Kuro no Maou

Chapter 87 Defence Plan

In the conference room on the second floor of the guild hall, Kurono and the rest had gathered.

Not coincidentally, but because Kurono had asked them to. Along with the 3 members of [Element Masters], Vulcan of [Vulcan Powered], Irina of the [Three Hunting Princesses], skeleton magician Mozrun aka Mossan and the slime Su-san, these 7 were sitting around a big table.

Except the members of Element master, the rest still were wondering the reason to have assembled like this.

Without minding that, Kurono spread out a map of the western region of Daedalus on the table and spoke.

“Let’s start the strategy meeting of the [Adventurer Alliance]!”

The name ‘Adventurer Alliance, was obviously the name given to the Adventurers taking part in this Emergency Quest.

Kurono had grandly declared the start of the strategy meeting but,

“haa?”

The reaction of rest of the members was totally cold and vacant.

“Strategy meeting? What the hell is that?”

As the representative of every dumbfounded person here, Vulcan asked Kurono.

“Well, a strategy meeting means a strategy meeting. Everyone does that before challenging a quest as a party, right?”(kurono)

Basically what the adventurers talked about in the guild lobbies or during meals was that.

“Well that’s because it’s a party after all. For random collection of adventurers like this, the leader takes all the decisions independently; he won’t call for the other members.”

“Is that so?”

“Of course! If you start asking the opinion of every damn person, you won’t be reaching to any conclusion after all! That’s why the strongest one becomes the leader so that nobody else gets a reason to complain!!”

Vulcan’s complaint was basically similar to how animals decide their boss, but in this Pandora continent, it was normal.

If the number is small like a Party then coordinating is easy, but in cases like this where various people gather of different races and abilities, it’s best to leave it to the strongest guy to control and govern them all as Vulcan had said.

This wasn’t a peaceful land like Kurono’s Japan. Not to mention that the adventurers were mostly a gathering of rowdy ruffians. So, it was pretty much impossible to have every one peacefully listen to each other.

But, even Kurono had understood that during his 3 months as an adventurer.

Still he had proposed a strategy meeting.

“Although what Vulcan is saying is reasonable but I, a rank 1 adventurer, am still not very experienced. I’m not even well versed with the geography of this area either. Whether the plan I think is executable or not, what can each and every do and cannot, if all this is not something within my knowledge, I won’t be able to come up with an effective plan. Asking others for opinion might seem pathetic to other adventurers but I need everyone’s strength. Can you think of this as helping me and cooperate?”

On Kurono’s straight call for cooperation, the hall was completely silent.

But that silence was soon broken.

“Isn’t it fine? If the leader is asking for our knowledge then we should simply properly respond his request.”

The first one to accept the proposal was Irina.

“yeah, let’s think of all 50 here as a single party! Well, I myself am a solo guy though! Ahhahha!”

“I also agree. Kurono-san isn’t a simple minded guy it seems. He should be able to integrate every opinion properly.”

Mozrun and Su-san also gave their agreements.

Vulcan was the only one with a bitter expression but he was also, at the end, a good guy, he also didn’t mope around too much.

“Can’t be helped, we should look after our inexperienced Leader after all!”(Vulcan)

“ Thanks, that saved me the trouble. As Mossan said, lets think of all us as a single paty and complete this quest together.”

Kurono relaxed after everyone decided to help.

It seems that yesterday’s battle against the scout troop had earned him proper trust from others.

Everyone here, except the 3 from Element Master, were famous in the area for their abilities. If he got their help, it would be easier to cooperate with the other adventurers as well.

Due to Kurono asking them for their proper cooperation, it could be said the Adventurer Alliance increased its solidarity by 1 level.

“So, what are we here to decide? Something like that Scorched earth tactic you used yesterday?”

“That was just a mere trick to slow down the enemy; it’s not a tactic to properly stop them.”

Although it was a trick, it needed to be done as quickly as possible so Kurono had postponed the meeting till today and had gone to Irz Village yesterday.

“Stop them? Is there any other way except fighting?”

“Yeah, aren’t we going to lie in wait for them here in the sturdy gates of Kuar?”

Normally thinking, that was the only way.

In the first place, the people of Pandora didn’t put much emphasis on tactics and strategies.

