Chapter 111 - Leap Of Faith
Your highness!
The words rang like thunder in his ears. Owen could not believe what he was hearing!
Your highness!? He scoured his memory but couldn't remember there ever being such a young figure among the royal members.
Wait a minute! The missing prince should also be around this boy's age…
Is… is he the prince?
After recovering from his concussion, Owen felt like he was doused in a basin of cold water and couldn't stop shivering in fear. He kept silent and looked up at the young figure in royal garment with trepidation.
He knew he had not left a good impression on the prince and the accumulative crimes he had committed over the years was enough to sentence him to death a hundred times over.
If the prince decides to dig into his history, his life would be as good as forfeited. That is if he was still even able to keep his life after just offending the prince.
Owen was as silent as a night owl. He did not dare to let out a single fart and awaited the prince's next words. The prince's following words would be like the edict of heaven. His life and death could be decided with a single word.
"Did my mother send you all here to defend the wall?" Leon inquired.
"Yes, her majesty has dispatched a batch of palace guards to each district and defend against the incoming crawlers. I am the one, her majesty has placed in charge of the defense for the western side, your highness." The palace guard leader, Isaac said respectfully.
The return of the prince to the royal palace was already old news. Such momentous news naturally travels through the palace very fast and every palace guard and maids were made aware of this fact from an early point.
In the off chance that someone among the palace guards did happen to not know who the prince was, then that person must have been a turd with hearing problem or have been living under rock in some unknown corners of the palace.
"I want to open the gate and let all the commoners in. Are there any problems with that?" Leon said coolly.
"There are no problems, your highness. We have been ordered to save as many commoners as we can by her majesty, before defending the wall to the best of our abilities."
"Good. Begin immediately. Much time has been lost."
"Yes, your highness!" Isaac said proudly, before turning to the other palace guards to direct them. A total of fifty palace guards have arrived.
By Leon's calculations that was a total of two hundred guards sent to the four districts. The palace most likely wasn't many palace guards left behind to guard the royal palace.
"Go open the gates!"
Isaac issued his commands, followed by a string of instructions to control the flow of commoners.
The city guards managing the wall watched on dumbly as the palace guards took over their role. They turn their heads to Owen for instructions, but he pretended they did not see him. He wanted to silently curse them.
Don't look at me dammit!
He was quite happy when the prince didn't mention him immediately when talking to the palace guard leader.
He had this vain hope that the prince had forgotten about him, but in fact, Leon had not. He was simply preoccupied with getting the commoners to start entering the Upper District as soon as possible.
Now that it was settled and the commoners began entering, he refocused his attention on Owen coldly.
"You."
"Y-Yes, your highness? What are your instructions?" Owen trembled.
"I order you and all your men to get out there and cover the commoners retreat. None of you can return if there is even one commoner left behind, do you accept?"
"Y-Y-Yes, your highness! I hear and obey." Owen complied obediently, but his face still paled at the mission.
What they had to do was not much different to a suicide mission if no one else were to assist them.
His men only consist of first step to second step awakeners, and they did not wear full body metal armor like the palace guards. Thus, they would be very vulnerable to the crawler's attacks.
The city guards heard the prince's words and paled when their captain agreed.
"Y-Your highness, there are too many people pouring in through the entrance. If we forced our way through, it will slow down the flow of people entering." A city guard protested with a poor excuse.
Leon had no intention of taking no for an answer from these pot-bellied city guards. They will do as they are told.
"Do you need me to teach you how to leave?" Leon coldly at the city guard just now.
"Y-Yes."
When the city guard answered. The others stepped away from him in fear of being implicated in whatever the prince planned do to the person.
"Very well. Let me show you how exactly you should all get out there and help the commoners without using the entrance." Leon said darkly.
Before the daring city guard could react, he was grabbed by the leg and taken over the fifty feet upper wall.
"AHHH!"
The city guard screamed as he was tossed over the wall. His unfit body landed with a thud on the roof of a nearby building in the Lower District.
Leon looked back down at the rest of the city guards and said, "Who else doesn't know how to go out?"
"We... we all know now. Thank you for your guidance, your highness."
The city guards all answered with gratitude, but they wore ugly expressions of wanting to cry. They would rather jump themselves, than be flung by the prince.
"Then get to it!"
"Y-Yes!"
Owen and the city guards all climbed up the upper wall and made the leap.
"AHHH!"
All sorts of screams came from these men as they tried to leap over to the nearest buildings, which were at least forty feet away.
Some made it, some barely made it, and some didn't. Leon didn't care. They weren't going to die from such a short fall anyway.
The ones that barely did, clung to the edges of the roof like they were clinging to their dear life. It was a very pathetic sight for these city guards who were supposed to be soldiers.
A trained first step awakener from the military would have been able to leap fifty feet long, even if they couldn't leap fifty feet high.
They only have themselves to blame for indulging themselves in the sex, alcohol and gambling over the years transformed their own trained bodies into that akin to pigs.
"Mummy, what are they doing?"
A child pointed up and asked her mother as they were following the crowds to enter the Upper District. The crowds also followed suit and looked.
"Mother doesn't know. It's better not to know."
The mother quickly covered her child's eyes as she deemed the sight of two hundred pot-bellied men leaping through the air with their dangling flesh unseemly for her child's eyes.
Others looked at it with some resentment and amusement intermixed. It was truly a sight to behold. What are flying pigs? No one really knows, but this was probably it.
Leon watched them coldly on top of the walls in case they didn't do as they were ordered. He had refrained from killing them because they had their uses, but if they continue to misbehave, he would not hesitate to execute them.
The city guards looked back and shivered. They dared not act on any funny thoughts as the prince was ever watching them like an ancient beast waiting for its prey to make a wrong move. They quickly head off to the rear to help.
"The pace is too slow..." Leon thought with a frown.
There were ten thousand commoners needing to enter, but the crawlers were closing in faster than the rate of commoners entering the Upper District. A confrontation with the crawlers was inevitable.
They were also severely undermanned.
Leon glanced over at the nobles and aristocrats doing nothing on the wall but watching. In times like these, everyone should be helping.
"Everyone, do you plan to help out or do you all just plan to stand there and watch?" Leon asked calmly.
"This… of course, we will help out… but we are not armed…" A nobleman said carefully. He was not stupid. The prince asked them a simple question, but he was implying that they should help out.
"That is not a problem. You can go collect your weapons and return. When the time comes, everyone is required to defend the wall and not let these crawlers break past."
"Yes…"
"Go now, I will remember you." Leon said placidly.
I will remember you…
The nobles and aristocrats wiped their sweats. The prince had imprinted their faces in his memory. They can't just leave and not return to help or they would be in trouble later.
After these nobles and aristocrats left to go arm themselves, Leon called for the guard leader.
"You called for me, your highness?"
"What is the defense plan?"
Hearing the prince's question, Isaac answered, "We have to hold the line until sunrise, your highness."
Leon nodded at Isaac's answer. He thought as such.
Once the sun rises from the east, the crawlers will scatter towards the light. But it will be a grueling period to defend until sun rise.
'There should also be a follow up plan to eliminate all the crawlers before they lay waste to all that lies east.'
Leon thought.