Stain

“Hibiki, are you sure this is right?” Fallem asked me.

“It’s the only way.” I responded.

I learned that the girl with pine green hair was named Fallem. I had needed an assistant to help deal with all the requests of the other members in the revolution and assigned Fallem to do the job. The requests some of the members were making were far too outrageous for one person to handle.

For instance, some of them were asking to take the place of some of the nobles after we had won the battle. That would be incredibly stupid. If they took the place of the nobles it wouldn’t fix anything. The hands of power would just switch. It would basically make the point of the rebellion minute.

What we realistically had to do was tear down all positions of power. We got rid of the monarchy long ago back in my world for a reason. While I had my gripes with democracy, at least it worked in my world. It wasn’t perfect but it was far better than what this kingdom had. However, positions of power were the least of my least concerns.

For the moment there was nothing else I wanted from this rebellion than to burn the Capital to cinders. The aftermath was of little concern for me and I would probably leave someone competent to take care of it. If I was to assign someone to take care of it right now. it would probably be Fallem.

She seemed the most responsible out of everyone here and at least showed some concern for the future. For someone to be in charge, they have to listen to the issues of everyone and make the most informed decision. The only problem she had was that she struggled to put her foot down on things.

With some direction under my leadership, I hope that can be fixed. It had started getting better recently, but it’s still not to the point I would prefer it to be. Maybe I should tell Fallem my plan and then assign her more tasks so she has more experience.

“Do we really need to kill them?” Fallem questioned me.

“Yes we do.” I spoke, remembering what we were in the middle of talking about.

“They were just misguided.”

“They sold information to our enemy. You should hate them just as much as I do. We have no use for people in our way.” I retorted.

The group of three on their knees in front of me had betrayed us. I had identified them a while ago and had some people follow them around to see their movements. It seemed that the old hideout’s location, the one where I had made my debut, was leaked by them. They were collaborating with the guards to lure everyone into the hideout where they would exterminate us all at once.

I had a feeling the old base was far too obvious not to be noticed. When I heard that it was suggested by members not even at the top and that everyone just blindly followed them, it started to raise my suspicions a bit. It’s a good thing I had us change base. It appeared that the old place was raided soon after we had switched.

“Shouldn’t we question them at least?” Fallem pleaded.

“Fallem, I understand you don’t like killing, but there is no way we can get information out of them.” I explained.

“But if we just torture them we can ge--.”

“We can’t torture them. If we do that, we would fall to the level of those like Clauffer and The Mad Mage.”

“But killing them seems so…”

“I know, but if we let them go, they’ll spread too much of our information.” I reminded her.

She was not able to argue with what I had just explained, instead settling for looking at the ground and holding her left arm with her right hand. She didn’t handle death the best. It made me worry about how she would handle the deaths in the revolution.

“Kill them in the other room!” I ordered the man and the woman guarding the room.

In reality they didn’t have too much information on our plans, so they weren’t going to be of much use to the kingdom in that department. The only issue with letting them go, however, was that they knew what most of our members looked like and would be able to identify them when asked. I couldn’t take that chance. They would all be killed in the same manner as Flint and Allirea were.

As they were escorted out, they had fear riddled across their faces. Their pitiable state made me want to stop the people dragging them out as it started to hurt my chest. I knew better than to stop them, however. I knew they were just trying to get any sympathy they could find from me, but it still hurt to see.

“Fallem.” I called to her, causing her to look towards me.

“Y-yes?” She wondered.

“Are you really going to be able to handle all this revolution business? If you ask me, you should run off now before things start going cra-.”

“NO!” She yelled, stopping me from finishing.

At the firm rejection of what I had just been saying, I could only stare at her in disbelief. This had been the first time I had heard her yell at me, let alone ever speak so loudly. The new sight could only shock me into silence and wait for her to continue.

“Uhm, I’m sorry.” Her tone returned to being airy.

“It’s fine.” I responded, quelling her fear.

“It’s just that, after my brother…”

“Fallem?”

“It’s just that since he went missing, I could only have hatred for the people in power in this terrible kingdom!”

“I get that, but are you sure it’s enough to watch all the brutalities that are about to occur?”

“Yes. I hate killing, but I hate them more!”

“Are you prepared to see others die as well?”

“Others?”

“Obviously our side would suffer casualties, and so would many innocents.” I reminded her.

Her expression was quite shocked at the explanation. It seemed ever since I introduced the guns to the people, every person in this group had firmly believed our victory would be easy. No one for a moment doubted the fact that with this firepower we would lose.

Well no one but me. I know for this world guns are very powerful due to their speed and the fact that we paired them with magic crystals, but there was still an issue. The model of gun I made wasn’t perfect. Not only would it take at least thirty seconds between shots, the bullets also moved slower than a normal gun in my world.

This speed issue was only further compounded when using the magic crystals, the added power only served to make the bullets even slower. While it wasn’t a major issue to the people which comprised our forces, it did worry me greatly. This was because I wasn’t quite sure what a strong mage was able to do.

