Translator Corner
Minasan Oidemasu! This is Yukkuri demasu!
Please remember that: Frontier is the area outside the Three Great CivilizedLands.
As always,
DISCLAIMER: There is no guarantee that my translation is 100%correct. Please correct me if I was wrong.
Plus, if youwant to thank someone go to the guys at Ainushi Translation who give me the RAWfor this LN. They’re the real MVPs.
Author:
みのろう (Minorou)
Translator:
Yukkuri Oniisan!
Editor:
Online Grammar Editor!
Chapter 1
Upheaval
Part 8 - FINAL
Silence reigned above the great ocean.
「…………………………」
Everyone couldn’t believe what had happened in frontof their eyes and no one let out any word.
A wyvern was something that is next to impossible to bedefeated by ships, even for a single unit. However, just by looking at their size,there were more than 200 units ── yes, more than 200 units of theelite Wyverns fell down as a rain of blood.
It was not a dream. It would be better if all of thiswas just a dream.
「Are we…… fighting against the legendary Mage Emperor Army……?」
In front of the overwhelming strength of the enemy,Sharkun muttered in an unhinged mental state. His hands were shaking and his feetalso began to shake.
He didn’t know how to say this.
However, the tragedy play didn’t turn a blind eye to them.
On the far side eastern horizon, vessels similar tothe huge monstrous ship in front of them appeared. There were seven.
Perched on their entirely gray hull was the magicweapons that had mowed down the warship.
Their weapons that previously eliminated warships and wyvernsin the blink of the eye, turned towards Lourian Fleet and unleashed a storm ofdestruction.
In Rodenius history, what decides the outcome of a navalbattle is a clash of sailors, which is to say, a melee combat.
Although it is possible to damage the hull with ballistaor ignite them with a fire arrow – though, it rarely burns – to damage the shipto a certain extent, in practice, the ship is indestructible.
Since the melee combat decided the battle, in the end,the number of sailors eventually is the deciding factor.
For the invasion this time, they had gathered 4,400 warships.It would be a different story if the opponent is the Major Powers of the Three GreatCivilized Lands, but it won’t be defeated by a Frontier’s nation. No, with thisgreat number, they believe they could even compete with the Major Powers of theThree Great Civilized Lands.
Or so they had, until two hours ago.
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The sh.e.l.ls fired by 7 destroyers steadily sunk a shipper sh.e.l.l. The attacks were from outside the range their enemies. It was like ashooting exercise.
The numbers of the roar from main guns of the JMSDF destroyerswas the number of how many Lourian Navy warships sunk. However, 4,400 shipswere a lot.
Perhaps because of confusion or unrest, the LouriaKingdom Navy was moving chaotically. However, there was no sign of retreat, andeventually, when 1,400 ships found their rest in the watery grave amongst theseaweed, the compact-gun’s sh.e.l.l was nearly exhausted.
「Cease firing.」
Debris of what once was ships floated on the entiresea surface.
『Myoukou』 was closing in on the enemyfleet.
When it reached the 400-meter range, it fired its 12.7mm machine guns which was once used to counter unidentified ship.[1]An enemy ship’s hull and deck were filled with holes that it slanted, the oil forthe fire arrow was ignited by the torch fire and engulfed the ship with fire. Anothership sunk when its inner deck was flooded with water.
The deeds were performed businesslike and one by one, theenemy ships were sent to the bottom.
More and more, the tragedy that struck Louria Kingdom Navycontinued. Five JGSDF 『AH-1S Cobra』[2] attack helicopters on board the Helicopter Destroyer Izumo joined thebattle.
The attack helicopters fired their Hydra-70 rockets onthe warships underneath. The continuous flying rockets were like a meteor rain thatpulverized the wooden warships. After each unit had spent their 152 rockets[3],they strafed down with the 20 mm cannons to destroy the warships. In any case, theydidn’t aim at the people. Their entire attacks were targeting the rudders.
Once they completely out of bullets, they returned to 『Izumo』 to resupply and resortie.
