Castle of Black Iron

Zhang Tie left the airship with a bloody nose and swollen face and looked very embarrassed. However, he didn’t feel depressed about that; instead, he felt a bit relaxed. He had a sense of relief after being beaten by Lan Yunxi. What he was afraid most was being ignored by Lan Yunxi.

Back in the battle fortress, Hillman and the other three guys were really startled by Zhang Tie’s embarrassed look. They thought that Zhang Tie met demons on the way. Zhang Tie didn’t want to explain it to them. He just let them have a good sleep and return to Jinyun Country together with him tomorrow.

”Argh, we will go back to Jinyun Country tomorrow?” Michel asked Zhang Tie with an amazing look.

”Hmm, of course, so you should go to bed early tonight. We will set out early morning!”

”Oh, thank god, I thought that we were going to fight demons here.”

”Do you want to stay here? If you want, I will tell them to keep you here!”

”Argh. Don’t do that! I’m just joking!” Michel hurriedly replied with a big smile.

Zhang Tie then entered his cabin and started to cultivate.

No matter how tense it was in the first theater of operations, as Zhang Tie had disappeared for three years, if he didn’t return home to take a look at his family members and his friends, he would not be able to concentrate on fighting demons here.

To resist foreign aggression, there must be internal stability. His family members were still concerned about him. Additionally, he also cared about those girls of Rose Association and the God Blessing Brotherhood. It was righteous for him to just stay here in the 1st theater of operations, however, Zhang Tie was not proud of it at all. No matter what, family ranked first in Zhang Tie’s mind forever. If he lost his own family and those people whom he was concerned about the most, who was he fighting demons for?

It only took him about 20 days to return to Huaiyuan Prefecture and come back. Zhang Tie didn’t believe that such a great theater of operations would collapse without him.

”Additionally, Lan Yunxi is still angry at him. It’s tricky to manage her. Slow down.” Zhang Tie finally understood that polygamy was not that easy.

At about 5 in the next early morning, Zhang Tie heard the knocks from outside the narrow room.

Having long prepared for it, Zhang Tie hurriedly got off the bed and opened the door. A second lieutenant in airship uniform was standing outside the door, ”Are you Zhang Tie?”

”Yup!”

”Airship 086 is going to set off, my officer told me to take you onto the airship!”

”Fine!” Zhang Tie hurriedly knocked at the door next to his room. Hillman and the other 3 guys had long prepared for that. The moment they heard Zhang Tie’s knocks did they come out hurriedly.

After walking out of the battle fortress of Huaiyuan Palace, Zhang Tie let them wait for a short while. He then rapidly ran towards the room of Liu Xi and knocked at his door. Liu Xi was not inside. Zhang Tie estimated that Liu Xi was still on duty. Therefore, he left a slip of paper in Liu Xi’s room. Soon after that, he left with that second lieutenant.

In the airship base outside the battle fortress, Zhang Tie caught sight of airship 086, which was a fury-level war airship. Over 200 wounded soldiers were in that airship, who required medical treatment in Huaiyuan Prefecture. Compared to them, Zhang Tie was just thumbing a ride.

The coxswain didn’t know Zhang Tie’s status. Therefore, when Zhang Tie boarded on the airship, the coxswain didn’t show up. The crew of the airship also treated Zhang Tie as a coward of Huaiyuan Palace who hurriedly escaped away at the sight of the dangers in the frontier.

Zhang Tie didn’t care about their thoughts. When a person was enough powerful, he indeed didn’t have to care about others’ feelings, neither would he show himself up in front of others. Zhang Tie estimated that he had killed tens of thousands of demon puppets, 13 LV 9 demons and 1 LV 14 demon from the accident in Heavens Cold City to now. He wondered whether this was a contribution that he had made to humans in the holy war or not. Therefore, he was very reassured about his current situation.

