Became a Strategist with a 100 Intelligence and 100\% Accuracy-Chapter 304: Blind Spot of a Hardcore Player (4)

“What are you talking about? Retreating the troops all of a sudden...? What kind of ridiculous nonsense is that?”

Epinnel’s expression was one of utter disbelief, yet the soldier reporting to her didn’t flinch. He held her gaze firmly as he continued.

“It’s true! There was this enormous sound—like a bolt of lightning striking the earth—and then the fortress just collapsed...!”

“Were there any witnesses?”

“No direct ones... but General, do you really think I’d bring you lies?”

It didn’t feel like some baseless rumor or panic-fueled exaggeration.

Still, Epinnel knew that she wouldn’t be able to grasp the full picture just by hearing about it.

“Can you take me there right now?”

“Ah—yes! Right away!”

Epinnel quickly assembled a recon party and headed for the location where Serpina’s fortress had once stood.

Something felt strange.

It had been so long—

She realized she could feel her heart pounding again.

***

“This is...”

The place Epinnel arrived at was—

No, had been—Serpina’s fortress.

It had been completely and utterly destroyed.

For a moment, all she could do was stand there in stunned silence, overwhelmed by the scale of the devastation.

“What in the world happened here...? It’s like an earthquake tore through this place...”

“There’s no sign of that. If it had been an earthquake, we would’ve felt it all the way back at Valharat Castle.”

“Then how...?”

As Epinnel stood there, confused by the incomprehensible scene before her, a familiar voice rang out from behind.

“...It came true...!”

“Yuri...?”

The soldiers accompanying Epinnel immediately turned and saluted the supreme commander of their nation as she approached.

“Emma... Hernandorf... They helped us...!”

“What...??”

“If not that, then how do you explain this, Epinnel? How do you explain the enemy’s fortress suddenly collapsing like this, while everything else remains intact?”

“No, but even so, that doesn’t prove Emma or Hernandorf had anything to do with it—”

“It does prove it!”

Yuri cut her off with a sharp, unwavering cry.

“I told you they came to me in my dream! That a path to the heavens had opened, and all they needed was our devotion! This is the proof! You know as well as I do—if there’s a path to the heavens, we can access power as strong as magic!”

“What do you even... Wait, don’t tell me—”

“That’s right.”

Yuri nodded vigorously, eyes closed, as if in reverence.

“When Swen was in the Brans Army and called down a ‘miracle’ from the sky—the stones from the heavens—he was holding a ritual. And Swen... isn’t a mage. So there’s only one possible conclusion.”

With that, she knelt to the ground.

The soldiers, bewildered but unwilling to defy the highest authority present, followed suit.

It was a breathtaking sight—rows of warriors dropping to their knees, unsure why, but compelled to follow.

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Yuri didn’t seem to care about their gaze.

With eyes shining, she looked up at the sky and declared:

“It worked! Our sincerity reached the heavens! The path has been opened!”

The only one still standing, Epinnel cautiously asked,

“So... are you saying some kind of stone or... something fell from the sky?”

“I don’t know what it was! But something powerful enough to level this fortress—something acted here!”

“Something... like that?”

“Yes. Something like that.”

Epinnel still wasn’t entirely convinced—but she couldn’t deny it either.

Yuri’s explanation... sounded plausible.

And more than that—

Part of her wanted it to be true.

Normally, Epinnel would have taken a more rational approach.

But this was no ordinary moment.

They were facing a battle they couldn’t win.

She’d already resigned herself to doing as much damage as possible before dying.

So Yuri’s words—outlandish as they were—shone like a single beam of light piercing through hopeless darkness.

Something unbelievable?

Just a few years ago, anyone who talked about mages would’ve been laughed out of the room.

But now?

No one doubted their existence.

The first mage had appeared in the northern continent.

The second had emerged in the south.

Eyewitness accounts from countless soldiers...

Magic was no longer legend. It was reality.

