Chapter 982 — Spiral to the Bottom

"I can't afford to care about that now," An Luo said at once. "Count Winterbourne, I need the help of your mage legion. Winterwolf Fortress is full of soldiers and knights more or less tied to the God of War faith; your mage corps is the only force still reliable right now. I need your magic—whether retaking the communications tower, building a new channel out, or any other way to let Winterwolf Fortress 'speak' to the outside, try them all."

"I'll think of something," Count Winterbourne considered for all of a second, "but only on the premise that we hold this fortress intact through the night. The Cecilians' night assault shows no sign of letting up—it's even fiercer than by day. I suspect they mean to pound down our shields and walls outright with ever more long-range 'skyfire.' I called you here precisely for this: the mage's eye has spotted two more firing points the Cecilians have added to the northwest. They've hauled some kind of magitech cannon bigger than a battle tank's main gun to the front with heavy vehicles. Those things don't look ready yet, but they could open fire at any moment."

"Just how many more magitech cannons do they have on the way..." An Luo could scarcely keep the astonishment out of her voice. "Can the Black Banner Mage Legion take out those two firing points?"

"They're beyond the range of legion spells. The Cecilians picked their positions well—I fear they've already sounded out the Black Banner Mage Legion's attack limits. Looks like we'll have to rely on strengthening the shields and weathering those things head-on."

"...Understood. I'll order all the energy of the eastern mana focus transferred to the shields, and have the battlemages attached to the knight orders ready to go up on the walls and sustain the shields."

An Luo had barely finished speaking when a shrill, grating shriek that set the teeth on edge and the ears ringing suddenly came from the distance. After a very brief delay, an explosion far more deafening than any bombardment before—one that made the whole fortress tremble faintly—erupted beneath the night sky!

The battlemages in the hall were stunned by the colossal blast, while Palin Winterbourne and An Luo both changed color at once. The two of them darted out of the hall onto a connecting bridge that faced the walls, and lifting their heads toward the source of the explosion, they saw—before their eyes, the thick energy shield outside Winterwolf Fortress was rippling in layer upon layer, and a still larger flare of explosive light burst forth again a few seconds later.

After a slight delay, the thunderous roar of that second explosion reached An Luo's ears.

Was it that kind of great cannon?

Thought flashed swiftly across Palin Winterbourne's face, and the next moment he traced the runes of a message spell in the air, rapidly issuing new orders to his Black Banner battlemages: "Echelons four through six, charge! Drop two wide-area illusions each on positions A2 and A3 to the northwest! Echelons seven through ten, reinforce the shields and prepare for the follow-up impact!"

An Luo, too, rushed to the count's side. She knew her adjutant and the other commanders must be on the other end of the message spell as well; however many of them had become carriers of the god's corruption, at least where "fighting the war" was concerned, they would surely still obey her orders: "Crodian! Transfer the energy of the eastern mana focus to the shields at once! Get the legion's battlemages up on the walls..."

Orders flew out one after another. The defenders of Winterwolf Fortress, though briefly thrown into panic by the sudden ground fire, soon restored order. More energy was channeled to the shields, more mages turned their attention to the new source of attack, the fortress's defenses adjusted with swift precision, and the shields, briefly shaken, gradually steadied.

An Luo and Palin Winterbourne stood on the connecting bridge, adjusting the fortress's defensive strength through message spells while watching the Cecilians' new assault. They looked down over the tense, busy bustle within the bastion, watched the shields near the walls grow solid again, and both let out an unconscious breath of relief.

Nearly all of Winterwolf Fortress's defensive strength was now concentrated on the walls and the shields. The Cecilians' tireless ground assault weighed heavily on An Luo, but fortunately the fortress seemed to be holding.

...

Philip received the latest intelligence from the ground forces.

"So even the Truth-I orbital accelerator cannon can't crack their shields..." he murmured softly to himself, as if somewhat surprised by the defensive strength of that Typhon border fortress. "Or is the Black Banner Mage Legion reinforcing those shields?"

"It seems ground fire alone really can't break that fortress in a short time," a senior staff officer said beside him. "General, it's nearly midnight."

Philip glanced at the mechanical watch on the table, then his gaze settled on the arcane-net terminal not far away.

……

In the dark, howling night, a low hum rose among the clouds as a war machine of steel and crystal swept through the sky like a phantom.

More than twenty mass-produced "Dragoons" followed their squadron leader in a ring formation, cruising at low speed with lights out along the boundary of Winterwolf Fortress's alert zone.

Ginna drew a deep breath—the breeze shield and the sturdy cockpit kept out the wailing wind, yet she still felt as though she could smell the cold, faintly bloody air outside—she looked down through the observation window ahead and below, and saw light flickering and bursting along the dark edge of the earth, pale cyan flashes tearing through the darkness in an unbroken stream.

At the far end of those crisscrossing beams stood a fortress holding stubbornly firm upon the land, the shield above it rippling again and again, yet still showing no sign of fading.

The young air commander drew another deep breath, steadying her somewhat tense nerves.

It was not her first flight, still less her first battle; she had ridden a griffin over the war-torn Bastion Keep, and she had flown with the elves' giant eagles across a land polluted by the crystal-cluster calamity, soaring above the old royal capital on the brink of falling.

But this felt different.

Her hands gripped the control stick tightly, and the humming of the anti-gravity ring and the draconic drive gradually calmed her. She turned her head slightly and saw that the mechanic and bombardier seated behind her looked just as tense.

"Relax—this isn't the first time we've had our hands on these controls," she said.

"I'm just working on a rousing opening line," the bombardier said with feigned composure, "something to say when the bombs go down."

"Don't waste your effort on that," Ginna said at once. "Focus on—"

She got only halfway through.

A device on the craft's console suddenly lit up, and the next second General Philip's voice came through it—

"Dragoons, execute the mission. Code Z-17."