Chapter 1156: The Battle of Taquila (II)
Translator: Transn Editor: Transn
After Lightning crossed the encampment, she climbed higher and paused in midair.
"What's the matter, coo?" Maggie asked while raising her head.
Lightning did not answer but turned around and peered down at Taquila. The visibility of this impenetrable blackness was less than 200 meters, and it was a rather hopeless attempt to look for the Magic Slayer under this condition.
But that did not matter.
Lightning knew the Magic Slayer could see her.
Her back was currently facing the moon, so the Magic Slayer would instantly spot her when he stared up.
Nevertheless, he did not come after her.
He knew he could not catch up.
So, he decided to let her go.
In a way, she won!
Lightning took a deep breath, outstretched her right hand with her finger tips still trembling, but she mustered her courage and gave him the finger.
That was the gesture Roland had taught her — a gesture of victory!
Then she whipped around, headed to the First Army's encampment without casting one last backward glance, and told Sylvie everything she had seen.
"A neatly-cut cylinder made of God's Stones of Retaliation? Noted," Sylvie said as she wrote down the approximate size of the pillars and then handed the sheet of paper to Agatha, who quickly figured out the exact location and shape based on the size of the God's Stones. The data was soon transmitted to the observation room.
Although there might be errors in this calculation, at least they had something to rely on now. Sylvie thus made a rough estimate of the location of the pillars and called the Artillery Battalion.
A moment later, there was an earsplitting roar from the Longsong Cannons at the encampment.
Firelights erupted from the muzzle and flitted across the sky like fireflies and pierced the darkness.
As more cannons joined the battle, the encampment became vaguely visible. Sometimes shells streaked in the air like plummeting comets and left long tails behind them.
A long echo of the explosions rent the air and awoke the Fertile Plains from its deep sleep.
"So beautiful, coo..." Maggie mumbled as she stared at the artillery encampment in a daze.
Lightning stood against the wind with her hands clenching into fists.
Now, there was only one more obstacle to overcome.
...
Ursrook hovered in the air and watched mounds of earth rise and fall with an air of detachment. This was the most powerful weapon human beings had invented so far. One projectile could kill a dozen junior demons instantly without even physically contacting them. The iron shards ejected by those projectiles could penetrate armor and sink into flesh even from dozens of meters away.
Even for him, he was not completely sure whether he would survive a direct blow.
In the report submitted to the Sky Lord, he called this weapon "fiery rain".
Apart from that, human beings had also invented individual weapons such as "fire bolt" and "fire fork". Apparently, the evolution of the human race largely relied on fire. The lord believed this was a kind of upgrade, but he was more inclined to viewing such progress as a coincidence. Witches obviously possessed more diverse abilities than common people. Perhaps a singular witch, whose ability was fire control, had finally awakened after several hundred years and helped the human population to master this natural element.
However, even if human beings developed in a direction he did not wish to see, it did not mean there was nothing he could do about it. He could create boulders out of God's Stones to block the fiery rain. Ursrook noticed that God's Stones seemed to be impervious to the impact of explosions. When these projectiles brushed past the stone pillars, they bounced off, without leaving the slightest trace on the pillars.
The real danger lay in the fiery rain that penetrated the pillars and reached the symbiotic demons inside. Their impenetrable armor appeared to be impotent under the attack of the fiery rain and was instantly cracked and collapsed in one blow.
Ironically, the king seemed to have great faith in those pillars that could not feel pain and believed that it was the most epochal breakthrough their kind had obtained so far from the "legacy shards". The stone pillars not only provided far more supplies to the front but also more strategic options. The king believed that 100 such pillars would be sufficient to annhilate the entire human race.
Therefore, 100 pillars was exactly what the lord had given him.
Nonetheless, over the past half a year, not only did he fail to exterminate the human race but their grip on Taquila seemed to have loosened as well. Less than 40% of the pillars were now left at Ursrook's disposal.
If the Sky Lord had not so blindly trusted the king, Ursrook would not have found himself in such a disgusting dilemma.
If those stone pillars were destroyed halfway, he would have nothing but junior demons to fight the enemy.
That would be almost like suicide. Even the stone pillars would break upon the tremendous force of the fiery rain, let alone those unarmored junior demons.
However, Ursrook did not care.
All these sacrifices were for the final victory.
And human beings would have to pay for them.
...
At 10:00 at night in the underground headquarters.
The battle had lasted for three hours. Every five minutes, Iron Axe heard a magnificent crash coming from above that was followed by a cloud of dust showering down from the ceiling.
He heard no sounds other than the roaring cannons from the encampment. It was as though the demons were not participating in this battle at all.
This was so unusual compared to the previous battles he had partaken.
To save ammunition and preserve the cannons, Iron Axe had asked the Artillery Battalion to refrain themselves from shooting too frequently but to aim at the area exclusively behind the black shadow. The problem was that they were unable to see whether the attack was effective through the Magic Eye.
The only thing he could confirm at the moment was that the 152-caliber Longsong Cannons could not destroy the God's Stone of Punishment Pillars. Although the hailing shells significantly slowed down the stone pillars, Iron Axe knew those pillars would eventually recover. He wondered how the Spider Demons mobilize such gigantic monsters.
"Damn it," Iron Axe snapped irritably as he punched the table. "If this occurred during the day, those monsters wouldn't stand a chance!"
The biggest problem for the First Army now was that they did not know where their shells landed, which meant that the soldiers were aiming blankly at the blind zones that stretched around 150 meters, with no feedback to rely on to correct their firing angles.
According to Sylvie, the Magic Slayer was hovering outside the encampment, apparently on the alert for Lightning. Although Lightning was fast, it was essentially very energy-consuming and also dangerous to fly at such a high speed while at the same time infiltrating the demons' encampment to provide information on the landing spots for the First Army.
Yet the soldiers must have some feedback to continue with the operation.
If such information was not provided in a timely manner, they would find it hard to effectively kill the demons.
Of course, the First Army could have directed all the shells to the blind zones to keep the demons at bay. However, if the demons chose to retreat, all their ammunition would be wasted.
Furthermore, it appeared that several Mad Demons that flanked the blind zones and attempted to launch a pincer attack. They were clearly visible to the soldiers, but Iron Axe felt reluctant to waste the ammunition on just a few demons.
"That was why the demons chose to fight at night," Edith said serenely. "This is actually better than I thought. Thanks to Sylvie, we can at least see the enemy in the darkness. Why do you look so restless? It's the demons who should worry."
"I just don't want to waste the ammunition that took us so long to produce," Iron Axe grumbled while frowning.
"Don't worry. They can't go on like that forever. I think the demons know that as well. They'll probably fight back once they are within shooting range of the mortars," the Pearl of the Northern Region said while curling up her lips. "Unfortunately for the demons, they don't know that things will soon change. The moment they enter the shooting range of the flares, we'll have a clear winner of this battle."