This time, 5 of them were allocated with 5 independent cabins. Although it was a bit crowded but it was better than that in the crystal battle fortress. Whereas, due to too many wounded soldiers were inside, the entire airship was filled with a smell of disinfected water.

Less than 10 minutes after they boarded on, the airship 086 had slowly suspended in the air under the guidance of the ground lamp signals. At the same time, the anchor chains which were used to fix the airship were also collected. Standing on the deck of the airship, Zhang Tie watched these battle fortresses. On the top of that battle fortress of Huaiyuan Palace, Zhang Tie saw a graceful figure who was watching this airship.

That was Lan Yunxi.

”Wait for me. I will be back soon. Wait for me back. I will kill all the wing demons and drive all those b*stards away!” Zhang Tie shouted towards that figure. After hearing Zhang Tie’s exclamation, that figure directly turned around and entered the battle fortress.

Touching his nose, Zhang Tie watched those fighters manipulating some defense weapons on the deck who were staring at him as if they saw an idiot.

”You can kill wing demons?” a tough Chinese soldier with the rank of sergeant first class asked Zhang Tie.

”Not yet. But I think it’s not difficult!” Zhang Tie shrugged.

”Brat, don’t talk nonsense. If you could kill a wing demon, I would call you grandpa!”

”Is wing demon that tricky?”

”Of course, they were LV 9 demons. As long as they reached the dead defensive corners of airship, one wing demon could tear all the major air sacs of a fury-level airship in one minute. In order to deal with wing demons, we’ve lost too many brothers.”

”Does wing demons fly faster than airship?”

”Of course!”

”Are they faster than glider?”

”Almost!”

”Why not beat them by glider?”

”Brat, don’t brag, glider is not like airship. It has limited weapons. There’s only a driver inside. How to beat demons in the cockpit?” that sergeant first class stared at Zhang Tie.

”Do you have a glider on this airship?”

”Of course!”

”Haha, you will know how to beat them!” Zhang Tie smiled before leaving the deck.

...

”F*ck, this brat must have not been to the battle field!” a soldier on the deck said after Zhang Tie left.

All the others nodded.

...

After leaving the deck, Zhang Tie directly returned to his cabin. He told Hillman to call him if the airship encountered an air attack. After that, he closed the door and started to cultivate.

Zhang Tie estimated it would take him at least 7 days by airship from Selnes Plain to Huaiyuan Prefecture of Jinyun Country. He could have a good cultivation in this period. Of course, if the airship met the attack of some iron-beak ibises on the way back, it would be awesome.

Zhang Tie sat with his legs crossed in the narrow cabin as he started to visualize the mysterious runes off ’Great Wilderness Sutra’. After that, he started to recite the endless true words of the Great Wilderness Sutra.

He had to recite the true words of endless Great Wilderness Sutra for 50 times before activating the second storey of the All-Spirits Pagoda. As long as the second storey was activated, Zhang Tie would have 5 Great Wilderness Seals and could manipulate all the LV 1 living beings. After that, Zhang Tie would prepare to see how powerful the soul-based animal controlling method in the ”Great Wilderness Sutra” was.

As Zhang Tie muttered the true words one after another, mysterious tadpole-sized runes gradually formed in Zhang Tie’s mind before drilling into the second storey of the All-Spirits Pagoda. Gradually, the second storey of the All-Spirits Pagoda started to shine.

Zhang Tie gently sped up. Gradually, each sentence of Great Wilderness endless true words jumped out of his mouth in the form of one syllable. As he read too fast, he only heard the sound ”buzz”...”buzz”...later on, all of Zhang Tie’s cells started to hum...

...

In cultivation, Zhang Tie forgot about time. When he felt hungry as his stomach sounded like a thunder, he instantly retreated from the state of reciting Great Wilderness endless true words. After that, Zhang Tie got off the bed. After moving his limbs, he opened the door and walked out.

”Argh, boss, you’re out?” half-balded counterfeiter Abu let out a sigh immediately the moment he saw Zhang Tie coming out.

