Actius

Actius is the king of the western barbarians whose invasion supports the Curtis rebellion. He relies on numbers, monsters, War-backed morale, and personal caution rather than leading from the front; when In-gong breaks those advantages, Actius's repeated retreats help collapse the rebel coalition.

Biography

Invasion of Curtis

Actius surrounds Curtis's central fortress with roughly twenty to thirty thousand barbarians and maintains the initiative through an organized night of feigned pressure and rotating rest. At dawn, he accepts heavy casualties to exhaust Anastasia and her nightmare troops, whose mental magic is blocked by the red energy of War surrounding his soldiers. Watching from a safe distance, he orders repeated attacks until In-gong reaches him, destroys his horn drake Bedora, and burns the nearby banner sustaining War's energy. Actius chooses immediate escape over a direct confrontation; the sight of their king fleeing, combined with the loss of War's influence, turns local confusion into a general rout. (Chapters 159–160)

Actius prioritizes his own safety so completely that nearby bases learn of the defeat from scattered soldiers rather than from him. He withdraws north but still sends seven thousand fresh barbarians to reinforce Berkintox's next attack, contributing forces without exposing himself again. Once Berkintox and Artman die, Actius cannot become a political center for Curtis's rebels, and he ultimately races back beyond the Western Limit Line instead of continuing the war. His departure destroys the remaining coalition's morale and allows Anastasia and Victor to recover most of Curtis. In-gong's expectation that Actius would flee under danger came from Knight Saga, but the present campaign independently confirms that behavior. (Chapters 162–164, 166, 168, and 172)

Appearance and personality

The corpus does not describe Actius's species, age, face, build, clothing, or weapons. It repeatedly calls him cowardly because he remains away from the main point of attack and flees when personally threatened, but it also distinguishes caution from stupidity: Berkintox judges him cunning, clever, able to choose winnable battles, and necessarily strong enough to have become barbarian king. His demonstrated priorities are victory at acceptable personal risk and survival once that victory becomes uncertain. (Chapters 159–162)

Powers and abilities

Command, attrition, and monster forces

Actius coordinates a large siege force, rotates troops to conceal fatigue, delays until daylight weakens the nightmares' advantage, and uses repeated attacks to drain enemy magic. He commands wyvern riders, siege monsters, and Bedora, a thirty-metre horn drake whose breath forms a light pillar about three metres wide. These are forces under his command rather than Actius's innate powers. His main limitation is personal risk: once In-gong crosses the battlefield and destroys Bedora, Actius abandons the position instead of demonstrating his own combat ability. (Chapters 159–160)

War-backed army

The western barbarians fight under a red aura of War that suppresses fear, resists nightmare mental magic, and keeps them charging through lethal spells. A nearby banner distributes that power across the battlefield; destroying it removes the effect and exposes the army to Anastasia's magic. The corpus explicitly identifies Berkintox—not Actius—as an Apostle of War. It never shows Actius generating the aura, possessed by a Rider, or personally receiving an apostle transformation, so War's power should be treated as army support available to his invasion rather than an established personal ability. (Chapters 159–160 and 162)

Relationships

• In-gong: In-gong targets Actius's confidence and command structure rather than attempting to kill every barbarian. Destroying Bedora and the War banner prompts Actius to flee and makes his safety-first leadership the key to routing the army. (Chapters 160–161)
• Anastasia: Actius tries to exhaust and capture Anastasia through attrition at the central fortress. She survives, turns her mental magic on his troops after the banner falls, and later helps recover the territory he abandons. (Chapters 159–160 and 168–172)
• Victor: The rebel plan initially assigns Actius to defeat Victor, but the king's rout and later withdrawal leave Victor free to help retake northern and western Curtis. (Chapters 162, 168, and 172)
• Berkintox: Actius joins the apostle's rebel coalition and sends him additional barbarians after the central-fortress defeat. Their roles remain distinct: Berkintox supplies the political center and personal War power, while Actius supplies an external army. (Chapters 159 and 162–164)

Items

• Actius commands beside an unnamed banner that distributes the energy of War across the battlefield. The text does not establish that he owns or created it, and In-gong destroys it during the rout. Bedora is a living horn drake under Actius's command, not an item. (Chapter 160)