Making plans

As the soldiers outlines grew closer you could visibly see Shin spring up ready to attack. As the soldiers exited the treeline I let out a sigh of relief because I recognized those soldiers as the remnants of Sho Bun Kun army with Sho Bun Kun leading them from the front towards the King.

As soon as Shin saw Sho Bun Kun he ran straight over to get an explanation for his best friends death only for the minister to walk straight past him without so much as sparing a glance. Once Sho reached the king he got down on one knee.

" I am so happy that you are safe your highness " Sho Bun Kun shouted with tears coming down his face showing how he was truly happy that the King was unharmed.

Once the initial greetings were out of the way the soldiers sat down to eat the provisions prepared by the minister for this occasion. As the soldiers ate the minister and more important soldiers such as Heki sat down with the King and discussed what went wrong with their escape.

" It was general Ou Ki your majesty, he ambushed our convoy as we were escaping causing us to be separated " recounted Sho Bun Kun with clear anger on his face remembering the night when hundreds of his soldiers were killed.

At this point Shin was clearly very angsty and yelled " what happened to Hyou ".

Heki asked permission to say what happened and once he did he told his account of that night where Hyou valiantly led the soldiers to make an escape while acting as the king which allowed the actual King to get away safely.

Shin coming to terms with what happened to Hyou then asked what the King would do with him and if he could make Shin a general which caused the soldiers who were clearly exhausted to nearly beat him up.

After a few more rounds of back and forth between Shin and Ei Sei, Shin reaffirmed his goal of becoming a great general.

After their bantering finished the top brass moved inside to discuss the specifics. As I moved to go inside the minister asked Ei Sei who I was.

" He is our strongest combat force for the moment " replied Ei Sei " He can join in with us, so can Shin " continued Ei Sei after taking a brief look at the two of us.

" Very well your Majesty " acquiesced Sho Bun Kun while looking at me with a surprised expression.

Everything that happened in the building was identical to the manga and with them realizing that we would have no further help and that gaining the mountains people help was necessary to regain the throne. We began packing and getting ready to walk into the wild mountains the home of the maiju the warriors who could defeat armies more than ten times their size or so goes the legend. I was delegated by Sho Bun Kun to protect the king once he saw some of my skills personally realizing that I could better protect the king in the mountains then he could.

After a few hours of hiking it was quickly becoming apparent that many of the soldiers were too exhausted or wounded to continue hiking at the pace set by the king.

" Your highness can we slow down otherwise many of your soldiers won't be able to continue" pleaded Sho Bun Kun to Ei Sei.

" No we keep moving, anybody who can't keep up is to return to the meeting point and await our return " countered Ei Sei surprising almost everybody with his answer.

" But your highness if we leave the soldiers will will protect you " demanded Sho Bun Kun.

" I feel hurt " I jokingly commented hoping to and successfully getting a reaction out of Sho Bun Kun who turned in my direction.

" With all due respect, we barely know you and I would feel much better if his majesty had a company of guards with him than a single swordsman no matter how skilled he may be" he responded before once more turning to the king.

" Sho Bun Kun, do you really think that even if we brought all these soldiers they could protect me from the mountain king's soldiers who are descendant's of the maiju" replied Ei Sei before continuing " we will keep this pace and the soldiers who can't continue will descend the mountains" .

" Very well your majesty " said Sho Bun Kun seemingly agreeing before turning around and shouting at he soldiers behind " If you can no longer continue descend the mountains and I won't have any backtalk ".

After a few more days of hiking and climbing with the only entertainment being the constant yelling from Shin and the history lessons from Ei Sei on the mountain people we are closing in on the territory of the mountain King. At this point besides myself and the comedic duo there are only around ten soldiers that managed to keep up along with Heki and the more elderly Sho Bun Kun who seemed that he was continuing only because of his will to protect the king. I knew from the manga that we would soon be ambushed by the mountain people so I was constantly keeping a watch. I had already discovered a few of their scouts as early as three days ago but decided not to tell the king knowing that it wouldn't change anything and only put everybody more on edge that they already were.

After a few more hours of walking I finally felt a around 50 people approaching us. Deciding to improve my worth little more with a demonstration I lean over to the king and whisper in his ear " your highness, we are currently being surrounded by around 50 people, should I alert everybody else ".

" No we continue " he responded without a pause even though I could tell he was a little bit surprised by them getting so close without anybody noticing.

Deciding to trust that author sama wouldn't let anything happen I relax my muscles that had unknowingly tensed when I discovered our soon to be ambushers.

(Bajiou POV) (AN: right hand of the mountain king)

We were ordered to escort the flatland king to yotanwa sama. It was supposed to be an easy operation since they only have a dozen odd soldiers protecting the king. As we followed their group for a few hours I concluded that besides the kid who seemed to have spirit their group didn't pose any real danger but for some reason when I stare at the man walking beside the king with a skinny sword and weird clothes neither of which I have seen before my instincts scream at me to run. Despite usually following my instincts I continue to direct the ambush as it was ordered by Yotanwa sama.

(MC POV)

We walk for a few more minutes until we reach a spot where I sense them hiding. Despite knowing they wouldn't do anything I feel unnerved about purposely falling into an ambush. I grip my sword under my haori in order to gain some sense of security knowing that I could still fight my way out if anything bad happened.

Then all of a sudden prompted by something I couldn't detect the mountain people stood up from their hiding places thoroughly shocking everyone besides myself and Ei Sei who I had alerted beforehand.

"Protect the king" shouted Sho Bun Kun who was shocked at the sight of the mountain people some who stood over 215 cm tall (7 ft) while scrambling to the king himself.

An uneasy air hung over the two sides as they briefly stared at each other with their weapons at hand in case they needed to fight. Everybody looked towards the king and the person who looked like the leader of the mountain people to see what decision they would make.

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This chapter was really hard for me to right so I gave up trying to right the dialogue that happened in the pavilion so sorry if for whatever reason you were forward to that.

I decided to release a bonus chapter because this is being received a lot better than I expected so thanks to everyone who read it, left a comment or a review. It really means a lot to me.

This chapter covered manga chapters 12-16

(1399 words)