Virtually every route from the Bernina Mountains to Saint Matilene could be considered firmly in Jean Beltois's grasp. Apart from a handful of staunchly loyalist lords, every domain that lived off the trade routes would gladly submit to him. Even among the loyalists, there was no guarantee they remained loyal to the royal house under the present circumstances.

“Eugene.”

“Boss!! How are you here already...?”

“You need to learn how to ride all over again.”

Catching up with the party that had left ahead of him, Ivan surveyed their surroundings. At this pace, they would never shake off any pursuit. Even he, hardly an accomplished horseman, had caught up with these greenhorns without much difficulty. They seemed exhausted after climbing through the night and crossing a battlefield, but the real “battlefield” lay ahead.

“You have two options.”

“Sorry?”

“Split up here and make your own way to Saint Matilene. That would ensure at least one of you arrives. In that case...”

“I would die.”

“Probably.”

Ivan nodded at Oscar's words. Of all of them, he would be the one the great counts most wanted eliminated right now.

“We can't do that!”

“Exactly! How could we abandon a friend?”

Isabelle and Esidisi immediately cried out. Ivan nodded quietly.

If Oscar died here, they would lose their justification for taking command of the capital's troops and attempting to defend it. Without the authority of the Grand Duke of Etakrich, everyone here was effectively an outsider.

“Or we could dangle a different bait. Elpihera.”

“What?! I-I'm the bait?!”

“No. I am.”

“Huh...?”

Ivan took out a map and tossed it to Elpihera. It was a military map obtained directly by Counterintelligence Command. She looked it over once, then asked quietly.

“I know I'm hardly the one to say this, but is giving an elf a military map wise...?”

“The Privy Council will already have a military map of Thilles anyway. It's hardly a valuable secret.”

“... You could at least pretend you trust me... So what should I do?”

“You need to create a spell. Now.”

Ivan brought his horse alongside hers and set a finger on the map in her hands.

“This map isn't precisely to scale. Use it only as a reference. Can you follow my directions exactly?”

“You mean I should measure the distance we travel as we go?”

“Precisely.”

“That won't be a difficult spell.”

Starting at one corner of the map, Ivan began tracing a winding line, sometimes turning sharply, sometimes curving gently.

“From Pierrecourt, two kilometers northwest at 120 degrees. Then take Street 27 on the right and go another five kilometers toward Rocheval. When you find the railway, cross without stopping and continue nine kilometers to Tiribul...”

His explanation flowed smoothly, clear and helpful, as though he were retracing a route he had always known. None of them could have described their own hometowns that way. The party stared blankly at his face.

“... Then another nine kilometers, keeping the road from Lausanne to Sauvar on your left. Once you reach Saint Matilene's southern boulevard, ride straight to the royal castle at full speed. Understood?”

“Nine kilometers from Lausanne to Sauvar... Yes. Yes, I've memorized it all.”

“On this mission, scouting will be your responsibility alone. The moment you take a wrong turn, the whole party dies. Can you do it?”

“If I say I can't, will you let me off?”

“We'll take the other option, and Oscar will die instead.”

“Wow. Listen to this man threaten me.”

Elpihera grumbled, twitching her ears.

“Fine. We Grikencoses have good memories, you know.”

“I know.”

Her father had been the same. Ivan chuckled and gently ruffled her hair.

“...?!”

“!!!”

Everyone stared at him in shock. Even Elpihera was so startled that her ears stood straight up.

Meeting their stares, Ivan turned away and wheeled his horse around.

“What about you, mister?!”

“Bait.”

“Won't that be... far too dangerous?”

“Our odds of survival are higher if I'm the one in danger.”

“Ugh...”

CLOP, CLOP.

Ivan's horse carried him away in the opposite direction. Isabelle shouted after him.

“Just you wait! I mean it! I'll catch up to you soon enough, and then you won't ever be able to say that again!”

“I look forward to it.”

“Wait! Sir Yeremov! Do you have any advice for us once we reach Saint Matilene?”

“If you believe something must be done, don't hesitate. Whatever it is.”

As befitted the Hero's Party.

His voice scattered on the wind. At the fork in the mountain road, his figure gradually vanished from sight.

The party watched him go for a moment, then spurred their horses onward. They had a long way to travel, and Saint Matilene had little time left. Too many lives were at stake for them to fail now, to give up now. It was time to act as the Hero's Party should.

