Castle of Black Iron

Zhang Tie, who had hovered more than half a year above Selnes Theater of Operations by the gliders, was familiar with this region. The mountains and rivers under his feet were the coordinates in Zhang Tie’s mind. Even if he didn’t use airmap, he could still identify the correct route and direction based on his memory. Therefore, after flying towards the south for 7 hours, during which period he corrected his route twice and inspected the situations of some cities in Titanic Duchy, Zhang Tie finally flew over the entire territory of Titanic Duchy and arrived at the Selnes Theater of Operations that he was familiar with at dusk.

4 months ago, he was familiar with everything over here very much; however, now he felt pretty strange about this region.

Rouben said the humans’ defense line in Selnes Theater of Operations was going to collapse. When Zhang Tie listened to that, he was even a bit dubious about that. However, when he was really close to Selnes Theater of Operations, he realized that Rouben didn’t cheat him.

When Zhang Tie saw those huge pyramid-sized gravetower demons erecting outside the city near the demons’ region, he knew that the situation here was even worse than he could imagine.

If the gravetower demons appeared in Selnes Theater of Operations, it meant that human airship troops had completely lost their air supremacy over Selnes Theater of Operations. If not, human airship troops would never allow demons to build their arsenal in the frontline tactically or strategically. Demonized puppets constantly provided by gravetower demons would be the worst nightmare of the human troop.

However, the human airship troop could not stop this anymore.

Zhang Tie remembered the wrecks of human airships outside Tokei City. It seemed that human airship troop had paid a greater price than that he could imagine in that move. Although the gravetower demons outside Tokei City were destroyed, the human airship troop also suffered a great loss. They had not even recovered from that battle till now.

Zhang Tie looked downward and saw a constant demonized puppets camp. The pitch-dark demonized puppets on the ground stimulated goosebumps all over Zhang Tie’s body.

When Zhang Tie entered the battlefield of Selnes Theater of Operations, he was shocked once again as the sky was neither covered with human airships nor wing demons, but numerous vultures which ate rotten flesh.

There were also vultures above the battlefield before. However, Zhang Tie had not imagined that there were so many vultures now. The entire sky and ground were covered with vultures. When some vultures flew off the ground, they looked like a sort of dark gray wave while those in a certain air domain looked like clouds.

The only reason for so many vultures to gather here was that there was sufficient food on the ground.

Zhang Tie looked down and found miles of bones and incomplete corpses on the ground, which looked like the hell. The entire Selnes Theater of Operations had become the paradise of scavengers. Packs of wild-dogs and vultures were walking on the battlefield, which was dotted with wrecks of human armored vehicles and tanks. The armored vehicles were covered with blood stains while wrecks of airships could always be seen.

Judging from those corpses, Zhang Tie could not identify whether they were demonized puppets or humans. After remembering that Scala told him that Senel Clan had already turned over 10 million humans into demonized puppets, Zhang Tie looked down and felt icy right away. Although he had not joined the battle, he could also imagine how the army of demonized puppets submerged the Selnes Plain and combated the human troops here.

Zhang Tie then noticed those collapsed battle fortresses.

At the sight of those human battle fortresses, Zhang Tie’s scalp felt numb.

There was a slope paved by corpses outside each battle fortress, which leveled with the height of the wall of the battle fortress. Zhang Tie could completely imagine how those battle fortresses were broken through——under the strike of numerous demonized puppets, these steel battle fortresses defended with human fighters inside the battle fortresses as firm as rocks on the Selnes Plain. They shot down those demonized puppets in batches, causing the corpses of demonized puppets pile up from the foot of the wall of the fortress. When those demonized puppets’ corpses gradually elevated and reached the height of the wall, the following demonized puppets finally broke into the battle fortress while stepping on the former corpses...

In such a case, no human guard would survive in the battle fortress. However, Zhang Tie, with the sharp vision of thunder hawk, couldn’t find one demon’s corpse from the piles of corpses at all.

Demons and Three-eye Association broke though humans’ defense line at the cost of humans’ strength.