And the idea of “communing with the heavens” wasn’t so far-fetched either.

Swen, once their ally, had once summoned boulders from the sky through a ritual.

If that truly came not from his own abilities but from communion with the heavens—

Then couldn’t they do the same?

And crucially—there was no benefit for Serpina in staging something like this.

If she really wanted to crush Aishus, she would’ve simply brought overwhelming force and flattened them like a piece of cake.

Even Epinnel herself, if she’d been in Serpina’s shoes with 200,000 troops, could’ve conquered what remained of the Aishus Army in under a week.

This translation is the intellectual property of Novelight.

So maybe...

Maybe they had reached the heavens.

Maybe, as Yuri said, Emma and Hernandorf were helping them.

Just like a mage suddenly emerged in other nations...

Was it really so impossible for a miracle to happen here, too?

And slowly but surely еven Epinnel’s heart began to waver.

***

After that, the same kind of strange occurrences began happening repeatedly.

Every time Serpina’s forces tried to establish a new front line for an invasion, vivid eyewitness accounts soon followed—describing how those lines had suddenly collapsed.

Before long, reports emerged that Serpina’s soldiers were deserting en masse. The suspected cause? A wave of nightmares and auditory hallucinations. What stood out most was the content of those nightmares.

Multiple soldiers gave the same bizarre testimony:

“A knight clad in blue armor is after my head.”

It wasn’t just one or two people—it was many.

And of all people, Epinnel and Yuri were the ones who knew best:

That the blue armor being described was the very same one Emma had always worn.

“Now do you see, Epinnel? Do you understand now—that our hearts have reached Emma and Hernandorf?”

“Maybe... maybe it really is true.”

“That’s why we have to express our sincerity even more! Preparing for war won’t help us—we can’t win. We’ll only be captured and executed! Even if we inflict losses, it won’t change our fate!”

“But we’re not alone! Our comrades are with us—even watching over us from the heavens! And now, the world is finally starting to recognize how deeply, how truly, we’ve held onto our comrades in our hearts!”

“Mmh...”

Epinnel was wavering.

And then—

Bang!

The doors to the audience chamber burst open, and a one-armed woman strode in.

“Anima...?”

“I heard everything. Is it true, Yuri? That you’re expanding the altar?”

Yuri answered coldly.

“Anima. Don’t tell me you’re still clinging to your own interpretation?”

“I mean—come on, Yuri! Do you really believe we’re communicating with the heavens? What Swen did back then—it was just magic! There’s no such thing as a ‘connection to the heavens’!”

“It wasn’t magic. He’s not a mage.”

“You can’t prove that with certainty!”

“And you can’t prove that the concept of a connection to the heavens doesn’t exist, either.”

“T-That’s just twisting words. Yuri, please, come to your senses!”

“You’re the one who needs to wake up, Anima. You...”

And then—

Tears fell from Yuri’s eyes.

Anima froze, shocked to see her like that.

“Hernandorf charged into enemy territory alone—he risked everything to save you. Emma... she said she’d kneel to Serpina if it meant saving your life. Those two... did everything for you. So how can you... say something so heartless?”

“I... I didn’t...”

I never asked them to do [N O V E L I G H T] that.

I never wanted them to sacrifice themselves for me.

But she couldn’t bring herself to say the words.

“It’s too cruel. It’s all too cruel... The heavens have finally heard our prayers. It’s finally our turn... So why...?”

“Anima. Come with me.”

Sensing Yuri needed time to collect herself, Epinnel stepped in and led Anima out of the audience chamber.

“Epinnel. Don’t tell me you’re siding with Yuri too?”

“Before we get into that, I want to know what you think. What do you believe is causing all this?”

“I... I think it’s all an act. Orchestrated by Serpina. Who else could pull something like this off but her?”

“And the fortress that collapsed?”

“She has a mage. Creating a collapse with magic isn’t impossible.”

