Chapter 1399: The Bloody Battle in the Mountains (3)
The Seagull’s greatest weapon was the silence it kept even at speed. Built for ambush, built to arrive unannounced.
After passing through the cloud layer, the glider slipped between mountain peaks like something imagined rather than engineered—no engine roar, no silhouette against a bright sky, just a shape moving through the grey. Below, the assault force’s defensive line had already collapsed. The soldiers fought in fragments now, each man holding his own ground, retreating by inches. Any other unit would have broken and scattered the moment the chain of command frayed. The First Army held, though the cost was written in the ground they’d given up.
Without their firepower advantage, killing even a single Spider Demon required three times the effort—and that was before accounting for the armored thing moving among the enemy.
Through the aiming lens, Andrea studied it.
Its armor covered every surface, veined with strange patterns that seemed almost organic, and it carried a halberd too large for anything merely human—yet it moved through the mountainside the way water moves through cracks. No weight to it. No drag. It cut direction mid-stride as though gravity were a suggestion, changing vector without the breath of hesitation that even the fastest cavalry required. For Andrea, it was the category of opponent she found most difficult: the kind whose movement refused to be predicted.
“Distance?”
“Nineteen hundred meters.” Sylvie’s voice had taken on that particular thinness. “Can you make the shot?”
“No.” Her lips were dry. “Closer.”
As the Seagull descended, Andrea began activating her ability in short pulses—not committing, just feeling the geometry. The silver lines split from one to two to many, each representing a firing solution, each dependent on the target holding still. By the time the lines filled her vision entirely, she had more than a dozen paths to a confirmed hit. The problem was that none of them could account for the next few seconds of the Magic Slayer’s movement after she pulled the trigger. Against an ordinary target, she would fire several rounds and let probability close the gap. But the God’s Stone of Retaliation bullets were not ordinary, and there were a limited number of them. She could not gamble.
Minimum flight time. That was the only answer.
“Fifteen hundred meters!”
Sylvie had gripped the front of Andrea’s coat without realizing it. Andrea didn’t comment.
“Seagull changing course—watch the angle!” Wendy’s warning came through the cabin noise.
At fifteen hundred meters, the glider was just distinguishable from a large bird against the right background. No one on the battlefield below seemed to be watching the sky—the soldiers and demons were too occupied with each other. But every witch aboard was holding her breath regardless, instinct overriding reason, as though sound itself might give them away.
“Thirteen hundred!”
“Closer.”
She had her finger resting against the trigger guard, not on it. One second was enough to acquire most targets. For a Senior-ranked Demon she wanted every variable removed, every possible error compressed toward zero.
“Eleven hundred!”
“Shavi, watch your gear angles—I’m nearly at my limit!”
“Nine hundred—”
Andrea released her ability fully.
Every silver line collapsed into one. At this distance, wind and gravity were almost irrelevant—the line between her rifle and the Magic Slayer was as close to a straight truth as her power could produce.
“What you see is what you get,” she said softly, and fired.
At nearly the same moment, the Magic Slayer sensed something change in the pattern of the soldiers below. It turned—found the glider sweeping overhead—and the God’s Stone of Retaliation bullet was already in flight. At that range, it didn’t matter how fast the demon was. There was no time left to dodge.
The impact detonated a shockwave outward from the Magic Slayer’s body. The force threw it clear of its feet. Above, the dark clouds dissolved all at once, the gathered gold light releasing and scattering like mist burned off by sun.
“Did we get it?” Wendy asked.
Sylvie’s face had gone grey. “No. I don’t think the bullet landed.”
“That’s not possible.” Andrea was already reaching for an enchanted gauze, pressing it to her shoulder. “I saw it. It hadn’t even noticed the shot when I fired—”
Sylvie shook her head, searching for words. Her Eyes of Magic couldn’t penetrate a God’s Stone of Retaliation barrier—she couldn’t see what had happened in the instant before impact. But she had seen something: as the black light of the bullet closed the final distance to the Magic Slayer, the space around the demon had bent, as though something thin and transparent had interposed itself between the round and its target. Then the God’s Stone energy detonated, the distortion cleared, and the bullet struck the armor squarely in the chest.
And it rose.
“Stop arguing,” Shavi said flatly. “What’s it doing now?”
“Getting up.” Sylvie’s voice had gone very quiet.
Through the Eyes of Magic, she could see the scars the shattered God’s Stone had left in the black armor—clearly visible furrows and cracked plates, the damage undeniable. The most distinctive: roughly half the Magic Slayer’s tall spire-shaped helmet had been destroyed, revealing the lower portion of its face. Cold features. What looked, unervingly, somewhat like a woman’s.
It had survived. That was the outcome.
“Sylvie—reload!” Andrea’s voice had an edge to it.
“We’ve used all the God’s Stone of Retaliation rounds.”
“Then use standard ammunition.” Andrea did not lower the rifle. “If it can use its ability in this condition, then it doesn’t matter what the bullets are made of. What matters is that we keep shooting.”
“The sky’s going dark again!” Shavi said. “When does this thing stop?”
