Chapter 54.2: A Vast Expanse of Black, Sinister Wings
Several Dazzling Star natives stood atop a snowy ridge overlooking the battlefield between Blue Sea and the Skywing Dragons.
They watched the scene unfold…
…and found themselves completely at a loss for words.
The Skywing Dragons couldn’t understand what was happening.
But the onlookers could.
This battle was coming to an end.
It had been an extraordinarily long war.
For seventeen straight hours, the people of Blue Sea had fought the Skywing Dragons without pause.
The battle had begun in the afternoon and continued all the way into the following morning.
Ordinarily, no matter how formidable the people of Blue Sea were, creatures like the Skywing Dragons—which hunted by day and rested at night—would have broken off the fight after nightfall.
But as soon as darkness began to settle, Blue Sea Safe City started deploying lights over the battlefield.
These weren’t ordinary lamps.
They were Emergency Night Illumination Lamps, special items obtainable only from item cards. A single one could illuminate an entire mountain range, turning night into broad daylight. However, each lamp had a limited lifespan and became completely unusable after just twenty minutes.
That was why they were considered emergency-use items. Normally, anyone lucky enough to obtain one treated it as a life-saving treasure.
For example, if someone was sleeping in a wooden cabin at night and was suddenly attacked by a nocturnal snow beast, activating one of these lamps would instantly flood the surrounding area with daylight, giving the victim precious moments to react.
It was an exceptionally rare special item that could only be obtained from the rarest gold-tier item cards. In any disaster world, it was the kind of treasure people could always trade for a high price.
But none of the spectators had expected Blue Sea Safe City to use them so freely on the battlefield against the Skywing Dragons.
From the moment darkness fell, Blue Sea replaced the lamp every twenty minutes.
They burned through these priceless treasures all night long as though they cost nothing.
…
Inside Puya Safe City, Quan Shazi hadn’t closed his eyes for as long as Blue Sea Safe City had been there.
Nor was he the only one.
The battle had created such an enormous commotion that vast numbers of Skywing Dragons from distant regions were drawn in by the noise, skimming low across the snowy landscape as they converged on the battlefield from every direction.
Whether they were residents of Puya Safe City who had been sent out on assignments or native inhabitants of this region of Dazzling Star, everyone knew something enormous had happened here.
During the day, many Puya residents had hurried back after hearing the commotion.
When they caught sight of the bloodthirsty, battle-crazed warriors of Blue Sea, some turned around and fled on the spot.
The rest cautiously made their way back into their own Safe City, where they finally learned that the neighboring colossal city was called Blue Sea. It was a Tier 3 Safe City, invited by their city lord to help eliminate the Skywing Dragons.
The returning Puya residents were stunned.
“…Our Puya actually managed to hire helpers like them?!”
It wasn’t that they looked down on their own Safe City.
It was just that, even from a distance, every Blue Sea resident looked incredibly strong and well-built. Their Safe City itself was magnificently constructed, and they could even make out roads suspended in midair.
A Safe City like that…
How astronomical would its fees have to be?
They didn’t even dare imagine it.
Many Puya residents secretly wondered whether their city lord, having lost too many people to the Skywing Dragons, had finally snapped from hatred and decided to cede part of their territory as payment to Blue Sea.
But Puya Safe City had already been forced to abandon part of its territory and retreat during the previous disaster world. Its domain was already quite small.
If they gave up even more land…
…how much would they have left?
No matter how they thought about it, the residents simply couldn’t figure out what their city lord had possibly paid to hire such an overwhelmingly powerful Safe City to fight on their behalf.
Quan Shazi couldn’t figure it out either.
Ever since he had watched the people of Blue Sea charge headlong into the Skywing Dragons’ nesting grounds with the attitude of either the dragons die or we do—without a single glance backward—he had been completely unable to make sense of it.
The way they fought…
It didn’t look like the Skywing Dragons were simply valuable prey.
It looked as though the dragons and the people of Blue Sea shared some irreconcilable blood feud.
Could it be that, back in Blue Sea’s original world, they had already been mortal enemies with the Skywing Dragons?
Just watching the battle had left him exhausted.
Yet the people of Blue Sea showed no sign of tiring.
