Published at 25th of March 2019 9:59 pm

Volume 5 Intermission - To the Journey of Pilgrimage Part 2

The knights in the garrison forgot the battle in the past and began to move for the next fight.

Kazuki, who returned to his room was called out by Akane-senpai this time and led to the corridor.

“Kazuki, now that I think back I didn’t even say words of appreciation did I?”

Senpai said so while walking somewhere. “Congratulations to your victory. It’s a really overwhelming achievement. …You are really amazing. I am acting as a staff officer at Kanon’s side, but I’m completely no good.”

“That’s…I’m just an amateur who knows nothing after all, rather I’m only hitting upon strange ideas.”

“It’s not like that at all though…[Magic Eye OgreCyclops].”

“Eh?” Suddenly being called with his alias in the past, Kazuki was taken aback.

“Fufuu, actually I had met you once long ago in the past. I wonder if you have completely forgotten?”

“Ee!?” He had this trauma from that one case with Mio where he couldn’t remember someone he had met and made her mad.

“Well, it’s only natural for you not to remember. The truth is I was attending a dojo when I was small. In an inter-style match, I have this experience of being instantly killed by a young man called Cyclops. It was an experience that taught me my standing.”

“Senpai was a swordsman too!?”

“Fufufu, I had no talent at all and stopped completely soon after you know. Even so I wanted to be connected to the Knight Order in some form, so I aimed to be a strategist and studied for it. Confucius, Clausewitz…it was fun imagining myself holding the baton of command and become a hero. Nevertheless a Stigma emerged on me before I even became a strategist, and I could become a cadet of the Knight Order normally in the end.”

“…So senpai became that well-informed in military science not from studying the advanced strategy theory of the third years.”

“But even if I study the theory, I’ve never been in a real battle at all. I foolishly studied properly, fell into the way of thinking exactly according to the mold and unable to think differently, and cannot cope at all when something unexpected happened. I can’t think like you who didn’t get caught in common practice and managed to grasp the essentials.”

“But in reverse, I cannot do what senpai can do. Even if it is the case that I can learn that essential something, isn’t this only a simple story of strengths and weaknesses for each person? Then, if I and senpai compensate for each place we are lacking in, we are going to be the strongest!”

“Cooperating between you and me…that sounds interesting though…fufuu, I’ll decline that offer. If a plain ugly woman who studies too much like me is together with you, then the other girls are going to begrudge me.”

“What begrudge…senpai is not a plain ugly woman who studies too much at all!”

“No, rather than mixing tactical theory together with someone like me …being together with Kanon or Kaguya, or with girls like that Amasaki-san will be more enjoyable right, for a boy like you.”

“Such a thing is not true, I also want to talk with senpai all night long until the morning you know, about Clausewitz.”

“There you go saying such things again.” Akane-senpai’s clever expression crumbled and a smile emerged.

“…Senpai, your smile right now is really pretty.”

“Fufufu, you just keep joking. But…thank you. That’s right, rather than cooperating together with you, from now on I’m going to aspire for you, I will be diligent and aim to reach your level, how about that I wonder?”

From Akane-senpai, a large heart mark came flying. Yagumo Akane―40

“Please stop that, what aspiration…even though you are my great senior.”

Akane-senpai looked back to the front direction of the corridor, “Well then” saying that she changed the subject.

“Actually it’s really enjoyable talking with you that, against my better judgment, I deliberately took the long way in our walk, however…”

“So it’s like that. I thought that we kept going round and round in circles for a while. What a schemer.”

“Fufufu, for you to also notice it properly, just as I thought, you have an eye for the essentials, don’t you?”

Both of them faced each other and grinned broadly. Though when he thought that, Akane-senpai’s face immediately became serious.

“…While we were going around in circles meaninglessly, the truth is that we had seriously become lost children. Where in the world is this place currently?”

“Eh!? Wai, is senpai seriously saying that!?”

“Just as I thought I’m a no good person… Kazuki, do something with your intuition of the essentials somehow…”

“Eeee, please don’t say such pathetic things senpai! Understood, I’ll do something somehow! But even I’m going to try somehow, with not much information to go on…!”

“What I was saying just now is just a joke, our destination is right here.”

Akane-senpai suddenly moved her body right to the side, then she knocked on the door to a room that was in that direction. Kazuki reflexively pitched forward foolishly in an almost falling position.

It was one of the hotel’s rooms that had been transformed into the [strategy meeting room] so to speak.

Inside, Headmaster Amasaki, Kanon-senpai and then the regimental commander of Shizuoka regiment whose name was Yamagata Koyata, a man in the prime of his life were already in the room surrounding a table. On top of the table was a map that was spread out.

“The time for us to counterattack has also come.” Commander Yamagata said when Kazuki and Akane-senpai took a seat.

“Pardon me for suddenly entering the main topic, but the battle strength of eastern Japan is currently massing little by little in this garrison of the military boundary line. If it becomes like this then it's irrelevant even if our movements are leaked. Even with our movements leaked we are going to hit Gifu prefecture with our maximum strength, no question asked.”

“Why Gifu?” Kazuki interjected a question. There should be an option to march to the west too.

“If we are invading in the direction of further inside with Aichi prefecture as the beginning of our counter offensive, the defensive line will naturally become a great length, then the placement of soldiers will become difficult.”

So that’s it, when the military boundary line turned long, the defensive battle strength was going to be dispersed completely.