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With the surrounding no different from a hunting ground,the Louria Kingdom Navy fell into a panic.
「d.a.m.n it!! Those monsters, we can’t win against that thing! d.a.m.n it! Whoaaa!」
One ship, and then yet another ship, one by one as thetime pa.s.sed by, the friendly ships was sunk at an unbelievable rate.
「………… So, it’s futile.」
Vice-Admiral Sharkun had gone beyond despair andreached the point of resignation. They can’t win no matter what.
If this situation continues, it will only cause his subordinatesto die for nothing. However, if they surrender and become prisoners of war, thereare no chance Louria people would be spared after the ma.s.sacre at Gim.
The road left open to him was only the word: retreat.
The large fleet had lost one-third of its ships. If hereturned to the country, he can’t escape the capital punishment. His name willremain in the history chronicles as an incompetent admiral.
But even so, he couldn’t let his subordinate die morethan this.
『All ships retreat! I repeat, all ships retreat!』
The retreat order was given to every ship by using themana communicator.
Just when the flagship on which Sharken was aboard alsotried to retreat, a sh.e.l.l directly hit it.
His subordinate who was blown away from the explosion shockwavestruck him and thrown him off to the sea.
The sight he saw while floating on the sea was thesight of his ship splitting into two and sinking.
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「The enemy begins to retreat.」
「All hands, cease firing!」
The order was quickly given.
「So they are abandoning their comrades that floating in the sea and retreat?…… All hands, if there are survivors in the sea, rescue them!」
The naval battle had ended.
Vice-Admiral Sharkun was rescued by j.a.panese MaritimeSelf Defense Force.
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Bruay, who was aboard 『Izumo』, which stayed at the rear, completely couldn’t understand what had beengoing on. There was frequent exchange of words in the bridge of some sort and itseems that they were waging a battle at an unseen distance from this place, buthe completely didn’t know what had happened in specific.
The attack helicopters repet.i.tively resupplied and thenflew off. Other than this, he didn’t personally experience the battlefield and thebattle ended just like that with him as a spectator. Even when Louria KingdomFleet began to retreat, he personally didn’t see anything, so it didn’t feelreal.
However, when they arrived at the sea where the battlehappened for the rescue operation and he saw the sea surface in front of theship, slowly the realization seeped in. An innumerable floating debris and countlessLourian sailors covered the sea surface. There were no burned ships. Thewreckages of ship pulverized by a devastating force were floating over anunbelievable huge expanse of the sea. Amongst them, there were wyvern corpsesscattered everywhere.
Although he didn’t see the battle itself with hiseyes, he understood that it was a complete overwhelming victory.
✦✧✦✧✦
From Bruay’sDiary Entry of that day.
I was ordered to measure how much is the power ofj.a.pan. It is the duty of a military observer officer. However, how to put this,I didn’t see the battle at all. No, even the commanding admiral of the j.a.paneseFleet didn’t personally see that battle firsthand. When we arrived at the battlelocation, it was already j.a.panese’s complete victory.
There were only the shattered ship wreckages of theLouria Kingdom Fleet, that had been blown apart by an unbelievably large amountof explosion magic projections of immense power, drifting on the sea.
Because I didn’t see it, I don’t know how it happened.
After the rescue operation finished, they informed methat it’s a victory with 250 wyverns and 1400 warships destroyed. Even if thej.a.panese ship is so big, there are only 8 of them, moreover, it was in a singlebattle. This battle outcome in this very short time span was unprecedented inthe history.
Isn’t this even impossible even for the Great Power PapardiaEmpire?
The crisis of my motherland had pa.s.sed away, it’s atruly delightful event and I ought to feel happy for it, but j.a.pan’s militarypower is strong beyond common sense, so I can’t help but feel…… fear.
I am also greatly troubled about writing the reportfor the government. I must give the government a report, which wouldn’t bebelieved by anyone, and this made my stomach hurts. There is no doubt that thesame anguish also felt by the captain of warship Pima and the member of the diplomaticdelegation.