Thus, in cases of battling with large numbers, they only thought about the division between rear guard and vanguard and also finding a spacious place to fight properly.

“No, that won’t work.”

But, Kurono thought.

Kurono Maou who was a part of the literature club and was someone who aimed to mass produce those painful chuuni novels as a high schooler, he was much more knowledgeable about [Battles] than others.

Of course, that knowledge was something only that could satisfy an intellectual, but whether he could apply it in reality would be a totally different matter.

Although, even Kurono doesn’t expect these tactics to show 100% effect as shown in text books and heroic legends.

After risking his life countless times in battles, he even doubted that these were only optimistic theories that would only work in his own fantasy.

But again, Kurono didn’t have anything else to rely on either.

A boy of only 17 yrs old, the experience of such cases he had was almost nil after all. Especially in cases involving ‘tactics’.

If these adventurers had actual proper strategies and tactics, Kurono would not have even meddled like this.

But as expected, to execute these tactics, he needed the advice of the veterans of this world.

Kurono wasn’t very confident regarding his own strategy but, without showing that on his face, he started to explain it.

“We’ll abandon Kuar. Our defensive line will be——“

Kurono’s finger pointed towards a point on the map.

“Daedalus’ westernmost village of Alzas.”

Alzas village was a village that existed alongside the giant Rone river that flowed from the Gallahad mountain ranges. It was a village of the same size as Irz.

It had the Rone river on its east side where the main gate was, and a tributary called Haren by its west side which had the back gate of the village. It was like a small island between 2 rivers.

“Using the Adventurer Guild on the banks of Rone river as the fortress, we’ll stop the Crusaders at the front gate of Alzas.”

“Why does it have to be there? The walls and gate surrounding Kuar are better. And the guild of Alzas is not especially sturdy either.”

Irina had gone to Alzas it seems, but Kurono had not.

But Kurono’s impression that Alzas had the same level of facilities as Irz was proven true by her explanation.

“What’s more important is the terrain rather than the facilities. By that, I am talking about the big river that’ll be in front of us. I’ll ask this just in case, but does anyone here has any experience in fighting army troops?”(kurono)

Except Fiona, who was an ex-merc, nobody raised their hands.

These guys were adventurers, not soldiers after all, so it wasn’t really surprising.

“Rank 4 adventurers should have plenty of experience fighting monsters like goblins who fight in large groups, right? But the Crusaders aren’t on the level of those wild monsters. They have huge numbers and are also highly trained making them able to use coordinated attacks.”

Last night, Fiona explained Kurono about the difference between the armies of Daedalus and Syncrea Republic.

Human armies have the knowledge regarding, chain of commands, strategies, formations etc. from a long period of time.

But on the other hand, demon armies left everything to individual strength and only acted as a one large group under a single boss.

As Kurono wondered whether to fight on the plains (Kuar) or to use the rivers (Alzas), he realized that he himself wasn’t very experienced in fighting in big groups and organisations.

“As the individual strength got stronger, they could easily handle weak monsters who were large in numbers but that won’t work with a human army. No matter how strong they are, if they were attacked after being surrounded by 100 or 1000 soldiers, they’ll face the same end as a rank 1 adventurer surrounded and tortured to death by goblins.

Basically, if only 50 of us fought in a place as wide as Kuar village, we’ll be surrounded and annihilated by the enemy army.”

Although Kuar had a pretty sturdy wall so they won’t lose instantly, but the result will still be the same was what Kurono meant.

“Humans don’t have any special abilities as compared to other races so we can limit their movements a lot with simply rivers.”

There were races like the lizardmen and Mermaids that won’t be deterred by something like rivers, but the opponents were only humans.

“Attacking an enemy as they are defenceless while crossing the river is a basic strategy.”

“fuun, well leading the enemy towards an advantageous terrain is something everyone does. Also, if the enemy will come directly from the highway then there were no troubles like leading and baiting them there like monsters.”

“Even a roughly gathered group of adventurers can at least perform a proper ambush.”

“Exactly. Then I’ll tell the more specific details regarding this now. Which one of them can be done and who will do them is what we need to decide now. Unfortunately, we don’t have the time to discuss it at ease. Let’s quickly wrap things up here and get to work!”(kurono)