Sylvie fed the half-arm-long cartridge into the chamber. “It’s noticed us now. If we try again—”
“That’s why I have to take this shot.” The volume surprised even Andrea. “If we run now, we won’t make it back through the clouds.”
The Magic Slayer, standing amid the snow, raised its halberd. Its eyes had found the Seagull. They burned a sinister red, and the thunder that followed rolled across the entire valley like a pronouncement.
“Reloaded!”
“Wendy—hold course!” Andrea brought the rifle up. The silver lines rebuilt themselves in her vision, converging again on the target. She disregarded the pain in her shoulder entirely and fired.
The Magic Slayer leaped sideways and swung the halberd in the same motion.
This time, Sylvie saw them clearly—the things that had distorted space before.
They were thin and light, almost transparent, shaped something like a cicada’s wings but made of nothing biological. Pure magic, conjured into physical form and honed to an edge finer than any blade. They spiraled around the Magic Slayer continuously, autonomous guardians, and when the bullet came they did not wait for instruction—some cut directly across the bullet’s flight path while the rest drew tight around the demon in overlapping arcs.
A second shockwave. A blizzard of pulverized snow.
And then the Sigil’s golden light, redirected, came down.
It struck the Seagull’s left wing.
The glider lurched sideways and went into a spiral, the mountain rising to meet it from below.
An hour later, the Deity of Gods’s shadow covered the Impassable Mountain Range.
The gates beneath the floating island swung open and Red Mist cascaded out like a waterfall, rushing through the ravines in both directions, east and west, filling the low ground first and then climbing.
Silent Disaster removed his broken helmet and breathed in the thick, comfortable atmosphere.
Isolated pockets of human resistance persisted in the mountains, but they no longer threatened the larger picture. When the new enemy troops had appeared, Mask had fired three more stone spears. The humans had never anticipated firing channels built into the island’s underside—these stele, launched almost vertically downward, carried a lethality that the earlier arc-launched ones had not. The formations struck had no chance to reorganize before the Symbiotic Demons swept through and finished the work.
One thing had given him pause. A red iron bird—faster than any of the others, more agile, harder to pin—had made one pass to cover the retreating humans. The Deity of Gods couldn’t bring it down. Its gunfire had even consumed a meaningful quantity of the island’s magic power before being driven off by him and the Bogle Beasts. It was not suited to sustained engagement; it had withdrawn eventually. But he noted it.
The victory was not in doubt. The Impassable Mountain Range belonged to the demons.
Chapter 1399 - The Bloody Battle in the Mountains (3)
Translator: Henyee Translations Editor: Henyee Translations
The strongest advantage of the Seagull was the silence it possessed despite the increase in flight speed. It was most suited at ambushing enemies from behind.
After passing through the clouds, the glider bypassed multiple mountain peaks like an apparition and quietly approached the battlefield from behind. At this moment, the assault force’s defensive line had been completely breached and the soldiers were forced to hold their own ground and retreat while fighting. If it had been any other troops, they would had long scattered after losing an overall command.
But the First Army’s situation was no longer as optimistic as before. Upon losing their advantage in terms of firepower, the price to pay to kill the Spider Demons which also had long-ranged attacks increased severalfold. What’s more, they had their monster-like black-armored demon counterpart.
Relying on the aiming lens, Andrea could clearly see the appearance of the enemy. Apart from the veined patterns that covered its body and the exaggerated and bizarre armor, it held an extremely large halberd. His entire image resembled one of a heavy-armored soldier. But the agility it exhibited far surpassed that of charging cavalry. Additionally, it was capable of changing directions at will, as though the armor and weapon on it were weightless.
For Andrea, it was the most difficult type of opponent.
“How far are we?”
“1900 meters…” The anxiousness in Sylvie’s voice became more apparent. “How is it, can you land the shot now?”
“No.” She licked her dry lips. “Closer.”
During this entire process, Andrea quietly activated her ability multiple times. The silver lines in her vision split from one, to two, until it filled her entire vision. This meant she had more than ten ways to fire and hit the target, so long as the target was “cooperative” enough. The moment she pulled on the trigger, the final destination of the bullet would be certain. But no one could predict the enemy’s movements within those few seconds while the bullet traveled its trajectory.
If it was an ordinary firearm, she could fire continuously and use quantity to eliminate the probability of failure. But the sniper rifle in her hand was a large caliber rifle with a long interval for fire, and she was unable to use the precious God’s Stone of Retaliation bullets as a gamble.
Thus, the safest method was to decrease the bullet flight time as much as possible, to force the target to be as ‘static’ as possible between the gun’s firing and for the bullet to hit the target.
“1500 meters!” Sylvie could not help but grab onto her clothes tightly.
“Seagull is changing directions, take note of the inclination!” Wendy reminded.
This distance was enough for the naked eye to differentiate the glider from a large bird of prey. Although they were above an intense battlefield, no one paid special attention to movements in the sky. But the Witches were extremely tensed and felt their hearts in their throats. They slowed their breathing despite knowing that the enemies could not determine the source of the sound.
“1300 meters!” Sylvie shouted.