When the battlefield became a wide area, it was overwhelmingly advantageous for Yamato’s side who could obtain information through the traitor.

“Because of that we are going north from Aichi prefecture and aim for Gifu prefecture. Against our maximum battle strength, the other side will surely intercept with their maximum battle strength too. It’s convenient. Because if we shave off the opponent’s battle strength in one go then this conflict is as good as over. This all-out war of East and West…following your naming we are going to do [Magic War・Sekigahara]!”

“If we win this then the efficiency is good, but won’t our side’s damage become great too?”

When Akane-senpai interjected with a skeptical objection, Commander Yamagata was “I know” nodding.

From there he looked around restlessly at his surroundings as if searching for a monitoring camera and lowered his voice.

“…Of course we are not going to clash with them without any plan. This side too is preparing a plan. That bunch turned up in our territory working their tricks before, this time we are going to return the favor. Preceding the invasion to Gifu, we will send the minimum number of people to the enemy territory…”

He pointed at a certain point in the map on top of the table.

“…They are going to penetrate Ise Grand Shrine, beat the chief god of the Japanese Mythology and resolve the misunderstanding. I listened to the report. If we manage to do that, won’t the Divas of the Japanese Mythology all return to their senses and withdraw from the war front? With this Yamato will lose their military force all at once…and we will commence an all-out attack.”

I see, Kazuki nodded in comprehension.

If the danger to this [someone] that would invade Ise was not considered, this was a perfect idea.

“This is the strategy decided from the discussion with me and Kanon-kun. No one knows about this except the people here in this place right now. We have no intention to inform any other people―even the top brass of the Knight Order. In other words this strategy to invade Ise will not be conducted by the Knight Order, but we want the students of the Knight Academy to be the ones that do it. Because of that, this strategy’s arbitrary judgment…will be done by the Chief Student Council President and Headmaster Amasaki’s own judgment. You two will be the ones who will move the realization of this plan.”

In other words, the one who would execute this strategy was…

“Hayashizaki Kazuki. Making a student carry this great burden makes my heart heavy, but there is no other choice except having you do this.”

I understand…he couldn’t say anything else other than that.

“But what are we going to do about the penetration route? Those Yamato bunch entered our territory through the traitor, but we cannot do that kind of thing so simply.

“Use a sea route.”

“Using the sea is the idea that I thought of you know-☆“ Kanon-senpai gloated.

“In the first place, our country traditionally has insufficient maritime defense on the Pacific Ocean side. It’s because we were concentrating the precaution in Japan’s seaward side that are facing North Korea and Russia. The minimum monitoring is performed but the radar site is mainly directed to the sky.”

Commander Yamagata used his own finger as the comparison of an antenna and faced diagonally above.

“From the beginning, radar that is installed on the surface is weak at monitoring the sea's surface and low altitude sky anyway. For that purpose we are using patrol planes to look out for suspicious ships, but patrol planes don’t really get deployed in the side that is facing the Pacific Ocean. …Essentially, if there is going to be any violation of territorial sovereignty from the side of the Pacific Ocean then it’s going to be from the air.”

Ise Grand Shrine, the target destination, was in Mie prefecture. Between Aichi prefecture and Mie prefecture, Ise Bay was stretching.

Commander Yamagata traced a line on top of the map using his finger to show the route that the ship going to pass in Ise Bay.

“In the case that Yamato doesn’t make this oversight, what then?” Kazuki pointed out in a prudent tone. “They might see through the danger from the phase of our recovery of Aichi prefecture and shift the patrol planes from the side of the Sea of Japan to Ise Bay.”

“We had confirmed that there is no such movement using our satellite observation system.”

…Satellite observation system. Kazuki was lost for words. So even that kind of thing had entered the stage.

If he thought about it, there was a great number of fields outside combat where using technology was far better than magic. He was only putting his attention to Summoning Magic so he tended to unconsciously forget completely about the application merit of such things but…

“Even if we have a satellite monitoring system, it’s not an omnipotent system that can only be used in limited time and condition though. Anyway we have confirmed that there is a hole in the coastal security of the Yamato side from satellite images. Although all the facilities that were possessed by the Knight Order in western Japan are all taken over and it can be said that excellent politicians are gathering there within limitation, Yamato is still a new country that was just built in a short period and they are still in a period of disorder. They have a lot of gaps.”

Period of disorder…Just like when Chūkadou was sending spies to Japan when Tokyo was destroyed. So this time it was Japan that was going to take advantage of the disorder there.

“A small type boat is being prepared for the sake of this covert operation. So only a minimum number of members needed is going to be sent to carry out the operation.”

“You said the minimum number, in other words how much is it?”

“Two persons. Actually we just want only you alone to go, but surely you are going to need a person that can interact with the Divas of Japanese Mythology. Accordingly we want the same Knight Academy student like you, Tsukahara Kazuha to mobilize together with you.”

Kazuki felt a slight nervousness in his chest. With Kazuha-senpai…just the two of them alone?

◇ ◇ ◇ ◇

“So that’s how it became like this.”

When Kazuki conveyed that development through his cell phone, “Eh…eeeeeeeeehh!?” such a loud voice was the reply. While making a wry smile toward senpai’s reaction, Kazuki had instead become even calmer.

“Somehow the date that I promised seems to be becoming a fairly romantic situation, senpai.”

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