”What’s wrong?” Zhang Tie asked out of curiosity.

”Boss, we were all concerned about you during the past three days. If you didn’t come out today, Hillman would have called the captain to break your door by force!”

”Oh, I’ve cultivated 3 days?”

”You don’t know how long have you cultivated, boss?”

”In cultivation, you would have a different time experience!”

”Oh!” Abu scratched his head. The world of senior fighters was too mysterious for these LV 2 or 3 soldiers.

”Have the airship been attacked by those flying beasts?”

”No!” Abu shook his head.

”Where’s the canteen. I want to eat something!”

”Ah, good!”

Although there were too many food in Castle of Black Iron, Zhang Tie didn’t want to use Castle of Black Iron without any emergency.

On the way to the canteen, Zhang Tie found that Figo was dealing with wounds for those wounded soldiers as professionally as a doctor. It seemed that Figo had gained great respect from those wounded soldiers.

Zhang Tie was told that this guy was a surgeon before. Hillman was playing chess with the coxswain. At this moment, Figo and Hillman were the most popular guys on the airship.

When Zhang Tie was eating food, Michel stealthily ran towards here and whispered to Zhang Tie, ”Boss, I know where’s the code case of the airship. Do you want to see what’s inside?”

Zhang Tie almost sprayed out a mouth of soup...

”F*ck, what the hell are they?”

After hearing Michel’s words, Abu also smiled in a bashful way, ”Hmm, after observing their certificates these days, I found that it was very easy to counterfeit them!”

Zhang Tie took out of his clan plate and threw it to Abu, ”Can you counterfeit this?”

After observing that plate for about half a minute, Abu replied, ”I can make one with the same look. However, it’s hard to completely counterfeit it. The special alloys on it could not be bought in the market. If they were replaced by other materials, they could be noticed by experts. The grains and fine holes on this plate form a very sophisticated machine three-dimensional identification code. Without the digital decoding formula, I could not pass the identification of difference engine. I need at least 40 parameters to decode this identification code. Additionally, I have to use the core programming card of the difference engine to completely backcast the digital decoding formula.”

”You know difference engine?” Zhang Tie glanced at that half-balded guy.

”Doesn’t a pig slaughter know how to polish a knife?”

”I forgot to ask you. What was your job before?” Zhang Tie asked the counterfeiter.

”Boss, I was a keypunch operator of a difference engine!”

”A keypunch operator?”

Abu explained for 10 minutes. After finding that Zhang Tie didn’t understand what he said, he just looked at Zhang Tie with a helpless expression.

Zhang Tie didn’t ask him anymore. He could understand the principle of abacus; however, he was completely confused about the steam calculator which was composed of numerous gears.

However, Zhang Tie also confirmed one thing, these guys were very useful.

...

In the later days, Zhang Tie kept cultivating quietly in his cabin. Fortunately, this airship didn’t encounter any attack on the way because of its great threat or its better route in the air. As a result, Zhang Tie failed to meet his desire for having one more trouble-reappearance fruit in the travel by trying the glider on the airship.

After entering his 3rd meditation for some time, Zhang Tie felt the All-Spirits Pagoda suddenly started radiating countless golden light in his mind, among which, the shadows of various insects and beasts started to appear on the second storey of the pagoda. Zhang Tie realized that he had activated the second storey of the All-Spirits Pagoda.

Zhang Tie started to inject spiritual energy from the top of the pagoda. An octahedron-shaped Great Wilderness seal slowly formed into the second storey of the All-Spirits Pagoda.

Zhang Tie became thrilled, ”Is this the Great Wilderness Seal that could manipulate all the LV 1 living beings?”

After forming all the 5 Great Wilderness Seals on the second storey, Zhang Tie felt a bit tired because of lack of spiritual energy.

Zhang Tie poured in a vial of all-purpose medicament as he heard someone knocking at his door.

”We’re arriving at Huaiyuan Prefecture...”

...