“Closer!” Andrea had her finger on the trigger. A single second was enough for the majority of her targets, but since the enemy was a Senior ranked
Demon, she hoped to minimize all errors and prevent any accidents from occurring.
“1100 meters!”
“Shavi, pay attention to the gear angles, I’m almost at my limit!”
“900—”
Right at that moment, Andrea unleashed her ability.
Countless silver lines had practically crammed her entire vision and finally converged into one dazzling light pillar. At this short distance, the influence of the wind and gravity was practically negligible.
“What you see is what you get,” she muttered softly, and pulled the trigger.
Almost at the same time, the Magic Slayer sensed something different from the First Army soldier’s reactions. It suddenly turned and discovered the glider sweeping above its head. The moment the muzzle unleashed its fire, the God’s Stone of Retaliation bullet was already flying towards it. No matter how skilled and nimble it was, it was already too late for it to dodge!
Following a loud “bang”, a shockwave exploded from the Magic Slayer’s body. The powerful force sent it flying, while the dark clouds in the sky dissipated like ice and snow melting under the scorching sun.
“Did we succeed?” Wendy asked anxiously.
On the contrary, Sylvie’s face was pale white. “No… I’m afraid that the bullet missed.”
“How is that possible.” Andrea clenched her teeth and used an enchanted gauze on her shoulder. “When firing, I clearly saw that it had not noticed the shot—”
Sylvie was at a loss for words, her ability was unable to penetrate the barrier conjured from the God’s Stone of Retaliation; thus, she was unable to ascertain what happened in that instant. But she clearly saw that when the
black light from the God’s Stone of Retaliation bullet closed in onto the Magic Slayer, the space around the surroundings distorted, as though something had stood between it and the bullet. After the abrupt explosion of the black light, everything occurred as per normal, and the bullet shot straight into the target’s chest.
“Stop arguing, what’s the situation of the target?” Shavi interrupted.
“It’s… getting up,” Sylvie answered bitterly.
Through her Eyes of Magic, Sylvie saw clear scars left on the black armor, most probably from the shattered God’s stone, the most distinct being the damaged helmet. Half of the Magic Slayer’s tall and spire-shaped helmet had been smashed into pieces, revealing the chilly lower features beneath it.
Regardless of the reason of this development, the Magic Slayer’s ability to stand indicated the outcome.
“Sylvie, help me to reload!” Andrea screamed.
“We are already out of God’s Stone bullets…”
“Then use ordinary ones.” Andrea insisted. “Since the Magic Slayer is able to use its ability under such circumstances, it doesn’t matter whether the bullets are made out of God’s Stones or not. All that matters is we shoot at it!”
“The sky is getting dark again!” Shavi whined. “When will this guy ever stop?”
Sylvie pushed the half-arm long ‘bullet’ into the chamber. “But it has already noticed us, if we try again—”
“That is why I must take this shot!” Andrea roared. “If we run from this, I’m afraid we won’t make it out of the clouds!”
The Magic Slayer that was standing raised its halberd as its eyes glowed a sinisterly red. sinister red lights.
The rumbling of thunder spread across the entire valley.
“Reloaded!”
“Wendy, stabilize the direction!” Andrea aimed at her target as the silver lines once again connected the target with the muzzle. She ignored the piercing pain in her shoulder and fired without hesitation.
As though having sensed danger, the Magic Slayer leaped to the side and swung its halberd!
This time, Sylvie finally saw the true appearance of the distorted object—
They were light and transparent, similar to a cicada’s wings, but definitely not actual cicada wings. Formed using magic power, they were sharper than any blade and spiraled spontaneously around the Magic Slayer.
Even when the bullet was already a miss, they reacted instantly. Some cut directly at the bullet’s trajectory while the rest formed a wall of blades around the Senior Lord.
An explosive shockwave appeared once more and caused a snowy mist to form, while the distorted golden light struck down from the skies onto Seagull’s left wing.
The glider instantly lose balance and spiraled towards the bottom of the mountain—
…
After an hour, the Deity of Gods’s shadow shrouded the Impassable Mountain Range.
Following the opening of the gates beneath the island, a large quantity of Red Mist cascaded down like a waterfall and rushed through the ravine in both the east and west directions.
Silent Disaster removed his broken helmet and immersed himself in the comfortable and moist atmosphere.
Although there were remaining human troops resisting, it no longer affected the general situation. After noticing the appearance of new enemy troops, Mask fired another three spears. The humans would had never expected for Deity of Gods to have hidden firing pathways located at the bottom of the island, and these steles which were shot directly wielded even more lethality. After being crushed by the three spears, the humans had difficulty reorganizing and launching an effective counterattack.
Following that, the Symbiotic Demons searched for the defeated humans endlessly until they were all killed.
The iron birds attempted to cover the retreating humans once, and one particular red iron bird gave him trouble. Not only was the Deity of Gods unable to shoot down this target, the enemy’s gunfire expended a lot of the island’s magic power. In terms of its speed and mobility, the red iron bird was far stronger than the others. But it did not seem to be suited for prolonged battles, and was ultimately repelled by him and the Bogle Beasts.
There was no doubt that victory belonged to the demons for this battle.