* * *

A good agent never planned an operation around a single objective. An operation on a given front inevitably comprised the corps' grand strategy, essential objectives, and the supporting objectives needed to achieve them. Thus, Ivan scanned his surroundings as he urged his horse faster.

Countless spies infested these mountains. Wherever the party went, escaping their notice would be difficult. Especially with such a conspicuous group. That made his task simple: minimize the pressure on those youngsters.

That was why he had plotted their route himself. A direct run would inevitably draw pursuers, so he had sent them along the borders of domains belonging to staunch royalists or lords who owed no allegiance to Count Jean Beltois. It would prevent the count from daring to deploy a large force without justification. That would suffice. They could handle a small pursuit force. They had to be able to.

He could hardly step in to look after them in every situation.

“Just a little longer.”

Patting his horse's hot neck, Ivan crouched low and stared ahead.

To minimize the pressure on the Hero's Party, he needed to divert the counts' attention. He had to become a greater nuisance than the Hero's Party. Than Gilles Vert's eldest legitimate son.

And as it happened, he understood their grand strategy. He also understood the objectives essential to achieving it. Combine those two things with his knowledge of the military map, and discerning their tactical outline and supporting objectives was not difficult.

It was a kind of reverse engineering. If my goal were clear, and I knew precisely what resources I had, what would I do? Following that train of thought allowed him to deduce the scope of their movements. And that told him what they wanted most right now.

A trained agent had to be capable of doing whatever the enemy would hate most. Thwarting their most coveted objective, becoming the greatest possible nuisance, and thereby making himself impossible to ignore.

In Krasilof, the bait bit the prey.

* * *

'The demons' vanguard has three main invasion routes across the Bernina Mountains.'

To slip through the Eastern Front, they could travel in groups no larger than a single detachment. Anything larger was unsuitable for covert infiltration, and the tauruses that formed the enemy's main force were beasts with exceptionally high caloric needs. Assuming they supplied themselves entirely through pillaging, their total numbers could not exceed two thousand.

If they split up a force of that size, even the god of strategy could not take them beyond a few domains. Their offensive would reach its culmination point far too soon.

Demons revered strength alone. That meant that without their commanders nearby, there was no adequately controlling individual soldiers who did as they pleased. They would inevitably enter as a single warband. A detachment massed like that could not erase its tracks.

'When they raid and burn the surrounding domains, Count Guillaume rescues them and wins the royalists' support.'

He would piggyback on that operation. Faster than Guillaume, cleverer than Guillaume. He needed to copy the man's operation and seize what he wanted a step ahead of him. Save the domains from the demon threat. Win the royalists' support and muster at least a modest military force.

That would yield three main benefits. First, it would wreck Count Guillaume's plan. Second, it would allow him to strike Count Etouan's corps from the rear. Third, raising troops near Count Jean Beltois's domain would tie down the man's corps and his attention.

While chipping away at the three great counts' plans from outside, he could also fulfill Eugene's Quest:

'Keep the number of destroyed domains at 15 or fewer.'

If the demon guerrillas' offensive proceeded as planned, Count Guillaume would not move until at least seven domains were burning.

A good agent never planned an operation to achieve just one objective at a time. And...

'I've done this before.'

Doing something a second time was no hardship once one had done it once.

Ultimately, all he had to do was defeat the demons' vanguard and rouse potentially friendly domains to action. A series of simple chores, no different from the Extermination Unit's usual work.

* * *

Ivan ran his hands over the haphazardly broken trees and churned earth, then dusted them off. After two days spent scouring every projected demon route, his horse had already collapsed from exhaustion.

He took a nutrition bar from inside his coat and chewed it into small pieces. A familiar smell, and familiar surroundings. The rank stench of demons hung thick in the air not far away.

He had spent two days searching the Bernina Mountains for traces of demons. This was the last suspected infiltration point.

“Two days.”

Their operation must have begun with the dragons' arrival, putting him roughly two days behind by his calculations.

Once an infiltration unit composed entirely of tauruses had successfully begun invading undefended domains, how many villages would have burned in two days? That could be calculated.

'Five.'

If they targeted farming villages of one hundred to five hundred households, they would have burned at least five to feed a warband of this size. Tauruses were carnivorous beasts. They ate humans. With great relish.

Ivan had seen it before. Back then, it had been commonplace. He closed his mouth and began descending the mountainside, pistol in hand.