Nearby those battle fortresses which had not been broken through, there were still large batches of demonized puppets. Many of them were squatting on the ground and eating those corpses like scavengers on Selnes Plain. In the region where demonized puppets existed, even wild-dogs and vultures would stay away from them.

From north to south, Zhang Tie saw many human battle fortresses and trenches which had been collapsed while human corpses were piling as high as mountains outside the battle fortresses. Even the trenches had been filled with corpses.

Miserable, too miserable...

When it became completely dark, the Selnes Plain was covered with wildfire, making it look like a ghost region.

Zhang Tie finally recovered his composure. He realized that in the strike of about 10 million demonized puppets, the allied human forces’ defense line in Selnes Theater of Operations was finally torn open.

Zhang Tie didn’t know where the allied human forces had been retreated to and whether the southernmost three cities in Selnes Plain were still in the hand of the allied human forces.

Zhang Tie directly flew towards the Crystal Battle Fortress. The closer he was to the south, the more demonized puppets would he see on the ground. Many established demonized puppet troops were converging towards the south.

...

After a short while, Zhang Tie had been close to the Crystal Battle Fortress. It was pith-dark in the evening while being surrounded by the wildfire. At the sight of this scene, Zhang Tie’s heart raced. He instantly lowered his height to 200-300 m.

Zhang Tie could see that the corpses of demonized puppets outside the Crystal Battle Fortress were piling as high as a mountain from one mile away. The closer he was to the Crystal Battle Fortress, the more corpses of demonized puppets would he see. According to Zhang Tie’s estimation, there were at least 300,000 to 400,000 corpses of demonized puppets.

Hovering above the Crystal Battle Fortress, Zhang Tie could not see any person inside the fortress at all as the entire Crystal Battle Fortress had been occupied by the alive demonized puppets.

Zhang Tie hovered there a while. After seeing no wreck of the airships in the Crystal Battle Fortress, he became relaxed a bit.

Across the Selnes frontline, Crystal Battle Fortress was not only the biggest battle fortress but also the only battle fortress which could hold fury-level airships. Zhang Tie remembered that a few fury-level airships were parking in the Crystal Battle Fortress all the year round for the sake of emergency evacuation like life buoys on ships. If he didn’t see the wrecks of those airships, it meant that those airships had already evacuated from here along with most of the fighters in the battle fortress. This was the best news for Zhang Tie.

The Military Exploits List was still erecting over there. After being weathered about one year, the metal rack was still not rusted. The plates with names of elites from the major clans of Jinyun Country and their credits were still on the Military Exploits List. Zhang Tie found that his name still ranked first...

The Military Exploits List seemed to be especially left by people of the battle fortress which was a mock towards demons and represented the meritorious deeds and dignity of Chinese nations in Waii Sub-continent.

When Zhang Tie saw his name once again, his heart was filled with emotions.

Those slow-witted demonized puppets could never understand the Chinese on the plates. Otherwise, they might have long destroyed it.

After leaving the Crystal Battle Fortress, Zhang Tie flew towards the Glider Base of Hoorn Republic. Like how Zhang Tie had imagined, the glider base which was not far from the Crystal Battle Fortress had already been occupied by demonized puppets.

’I wonder how many fighters in this base have survived.’

The Glider Base of Hoorn Republic was only dozens of miles away from Mocco City. Given that this glider base had been collapsed, Zhang Tie knew it clearly that the allied human forces had already retreated to the last urban bases of Selnes Theater of Operations. If the last human bases were occupied by demonized puppets, the human defense line in Selnes Theater of Operations would be collapsed completely...

Zhang Tie’s guess was correct.

Soon after he left a few miles from the airship base of Hoorn Republic had he seen a battle between a human troop and a troop of demonized puppets. It was more like a chase than a battle...

Hundreds of human fighters were retreating in the wild while being chased by almost 1,000 demonized puppets who were like wild-dogs with bloody eyes. Those human fighters who stayed to stop them were constantly submerged and torn apart by demonized puppets.

At the sight of such a scene, Zhang Tie instantly landed in the weeds which were as high as 1 m...