If anything, the longer they fought, the more energized they became, and the more fiercely they threw themselves into the battle.
Wave after wave of Skywing Dragons kept arriving, their numbers growing ever larger.
Yet the people of Blue Sea remained astonishingly high-spirited. Not only were they completely unafraid, they even seemed… strangely excited.
Then again, that was probably what you’d expect from the residents of a Tier 3 Safe City.
If it had been the residents of Puya Safe City, they would have collapsed from exhaustion after fighting at such intensity for so long.
There was something else that puzzled Quan Shazi.
In most Safe Cities, when the residents were individually powerful, there were usually plenty of hotheads and troublemakers.
But after watching the endless streams of Blue Sea residents pouring onto the battlefield, he couldn’t find a single one.
They simply charged into battle.
When they got thirsty or hungry, they withdrew to the outer edge of the fighting, grabbed something to eat and drink, then immediately rushed back into combat.
Blue Sea Safe City even dispatched wave after wave of construction crews to build rows of toilets right beside the battlefield.
Unable to read Blue Sea’s language, Quan Shazi initially assumed those little buildings were some kind of secret weapon.
He watched Blue Sea residents hurry inside one after another, then rush back out and return to the fighting.
Only after observing them for several hours did he finally realize…
They were toilets.
There were also people in white coats—presumably battlefield doctors or medics.
They erected white tents beside the battlefield and began treating the wounded.
At first, Quan Shazi thought those doctors were unbelievably brave.
Skywing Dragons weren’t the sort of monsters that stayed confined to a particular area. They had eyes, they could fly, and they attacked wherever they pleased.
The medical tents weren’t in the very center of the battlefield, but they weren’t that far away, either.
If even one Skywing Dragon happened to notice them and swooped over to attack…
Wouldn’t those noncombatant doctors be doomed?
At last, Quan Shazi thought he’d discovered a flaw in Blue Sea’s management.
He immediately sent a message to Cheng Qisheng.
He hoped that by offering this well-intentioned piece of advice, the relationship between the two of them would appear a little closer.
Now that he’d witnessed the Blue Sea residents’ fanatical assault, Quan Shazi was convinced that Blue Sea Safe City really had come for the Skywing Dragons. He no longer worried, as he had before, that there might be something suspicious about their alliance or that Blue Sea might turn on him.
Still, when you encountered a Safe City with strength like this, it never hurt to seize every opportunity to build a good relationship.
There was nothing embarrassing about trying to cozy up to such a powerful ally.
Blue Sea Safe City didn’t look down on him for being only a Tier Two city lord and quickly replied:
[Thanks for the reminder, but don’t worry. It’s all part of the plan. =v=]
Quan Shazi was baffled.
He hadn’t seen anyone assigned to protect those doctors.
Then he watched as several Skywing Dragons flew straight toward the medical tents.
But the moment they came within range, those people who looked like ordinary medical staff hoisted the same familiar steel spears, hurled them with all their strength, worked together to drag the dragons out of the sky, and moments later were covered in blood from the fighting.
It wasn’t just the doctors.
Even the Blue Sea residents who appeared to be logistics personnel—slowly pushing carts piled high with food and water—fearlessly charged into battle the instant a Skywing Dragon attacked.
And every one of them fought with ruthless efficiency.
Quan Shazi fell silent.
He could only stare in stunned disbelief.
If these Blue Sea residents didn’t still stop to eat, drink, and use the restroom, he would have suspected they weren’t humans at all, but some kind of high-tech combat robots.
Even Quan Shazi—a Safe City lord who considered himself widely traveled and well-informed—was left utterly dumbfounded.
The native people of Dazzling Star were even more astonished.
Having lived here for many years, they were keenly aware whenever the Skywing Dragons became unusually active.
As soon as the dragons started behaving strangely, quite a few Dazzling Star natives cautiously made their way toward the area to investigate.
Every single one who arrived…
…was struck speechless.
When night fell, some remained hidden in the snow, bundled in their Tier 2 cold-weather suits as they continued secretly watching.
Others returned to their homes, gazing toward the distant battlefield from afar.
