Rewrite That Witch
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Chapter 1408: Different People

Roland stood on the castle walls and watched the fleet until it was gone — until the last silhouette had dissolved into the western clouds and there was nothing left to watch but the emptying sky.

“Aren’t we moving too quickly?” Nightingale stood just behind him, her concern worn plainly. “The new biplanes arrived only yesterday. They haven’t completed any formal training for bomb-dropping.”

She had been beside him long enough to know how the First Army worked. Every announced plan was rehearsed. The General Staff would verify feasibility in the war room, then move to full practice drills, then run exercises until the participants were confident before the mission was ever executed. The air-drop was preparation for the Glory of the Sun strike — but it was itself a standalone battle, and by any standard practice, the crews would need time.

“Yes,” Roland said, “but time does not wait.” He turned away from the empty sky. “Every report we have indicates Hackzord hasn’t appeared in either engagement. The letter worked. But the Sky Lord is mistrustful by nature — no one knows how long it holds him. The sooner the strike, the better.”

“At a fundamental level, this operation is the same as the assault force at the mountain — a probe. How does the enemy respond to an air strike? Does the Deity of Gods have corresponding defensive measures? We need those answers before the decisive battle.”

“Then — will it really be all right without the training?”

“Relax.” He let the smile come. “Tilly already has a plan.”

Hitting a target from a moving aircraft required precise coordination between pilot and equipment. Ten to fifteen days of practice under ideal conditions would have produced limited results. Given the rush, the first batch of Fury of Heaven planes hadn’t been fitted with sighting equipment — there was nothing to practice with, even if they’d had the time. Tilly’s solution reassigned the problem entirely. Hill would handle central command and calculation. Speed and altitude were the fixed variables; given those, the drop point was math. The pilot had one job: release the trigger on command. No ground observation needed. No sighting equipment required.

It was, Roland thought, not entirely unlike the early airborne warning systems he’d read about — the tracking, positioning, and targeting outsourced entirely to a third party, the aircraft itself completing only the final mechanical step. The Seagull was that third party. The eye that held the whole situation.

“Ah.” Nightingale’s expression shifted through something he recognized as the specific satisfaction of a diagram clicking into place. “As expected of Princess Tilly.”

Roland raised a brow. “I thought you might have felt left behind — being the only one not to see it.”

“That might have been true once.” She rolled her eyes without heat. “But with Anna nearby, anyone with an extensive knowledge base will always feel like they know nothing. I’ve been used to it for years.”

He was momentarily at a loss. There was nothing glorious in the admission, yet she’d delivered it with total composure — almost, he thought, with pride in the composure itself. It caught him off-guard in a way cleverness rarely did.

“I’ve also figured something out, these past few years,” she said.

“What’s that?”

She turned toward the morning sun, where it was still low and gentle. The light caught the edge of her hair. “Every person has their particular strengths. There’s no use blindly imitating someone else — you focus on what you do well.” She paused, as though giving him space to recognize where this was going. “Or perhaps you only like people who are extraordinarily knowledgeable?”

”…”

The answer didn’t require saying. Nightingale’s expression made it clear she already knew it — had, perhaps, known it for longer than the question had existed.

“Well. That’s settled.” She shook her fingers, turning toward the stairs. “So remember to stock the cabinet with Chaos Drinks before everyone returns in triumph. I intend to gather everyone for a proper celebration.”

He watched her go. Then it hit him: We aren’t in Neverwinter. Where am I supposed to find Chaos Drinks? And that entire speech about focusing on one’s strengths — wasn’t it just a formal justification for enjoying herself openly?

He shook his head, something between exasperation and affection, and followed.

“This is Seagull, Your Highness. You’ve entered the floating island’s alert radius.” At eight thirty-five in the morning, Sylvie pressed the Sigil of Listening to her ear and delivered her first warning, her voice measured against the gravity of what she was looking at. “In under a minute, the fleet will be within the steles’ attack range.”

“Copy.” Tilly’s tone was dry. “I see them.”

She had never intended to hide. The Deity of Gods kept Eye Demon sentries posted — the moment Sylvie could see them, they could see her. If the Seagull were seen to hold back, to orbit at distance, to demonstrate its importance to the operation, the enemy would recognize it as the linchpin and concentrate on it. The better doctrine: go in openly, noisily, and pull every set of eyes in the sky onto the fighter fleet. Let the Seagull be unremarkable.

Before Sylvie’s warning had finished its echo, the enemy was already moving.

Black shapes peeled off the island and formed up, climbing fast toward the incoming fleet.

So. Cautious. Tilly’s hand found the transmitter and opened all frequencies, her voice flat and deliberate. “Attention. Enemy has revealed itself. Steady up. Team One, Team Two, execute on plan.”

“Understood.” Good and Manfeld spoke in unison, separated by a kilometer of air.

The formation was simple. Fifty biplanes in two waves: the bombardment teams flying above the clouds to minimize enemy detection time, with the Fury of Heaven and Seagull escort held back; thirty-five Fire of Heaven planes driving into the demons’ defensive formation to scatter it. The main fighters closed to within ten kilometers of the stronghold. At that distance, the floating island stopped being a concept and became a thing you could see — the surface plated in black rock that caught the light like scales, the central city rising from its middle, and the steles standing at the island’s edges conspicuously, unmistakably motionless.

As expected. The steles were never built for this kind of fight.

“This is Phoenix. Has anyone identified the Senior Lord who ambushed the ground force previously?”

Sylvie scanned. “Not yet.”

Luck, then. Tilly looked back over her shoulder at the sun, still rising, still bright — directly behind the approaching fleet, washing out the sky in exactly the direction from which they’d come.

“Fine weather,” she said, to no one in particular. “A perfect day for their eternal rest.”

She opened the throttle. The engine’s roar changed pitch — higher, hungrier — and Phoenix climbed and turned and dove toward the first line of demons.

“Princess Tilly has engaged the enemy.” Sylvie’s voice had gone quiet and precise; she kept her eyes on what she could see rather than what she feared. The Aerial Knights were outnumbered. Attacking the demons’ main stronghold meant facing the full mobilization of their Devilbeasts — faster to scramble than last time. “The enemy count is still rising. At this rate, they’ll be surrounded.”

Wendy’s voice was calm beside her. “The Aerial Knights don’t need to kill every Devilbeast. They only need to hold them for ten minutes. Devilbeasts can’t match their speed in a straight run. Keep your attention on the main objective.”

She’s right. The sooner the bombs fell, the sooner the fleet could disengage. Splitting her attention between the fighter engagement and the central city would cost both. Sylvie bit her lip, steadied herself, and returned her focus to the island’s heart.

Through the layered Red Mist, what came into her sight was a grand square surrounding a monument that blotted out the sense of scale she’d been relying on. She was observing from altitude, from distance — and still she felt the building’s size as something more than measurement. It rose several hundred meters above the city below it, a pillar hammered from some deep place into the sky. Every human structure she had ever seen became a smaller thing in its presence.

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