We must absolutely never make enemies of j.a.pan. I amrelieved again and again, that j.a.pan, which held a power equal to the GreatPower, or even more, is our allies.
✦✧✦✧✦
At a certain warshipof the Louria Kingdom Eastern Subjugation Fleet.
The Papardia Empire’s military observer officer, Valhal,was trembling in his room at the warship.
This warship was luckily not sunk, but he personallywitnessed many warships in its surrounding sunk one after another.
His duty was to record in detail how will Lourianfleet of 4,400 ships curb-stomped the Qua-Toyne Princ.i.p.ality.
Even though primitive tactics such as fire arrows fromballista and ship raiding was fitting for barbarians, he enjoyed this mission dueand personally interested in what would happen if they had these numbers.
However, the enemy ship that appeared was far beyondhis common sense.
Although there was no evidence of them using 『Wind G.o.d’s Tear』 that speed up sailships, theirship speed was overwhelmingly fast. To begin with, those ships didn’t haveanything that can be called as a sail.
Regardless of their hull larger than the 100-Cannons Ship-of-the-Line,it had a huge…… long and slender, but that this was without any doubt, acannon. When he saw that the ship was only equipped with a single cannon, itgreatly bothered him that he thought if this was a joke.
He was surprised that there were cannons even thoughthe barbarian shouldn’t possess one, but a cannon is not accurate. It was hardto hit things with it, hence why the 100-cannon ship-of-the-line had so manycannons. Despite that, that cannon could hit from a distance of 3 kilometerswith just one shot. Moreover, it had tremendous power, that easily sunk warshipswith just a single hit.
What was more surprising is that they could defendagainst waves of wyverns attack. Even his motherland army, employed DragonMothership, to battle wyverns against wyverns. Because their capabilities far surpa.s.sedthan the wyverns raised in the barbaric lands, if the number is equal, they wouldwin. But the enemy this time didn’t have a single wyvern at all.
In the first place, a cannon shouldn’t be able to hitanything flying in the sky. This is common sense.
But they…… They could even hit a wyvern with a singleshot. He couldn’t think this as a work of man.
If Papardia Empire did things without knowing about theirexistence, the Empire might even be in a peril.
Using the mana communicator, Valhar reported what hehad seen, as true as possible, to his home country.
✦✧✦✧✦
Louria Kingdom.Capital Guard Knights Order Headquarters
After receiving the information of the enemy’s mainfleet discovery, 250 wyverns sortied to attack it. Three hours had pa.s.sed sincethe manacom ceased alongside with their scream.
A c.u.mbrous silence wafted inside the headquarters.
There was no report of them meeting with any other unitsand even when it was the time for them to return, not a single Dragoon Knightreturned. The headquarters were wrapped by uneasiness.
「Why they haven’t returned?」
No one answered the face-paled Patagene’s question.
(It can’t be…… they were annihilated……?)
In the history of Rodenius Continent, wyverns are thestrongest creature. However, since they are a valuable species, their numbers weren’tthat many.
The 500 wyverns of Louria Kingdom, gathered to uniteRodenius Continent was a large force finally gathered after 6 years with themilitary a.s.sistance from Papardia Empire.
With their overwhelming strength, they are surely ableto conquer Rodenius Continent.
The 250 wyverns that sortied to support the navy wouldsurely return and grant the greatest military result which will remain in the history.
However, this was not the reality.
He didn’t want to think about it. He didn’t want tothink about it, but there is a high possibility that they were annihilated.
Even if the enemy is an unexpectedly huge fleet, it isunthinkable that they could completely annihilate 250 wyverns. Can it be, does Qua-Toyneable to enlist the legendary Divine Dragon Bahamut?
In what way he should report to the Lourian King?
「…… Notify the vanguard army, order 50 wyverns to return back to the headquarters.」
☾☽☾☽☾☽☾☽☾☽☾☽☾☽☾☽☾☽☾☽
NEXT CHAPTER:
The aftermath of disastrous naval campaign.
The confusion on both Qua-Toyne and Louria side.
The haughty Major Power
And bunch of confused (and terrorized) villagers.