Knight: Becoming King of the World

"My lord, Henry’s army has sent men to buy grain and medicine again," a minister reported, rushing into the Count’s study.

"Oh? How much do they want?" A sharp glint flashed in the Count’s eyes.

"They need five hundred sacks of grain and seventy crates of medicine," the minister replied.

"Give it to them, but raise the price by twenty percent," the Count said coldly.

"Yes, my lord." The minister accepted his orders and left.

The Count was secretly calculating. No matter who won or lost this war, he had to ensure his own interests were not harmed.

Meanwhile, he was also monitoring the war’s progress and analyzing the strength of both sides. When the war ended, he would have to make a choice: support the victor or find a new path.

He was no longer young. He could no longer endure those precarious days of constant fighting and killing.

The small-scale skirmishes between the two sides did not last long, gradually escalating into larger-scale battles.

Both sides began to mobilize their armies, preparing for an all-out, decisive battle.

Henry’s army had attracted numerous nobles and soldiers, drawn by his personal charm and renowned battlefield prowess.

The Anti-Henry Alliance’s army, on the other hand, was composed of a group of nobles who feared Henry’s ambition and power.

They feared Henry’s rise would threaten their status and interests, so they banded together to halt his expansion.

On the fields of Akakarat, the two armies faced off. Countless noble banners and war flags fluttered in the wind.

Henry looked at the dazzling assortment of flags and felt his obsession with order starting to act up.

’Sooner or later, I’ll make it so there’s only one flag on this continent!’

Henry donned his black helmet and armor. Wielding a giant battle-ax, he stood at the very front of his formation. His army was the most orderly, their morale the highest.

The armies of Edmund, Calvin, and the other Barons and Knights were far inferior.

The difference was stark in comparison. The Anti-Henry Alliance’s army, by contrast, seemed somewhat chaotic. Their command system was imperfect, but their numerical advantage filled them with confidence.

’Forty thousand versus twenty thousand? This is a landslide victory!’

There were no pre-battle negotiations, no superfluous exchanges or communications between the two sides—only the will to fight to the death.

’Why do they seem even more eager to fight than when they were fighting Beastmen?’

At a single command, war drums thundered across the battlefield, horns blared, and the soldiers’ roars shook the very heavens.

Spears were a forest, swords flashed, and arrows fell like rain.

Henry gathered the elite Heavy Armor Infantry from all the nobles in his faction, forming a melee infantry phalanx of over thirty-four hundred men—the most elite and powerful of its kind.

This phalanx was the strongest force in Henry’s army, with his own infantry forming its core. They wore heavy iron armor and carried sharp spears and sturdy shields, an indestructible bulwark on the battlefield.

The second most powerful force was a unit of nine hundred—nearly a thousand—Heavy Cavalry, cobbled together by all the nobles.

Unlike Henry, who dismounted to lead from the front and face the battle head-on, most of the other nobles remained on their horses. They prioritized their own safety and had no intention of fighting on foot.

After Edmund and Calvin’s repeated attempts to dissuade him failed, they said no more. In their alliance of interests, Henry was the leader, after all.

The other side seemed to think similarly. Seeing Henry’s distinctive figure and noble banner at the forefront, advancing toward their formation, the nobles of the Anti-Henry Alliance all mocked him for being a reckless brute.

He wasn’t fit to be a noble, only fit to slaughter pigs and sheep in a pasture.

Amidst the jeers, Henry led his infantry phalanx slowly forward. The advancing army of the Anti-Henry Alliance watched his phalanx. Though they were somewhat surprised, they were not afraid.

They believed Henry’s move was merely a display of recklessness and stupidity.

As the distance between the two armies shrank, the atmosphere on the battlefield grew increasingly tense.

The soldiers at the front realized, ’Something’s wrong! Why does the enemy’s armor look so thick? And why are they all so tall and muscular?’

Henry’s infantry phalanx began to accelerate. They moved faster and faster, the clang of their armor and their shouts growing louder and louder.

With tens of thousands of men spread across the plain, the ends of the lines were nearly out of sight. Most nobles never had the chance to command such a large army in their entire lives, so as the battle progressed, they tended to focus only on their own sectors.

The last order Henry had given the other nobles before the battle was: "Hold on! Wait for my support!"

Those words put all the nobles at ease. The image of Henry in his black helm and armor, wielding that giant axe, was simply too staggering.

As Henry’s infantry phalanx picked up speed, the Anti-Henry Alliance’s archers began to let fly, but their Cavalry dared not move.

No one was foolish enough to waste a precious Cavalry unit charging a dense phalanx of Heavy Armor Infantry whose formation was tight and whose stamina was full.

Not even the emperor of the Caladia Empire would dare to be so extravagant as to waste Armored Cavalry in such a way.

It would be like throwing Dinars at a beggar—what’s the point, other than just giving away money?

The nobles of the Anti-Henry Alliance could now clearly see Henry’s appearance and the state of his phalanx. Although they felt the pressure, they still believed their vast numbers of archers could effectively weaken his infantry.

However, that was not the case.

Henry’s infantry phalanx was superbly equipped. Their shields and armor effectively deflected the arrow attacks.

Most arrows had already lost their force by the time they struck the infantry’s armor. Those that still had momentum were either deflected or simply lodged in the plates.

After two volleys of a sky-blotting black rain of arrows, not a single unlucky soul had died!

The soldiers temporarily assigned to Henry’s command by the other nobles were also astonished. ’Our luck is incredible!’

Moreover, why did they feel no panic in the face of an arrow storm that fell like a thundercloud? Instead, they felt a surge of excitement and anger.

The archers of the Anti-Henry Alliance grew uneasy. Though they continuously rained arrows upon Henry’s infantry phalanx, they were unable to inflict any significant damage.

A few enemy soldiers had begun to fall here and there, but the number was a drop in the ocean—practically negligible.

The nobles of the Anti-Henry Alliance, who moments before had been pointing and gesturing spiritedly at the battlefield, now began to panic. They stopped their bickering and hastily redeployed some infantry formations to block Henry’s advance.

When the archers saw Henry and the Heavy Armor Infantry behind him break into a full-blown charge, they hastily fell back in a panic, even disrupting some of the infantry units that were preparing to move up and hold the line.

The nobles and their officers were in no mood to reprimand or punish the commanders of the archer units.

Because Henry was already upon them!

Henry raised his great-ax high, his eyes blazing with the fire of battle.

"For victory! KILL!" Henry roared.

The infantry phalanx followed close behind, their collective roar like a clap of muffled thunder that shook the entire battlefield.

The infantrymen of the Anti-Henry Alliance felt an unprecedented pressure as fear began to take root in their hearts.

Some of them wanted to retreat, but reality did not permit such cowardice.

Henry’s figure was so immense it seemed to suffocate the enemies who faced him directly. As they watched this giant of a man in his massive, heavy armor charge toward them, their minds went blank.

He was like a fully-armored, elite Minotaur.

’No, he’s even more terrifying than a Minotaur!’

’Do I have to fight an enemy like this?’

’Why was I put in the front rank?’

’He’s raising his ax! Am I going to die?’

’No, I have a spear! Take this!’

The spearman’s expression turned crazed. Screaming, he viciously thrust his spear forward with all his might, only to feel a tremendous force jolt his hands open, tearing the weapon from his grasp.

The next second, the world spun. He felt as if he were flying through the sky, and then a great drowsiness washed over him...

In his last moment of consciousness, he seemed to see a row of heads dancing through the air...