adventurers completely regained their composure. Now they were ready for a battle.

Maybe Izario was just bluffing, but he definitely helped get everyone back in the mood.

On the other hand, our friends from Hagane were the same as usual. Those old soldiers were surprisingly calm, showing not the slightest sign of fear at the titan in front of them.

Ajisai and the others exiting the wagon were the same. Matsuyuki spoke while looking up at the titan with a slight smile on her face.

「Now then. What shall we do this time, Sakaki?」

「We need to coordinate with the adventurers for now. Whether or not you will be able to deploy depends on the evacuation of the townspeople.」

I guess the woman escorting her was named Sakaki. Both her face and voice closely resembled the commander Shikimi. Maybe those two were sisters as well.

Anyways, isn’t this situation really bad?

Both Izario’s Ignis and Hagane’s Berserk would cause tons of damage to the surrounding area. It’s hard to make use of them against a titan in the middle of town.

In that case, Fran will have put in the most work. I have to wonder how well the other adventurers and knights will fare against a giant antidemon…

The old soldiers of Hagane were certainly in high spirits, but there’s no way they could defeat the titan themselves. Our plan will probably involve luring the antidemon out of town, then Fran and everyone else blasting him with whatever they’ve got.

「What’s the plan?」

「Someone mobile, like you, jumps around to grab the big guy’s attention. We lead him to us with a long-range barrage, and drag him outside the walls. Then boom, we hit him with everything we’ve got.」

「I have no objections to Izario-dono’s plan. We will join in the barrage.」

Shikimi nodded and explained the equipment and skills of the old soldiers. Some of them could use magic, and the ones who couldn’t were trained in archery. Indeed, all of them possessed Bow Mastery and Bow Arts.

According to her, they could hit their target at a considerable distance. It was not a matter of confidence, it’s like she was simply stating a fact.

「You good with that, little lady?」

「Nn.」

「Woof!」

「I’m gonna need you to take care of the diversion team. Alright?」

「Okay.」

「We’ve still got a long way to go, so I hope we take him down with as little energy as possible.」

Izario was right. If taking out this guy meant mission complete, we could give him everything we got. But this battle was only the first of many.

With future battles against more titans still to come, we could not exhaust all of our strength here.

「For now, I’d like to move to the position with the minimum distance from the titan.」

「Agreed.」

Even though they were confident of their range, we were currently over a kilometer away. It seems that exceeded their capabilities.

The maximum distance for reliable accuracy was probably about 500 meters.

That’s why we decided to look for the location where the titan was closest to the city walls. We proceeded along the walls of the illegal city.

I couldn’t sense anyone left inside. It’d be great if they escaped, but there must have been a massive amount of casualties if they didn’t.

「Mrgh. The giant looked this way.」

「Arf!」

『Did he notice us?』

The titan’s gaze turned toward us. He obviously detected the presence of the second division.

「The big guy’s atmosphere just changed.」

「Is he coming this way?」

If he chases after us, that would save us the trouble of having to lure him out…

「Ruooooooooogh!」

「The titan is attempting something! Be careful!」

Right after Shikimi’s warning…

I sensed something with huge mass flying from the direction of the titan. It was… the roof of a house. He literally ripped it off a nearby house and threw it at us.

Izario tried to cast a spell, but we dived into action before he could.

『Fran!』

「Nn! I’ll handle it!」

Fran jumped up and stored the debris away.

「Nice one, little lady!」

「Nn. I’ll take care of anything flying at us! You all attack him!」

「Understood!」

So Fran handled the defense and Shikimi took the lead. This was considerably different from the plan, but the second division began its first battle nonetheless.

「Little lady! I’ll shoot down any that slip through. Don’t worry about your back.」

「Nn!」

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