Chapter 577 — Heading for the Wasteland

At the gate controller's shout, the magitech machinery gave a low rumble; heavy gears and hinges drew the equally heavy steel gates slowly open. Among the mountain rocks on the southern slope of the Dark Mountains, a stretch of "cliff face" clad in armor and gun emplacements opened its tooth-and-nail-armed portal, and one after another the great transport vehicles rolled out. Flanking them and fore and aft, several "multi-purpose war vehicles" — plated with light armor, pierced with firing ports for thermal ray guns, and crowned with arcane crystals — could be seen escorting the column forward.

At the rear of the convoy, several magitech cannons towed on tractor chassis were visible.

Amid blasts of horns and the thrum of engines and machinery, the convoy rolled along the hardened road toward the Black Forest.

At the Black Forest's edge, an especially tall giantwood stood quietly amid the twisted, festering thicket of plants — trees bearing the name "giant" routinely reached nearly a hundred meters, and in the Black Forest, the corrupted and frenzied magical energy had further spurred these towering giants to mutate. Its hideous crown stretched out in every direction, not a single leaf to be seen on the withered, crooked branches; against the murky sky, that crown was like a cluster of shriveled limbs, clawing madly at the heavens.

The convoy drove into the Black Forest.

The giantwood's branches and leaves began to quiver, rustling with a clatter, and atop its highest branch, a mass of black mist suddenly gathered, and out of the mist emerged a colossal corrupted crow, its feathers smeared with festering flesh and blood, half its skull laid bare.

The crow fixed its pitch-black eyes on the direction of the convoy, and from its rotting vocal cords a hoarse human voice suddenly emerged: "Gao Yang Cecil has left his domain... he has gone to the Great Wall himself."

Then the crow tilted its head, as though something in the void were speaking with it; it listened with one ear, and the sound continued from its throat: "The north is more important, the north is more important... I know, I know. I will keep watching, but only from far off..."

As it spoke, the crow listened again, and it seemed to hear something that infuriated it, for it suddenly beat its wings in a rage: "You ask why I watch from far off?! Do you have any idea how dangerous those mad Cecilians are! Do you have any idea how terrifying those lunatics are!!

"Do you know how they build their roads? Do you know how they 'explore' the forest? Do you know how they just wade straight through those traps and monster lairs!?

"That pack of lunatics, Cecilians with nothing but destruction on their minds, they are absolutely the projections of devils into this material world, the spawn of demons coupling with living volcanoes — listen, Doen was blown to bits, 'Rotpoison Bor' was blown to bits, and the eighteen plague beasts and six corrupted behemoths they had tamed, and Padoor too — damn it, Padoor only wanted to get a closer look, who would have guessed the Cecilians would bombard the entire thicket — I will only watch from far off, I want to be as far from those madmen as possible! Even those storm-born whose brains have been addled by the deep-sea tides are far calmer than those Cecilians!!

"If you have objections, then send someone to relieve me — I would rather do hard labor in the Abyss of Flesh and Blood... oh, damn it!!"

The crow's unbroken stream of curses suddenly stopped. "It" stared in horror at the distant outer wall of the fortress, that wall clad in steel, and saw several gun emplacements on its upper tier swing about in unison to point in its direction.

"Those lunatics may have found me!!"

With a startled cry the crow spread its wings and flew off, and almost at the same moment a ceaseless series of thunderous booms shattered the dead silence of the Black Forest, tearing through the chaotic sky and the thin mist among the trees.

Great swaths of explosion smoke and cloud shrouded the corrupted woodland in the distance. Inside the artillery control room of the South Gate Fortress, the chief architect Gordon watched the scene displayed on the holographic projection, watched the smoke and dust rise, watched vast stretches of forest vanish into ash.

The power of the fixed fortress cannon was truly astonishing.

The mechanical sergeant in charge of the gun emplacements reported: "All main batteries on the upper defense wall have been activated successfully. Turret II on the upper tier requires calibration. Observation devices are functioning well."

"Good. Record the data; in one hour we test the secondary batteries of every tier. George, take two assistants and go see exactly what the situation is with Turret II."

Having arranged the work in orderly fashion, Gordon breathed a soft sigh of relief.

When construction of the South Gate Fortress had first begun, he had been tense and anxious; this corrupted region, notorious for its evil name, was terrifying, and the great gaping rift, wide open at the time with almost no defenses or cover, had robbed him of sleep and appetite. But as the work progressed and the southern defense wall and turrets were installed in place, his initial tension and worry had vanished completely.

It was indeed as the lord had said: the Black Forest was dangerous, but before the might of Cecil magitech industry, it was no more than this.

"Another day with nothing to report," a mechanical sergeant at another console nearby remarked with feeling, and what he remarked happened to be exactly what Gordon was thinking. "Another peaceful day."

"Don't relax your guard," another mechanical sergeant warned. "There are still monsters in the Black Forest; a completely maddened monster might come charging at the fortress at any moment."

"Don't worry, I won't slacken off."

The vigilance of soldiers really is strong.

Gordon could not help but sigh inwardly, yet at the same time he felt a certain misgiving —

The monsters in the Black Forest... seemed to be growing fewer and fewer...