“Fine. What about the mass desertions?”

“Maybe she spread rumors among the soldiers. Or faked the reports. There are ways to stage that.”

“So you’re saying all the collapsing front lines, all the wasted supplies... all of that is a massive ruse?”

“If not, how else do you explain it? That Emma and Hernandorf are fighting for us from heaven? That kind of thing doesn’t happen!”

Epinnel sighed softly and looked her in the eyes.

“Alright, Anima. Let’s say everything you said is true. You’re smart—you’ve probably thought this through. Then here’s the one question I still have—why?”

“Why would Serpina go through all this? What does she gain?”

“......!!”

Anima turned pale. She couldn’t answer.

She had reached that same question before. But no matter how she looked at it, she couldn’t find a convincing reason why Serpina would do such a thing.

“You know as well as I do—there’s no way we can win against Serpina’s forces. We don’t have mages, our numbers are a fraction of theirs. We’ve lost the people’s trust, and the enemy’s morale is far higher. That’s why you wanted to negotiate with Serpina in the first place, isn’t it?”

“...Yeah. You’re right.”

“So in Serpina’s position, she could’ve just crushed us. Why waste her time faking all this? To mock us? Anima, I hate that woman—but I know one thing: She’s not the type to waste time on inefficient theatrics. And you know that too.”

Epinnel watched Anima’s silence for a moment, then grabbed her wrist.

“...Come with me, Anima. I have something to show you.”

***

They arrived by carriage at a ruined site near Valharat Castle.

It had once been a small frontline fortress used by Serpina’s forces. freeweɓnovel.cѳm

“This is...”

Like the previous site, the entire structure was reduced to rubble.

But this time—

There was blood. Everywhere.

The stench of rot clawed at their noses.

Crushed beneath the rubble were bits of armor marked with Serpina’s insignia—

And inside, unidentifiable, decaying flesh.

It was horrific. Like something from their academy days.

“Anima. Let me ask you one more time. Are you saying Serpina staged all this? That she did this to her own soldiers?”

“......”

“I know she’s cold enough to sacrifice her own troops without flinching. But right now—no matter how logically I look at it—there’s nothing for her to gain here. That’s why I’m betting against your theory. Unless, of course, you can tell me—what does she gain from all this?”

“Epinnel...”

“If you can’t explain it, then I’ll stand with Yuri. She’s our leader. And there’s no law that says we can’t use miracles like other nations use magic.”

Anima couldn’t say a word as Epinnel turned away.

Or rather—at this point, even Anima had begun to wonder.

Could it be real?

Are Emma and Hernandorf... really helping us?

Did Yuri’s prayers... truly reach them?

It was a thought too sweet—too perfectly timed—to ignore.

***

After that day, the Aishus Army diverted all their remaining wartime resources into expanding the altar.

Stories continued to spread—

That Serpina’s forces were thrown into chaos by some unknown power.

That even a rebellion had erupted near the border.

To Yuri, these were the sweetest reports she could possibly hear.

When rumors began circulating that Serpina’s army was fracturing over whether to continue the invasion or not—

She knew, with absolute certainty—

We’ve connected with the heavens. The bond between the five of us... the heavens have not forsaken it!

“We’ll make it through! With the strength of our comrades, we’ll overcome this trial... And with my own hands—I’ll take Serpina’s life, our enemy’s, once and for all...!!”

——And then.

“Commander!!”

At the sacred hour of prayer, a soldier came running, breathless. Yuri stopped praying. The officers standing guard rushed to intercept the intruder.

“What’s going on?! No one is to interrupt the prayers—!”

“Urgent news! I know I’ve committed a grave offense, but this must be reported...!”

“......!!”

Yuri’s eyes fell on the crimson armband the soldier wore. It meant only one thing.

——And it didn’t take long for Yuri to realize just how foolish it had been to believe that building altars and offering prayers would be enough to overcome the coming trials.