We haven’t had the chance to test these new weapons on mages. We have no idea how they would fare. The time between shot and target would be enough for some people to react. However, the real issue was that even if they were able to realize what was happening, was magic even strong enough to stop these bullets?

Not knowing this information could cost us greatly, but it may also be fair to assume that they could work due to how everyone else was reacting. I’m sure some of them had at least dealt with some mages before, so if they were to scale the power of the two, then being hopeful about our power does signify something.

Even then, the mages they could have encountered may have also been weak. I’ve met a few mages since joining the revolution. Their power wasn’t great but they did have some strength which, when paired with the rifles, made them far more powerful. While I hadn’t met any strong mages in the revolution, I did meet one who was particularly adept at it.

I couldn’t quite confirm it, but the power Celestia could conjure up seemed very great. When we met, she was able to cast electric magic and blow it past my head like it was nothing. It was even strong enough to sear the wall. Not to mention she was able to heal all my injuries in one go instead of going through each one individually.

Compared to her, the mages I met who could use electric magic couldn’t use it nearly as fast or as strong. Comparatively, Celestia could’ve been a power plant and them, dinky generators at best. When comparing her healing magic to that of our members, once again she was quicker. Our members could only heal one wound at a time while she had done all of mine at once.

Another peculiarity of her power was that she used two types of magic while our mages only focused on a singular type of magic. You’d think if they focused on one type of magic for their entire lives they would exceed someone who had learned two, but seeing it in action, it appears that was not the case. That or maybe she just had far too much talent.

I wish we had Celestia on our side, but I haven’t been able to find her since. With her capabilities, we may not even need an army to take care of the plan. Hell, maybe even these guns I worked so hard on would end up useless compared to her. Seriously, where did she go?

Not only was she missing, I kept hearing of this Mad Mage. They also seemed to be very powerful and sadistic. The things I heard them do sicken me to no end. I guess just like people, not all mages are as noble as Celestia. She would heal a stranger just because they were in need, but I’d imagine others would exploit that situation for their own gain.

“Fallem, I have something to tell you.” I broke from my train of thought to make sure I told her this before I forgot.

“W-what is it?” She responded, slightly weary of the silence I had just broken.

“After the main battle is finished, I’ll need you to take care of the rebel forces.”

“What do you mean?”

“What I mean is that you’ll need to guide them properly and make sure none of them turn out to be the nobles we despise.”

“But how can I?”

“You have everything you need already. You’re smart, capable and listen to others. You’ll do great. Just say ‘no’ a little more.”

“When you say it like that you make it sound like you won’t come back.”

“Well, there’s no guarantee I’ll survive. Once this is over I may end up as the most hated man on the continent.” I explained while leaning back in my chair.

“You have to make it back!”

“I don’t plan on it obviously. I don’t want to die just as much as the next guy. But still, it’s good to be prepared.”

“I see.”

“Also, if we lose, you’ll need to guide as many survivors as you can away from Milarch.”

“Huh?”

“If we lose, it would be better to move to a different country to regroup and seek refuge.”

“I see.” She responded, her spirits slightly lowered.

As we had finished speaking, the blonde haired woman whose name I learned to be Frisca came waltzing in. She came alone but looked as though she had a lot to say.

“Frisca! How did it go?” I questioned.

“Pieron has completed the gun order and I have brought them with me.” She replied.

“Perfect.”

“There was a minor issue however.”

“What was it?”

“We can’t replicate the power of your gun. It seems for some reason when you use the magic crystal on the gun, it’s far stronger.”

Could this be some special power I have? Right! A hint of light glinted from my finger and I looked to the source. I had forgotten about the ring since I had joined the revolution, but now it captivated me. This must’ve been it. Cordelia’s ring was the source of my power. Every time I shot using the fire crystal, the ring would start glowing.

“Interesting. Well it should be fine as long as they work.” I responded to the information.

“I have some more information I picked up as well.” She continued.

“Go on.”

“Yes! It seems the Craviot Church has started gathering more followers.”

“Hmm. Are they pretty big?”

“Not really, I’ve only really heard they have around thirty people in total before. With a couple people here and there, they shouldn’t have too many.”

I see. It’s true that they don’t really have the potential to be a possible threat, but it is a little concerning that they are gathering members now. It could just be that due to all the things going on, people have decided to take solace in religion. It was fairly common, in my world you would see people start becoming religious as they aged.

With how minor they were, they wouldn’t be too much of an issue. They wouldn’t be able to mobilize that quickly considering we would begin with a surprise attack. We would have time to regroup if they did try something.

The real issue would be any other nations attacking after we started. We’ve made some negotiations with other nations, Pieron in particular, but the threat was still there.

“Is that all the information you were able to pick up?” I pressed further as it looked like she knew more.

“Well, it would seem Clauffer Von Verse is making a trip to the Capital and should arrive in three days.” She informed.

“Hahahahahahaha!” I laughed loudly.

This was great. Not only did we finally have all the weapons and ammunition we needed, it aligned perfectly for me to kill Clauffer. Such a great thing could not have happened even if I tried to plan it. I’ll finally be able to wash out that stain from this world.