CH 237.1

The town dispatched scouts in order to verify the information brought by Heinrich. Indeed, a large horde of monsters were advancing toward this town. Soldiers and adventurers were getting ready, preparing for a large-scale battle at the south gate. Adventurers from throughout the town were steadily gathering here.

In between this, Yurina-san and I were in the middle of a marital fight.

It’s because Yurina-san insisted that she’s going to join the fray as well…

“Well, well… Calm down….”

There, Donny-san, who happened to be passing by, tried to mediate between us. Then Donny-san said something that basically meant there shouldn’t be any problem if I also became involved in their strategy meeting.

Donny-san…. Don’t tell me, you’re relying on Yurina-san’s paralyzing bomb and spider thread bomb because you’ve seen the effectiveness of her attack with your own eyes….?

Remaining oblivious to my suspicious gaze, Donny-san shot his hopeful eyes towards Yurina-san and I.

“Well, I guess it’s a good idea to be involved in the strategy meeting if I can ensure her safety…” 

“Thank you!”

I wasn’t entirely convinced yet but in the end, I still got myself involved with their strategy meeting.

After that, Yurina-san and I went to their command center together with Donny-san. When we were walking there, a white haired man who was dressed in a butler outfit bowed at us. It seemed like he had something he wanted to say to us.

Ah, this guy must be Heinrich’s butler. If I remember correctly, he should be in prison….

“Could it be… You’re Jill-san? It’s alright. I’ve already decided to let bygones be bygones.”

I conveyed to him that I had already forgiven him through mixtures of gestures and verbal communication.

When I entered the command center, I saw Heinrich, who looked tattered and that gatekeeper uncle. They seemed to be in a deep discussion, trying to come out with the best strategy.

Jill-san greeted Heinrich and the others. They also welcomed us with a mix of gestures and offered chairs for us to sit on.

At first, I didn’t have any intention to get involved with things like the military or wars but because Donny-san tried to mediate between our marital fight and asked me to lend him my wisdom, I had to participate in this meeting despite my reluctance.

Well, if it’s related to my wife’s safety, of course I will have to rack my brain to come up with the best plan.

According to Heinrich, it seemed most of the monsters consisted of high ranking Kobold, along with some Serpents, Cockatrices and Hellhounds. It seemed there was one particular monster more dangerous than the others. A Kobold King riding a big Armored Lizard (?).

Cockatrice should be much stronger than Kobold though?

But since I hadn’t seen the horde firsthand, I guess I should just go along with it for now. 

The vanguard unit, the unit focusing on melee combat, would consist of Shrike-san (the Guild Master of the Adventurers’ Guild), Kai-sensei and the skilled adventurer party that helped me with the Serpent some time ago. For the long distance unit, we had Han-sensei and Yurina-san. For the healing unit, Kishuu-sensei would be in charge of that unit.

Shrike-san would be placed in the center of the vanguard unit. While Kai-sensei on the right wing of the vanguard and the skilled adventurer party on the left wing of the vanguard. The advancing units were lined up at the south gate.

In addition to central, right and left wing sections of the vanguard, there was also a special strike unit that would be moving dynamically in accordance to the tide of the battle. This unit would be tasked with executing pincer attacks either on the back or the sides of the enemy unit. Given the importance of mobility for the strike unit, the members of the strike unit were divided into those who could ride horses and those who couldn’t. The ones capable of riding a horse were positioned on the left wing as the cavalry strike unit and those who couldn’t were positioned on the right wing as the infantry strike unit.

This formation was created by referencing the knowledge from the Sengoku Period and the Three Kingdoms. I proposed this idea to them during the strategy meeting.

As for the battle strategy, first, the vanguard would be positioning themselves close to the wall of the south gate and luring the enemy to the very edge. (We also set up ankle snares traps and pitfalls on locations where the enemy might pass by.) Then the long distance unit would unleash a barrage of arrows and magics onto the enemy from the top of the wall.

While the enemy was in disarray, the vanguard unit would begin attacking and at the same time, the strike unit would flank the enemy on both sides. We would be circling the advancing enemy and unleashed simultaneous attacks on multiple sides.

Any wounded soldiers would be immediately evacuated to the tents that we had set up along the walls, where they would be receiving treatment from the healing unit. At least, this was the hypothesis we had regarding what would happen during the battle. There was no telling what would happen during the actual war.

While we were racking our brains to come up with the best solutions within our limited time, Margo and Juno arrived at the command center, accompanied by the members of the Blue Brigade.

“Keigo, how is it going?”

“Ah, Margo. Good timing. I have a little favor I want to ask from you…”

I had proposed an emergency strategy for emergency scenarios as well. If by any chance the south gate was breached by the monsters, we had to evacuate all of the townsfolk through the north gate and assign new adventurers of level 5 or below with the task of escorting the citizens.

They agreed with my suggestion. One experienced soldier along with 5 new adventurers would be assigned to stay in town. They would be responsible for escorting and guiding the citizens away from the town.

The problem was, deciding the personnel for this role. We decided it would be best to have the 5 new adventurers to come from the Blue Brigade.

Then, a short while later….

“”Boss! Madam!!””

Hearing someone calling for me and Yurina-san, we both turned our heads to see our employees, Chatra and Maya, come running to us. We told them about the situation we were both in and told them to pack the store’s stuff and prepare to escape to Tairant together with everyone in the case of an emergency.

“I’ll be leaving Tanya and Ash in your care.”

“”Boss…!””

“Hey, don’t cry. When push comes to shove, you guys need to be the one protecting everyone in our stead.”

Their eyes were wet from crying. Nonetheless, both Chatra and Maya had been practicing swords and slingshots between their break so I believed they would at least be able to defeat some goblins. After I told them that I would be entrusting the store and the other employees in their care, they wished us the best of luck before returning to the store.

However, we were still far from finished with our battle preparations.  In order to execute the strategy we had devised, we needed to gather and assign the adventurers into different units. We still hadn’t finished doing that yet.

Whether they had good agility or good at magic or maybe good at bows. We didn’t have the time to assess the abilities of the people gathered here. However, solely relying on their self-evaluation to determine their position made me feel a little bit anxious. 

Hence why, I decided it would be best to use appraisal to find out their status and skills. I used appraisal on each individual gathered here and used the result to determine which unit to assign them to.

【Individual Name: Keigo Okuda has acquired Appraisal Level 5.】

I’m already completely exhausted even before the battle started…

I had been appraising an adventurer, wrote down their status and skills on paper and whenever my MP depleted, I would drink MP potion. I repeated that same motion numerous times to the point my appraisal skill was raised by a level.

CLANG CLANG CLANG CLANG CLANG

When we had finished preparing for the battle and had assigned everyone in the appropriate unit, I heard the sound of alarm coming from the watchtower. Since I was more of the speed type, I was assigned to the left wing cavalry strike unit.

I got on Rocinante (my horse) and quickly moved to my position, where I saw Juno, Heinrich and Jill-san. All of them were also the speed type. Margo wasn’t here though. He was the power type after all so he was assigned in the center vanguard unit.

Peering over the plains, I saw a cloud of dust rising in the distance.

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T/N: I’m honestly curious how this battle is going to unfold. After all, MC is not OP to the point he can easily annihilate dozens of monsters in second.