But regardless of where they were or what they were doing, most people noticed the illumination lamps that shone throughout the entire night.
The natives of Dazzling Star were genuinely stunned.
The most astonishing part came the next day.
When they returned to the battlefield…
…the people from Blue Sea Safe City were still fighting.
The snowfield had long since become a frozen sea of crimson.
Blood from countless Skywing Dragons had soaked through the snow, melting the surface before freezing again into solid ice. Layer after layer of fresh blood flowed over it, only to freeze into yet another crimson sheet.
The people of Blue Sea didn’t think there was anything wrong with fighting on solid ice.
Sure, it was slippery.
So they fought while sliding.
Their balance was excellent. Even if they slid toward danger, they could twist their bodies with astonishing agility and evade the attack.
And if they truly couldn’t avoid it…
They simply fired a grappling line to hook onto one Skywing Dragon overhead, then latched onto another one nearby.
Just like that, they could swing freely through the air.
It was much like in the zombie world, where the people of Blue Sea had swung from building to building like spiders.
It was simple.
As long as you didn’t touch the ground…
…you couldn’t die from falling.
And if you were about to land, you simply stayed as low as possible and picked the safest way to hit the ground.
The people of Dazzling Star couldn’t describe the shock they felt as they watched Blue Sea residents weaving through a web of ropes and chains—the chains attached to the spears that had been embedded in the Skywing Dragons overhead.
How…
How had these people managed to transform a barren, featureless frozen wasteland into something that resembled a pre-apocalypse jungle, where they moved about with effortless freedom?
At that moment, many natives of Dazzling Star came to the same realization.
Puya Safe City had completely misled them about what a Safe City was truly capable of.
So this…
This was what a real Safe City looked like in battle.
The seventeen-hour-long battle left countless witnesses utterly awestruck.
And even more people were still on their way, having seen wave after wave of Skywing Dragons flying in this direction and set out to discover what could possibly be happening.
As far as the people of Blue Sea were concerned, they hadn’t paid the slightest attention to whether anyone was watching them.
One Skywing Dragon after another was dragged out of the sky.
Eventually, the once-dark heavens were reduced to only a few dozen dragons circling overhead.
Only then did their dim-witted minds finally realize that the humans below were not easy prey.
“Screeeech—!”
Crying out, the remaining Skywing Dragons climbed to a higher altitude before hastily fleeing.
Standing atop a field littered with Skywing Dragon corpses, the people of Blue Sea watched them leave with obvious reluctance.
They had flown too high.
Even the champion javelin thrower couldn’t throw a spear that far.
All they could do was watch those few survivors escape.
“It doesn’t matter.”
Dragging one Skywing Dragon carcass after another home with their teammates, leaving bloody trails across the snow, the Blue Sea residents chatted cheerfully as they hauled away their spoils.
“We just can’t catch them because we don’t have wings yet.”
“But once we’ve got our own flying wings, if they fly…”
“…we’ll be able to fly after them too!”
The battle was over.
Now it was time to harvest the rewards.
When it came to weapons and military equipment, Blue Sea never wasted time.
The moment it was decided that ninety-nine percent of their stock of Long-Tendril Leaves would be devoted to manufacturing flying wings, the research institute had already begun extracting the leaves’ vascular fibers and producing the necessary connection interfaces according to the procedures submitted by Ruo Buyan.
As soon as the battle ended, every department that had been preparing in advance sprang into action.
The dragon carcasses were quickly collected, dissected, their four wings carefully removed and processed before being sent to the Flight Wing Processing Department.
Yes.
Blue Sea had actually established an entirely new government department just for the flight wings.
Ruo Buyan was serving as its director in addition to her existing duties—and naturally received another salary.
The Blue Sea residents who had fought to obtain these flight wings were eager.
The Blue Sea government was equally eager.
So every part of the operation moved at remarkable speed.
…
Meanwhile, Quan Shazi looked at the group chat, where the other city lords kept asking questions:
[Did you end up fighting them?]
[Should we still send you our coordinates?]
[Has the alliance taken effect?]
[How many crystals does it cost to hire Blue Sea as mercenaries?]
Puya Safe City: [We didn’t fight! The cooperation went great! The boss handled everything incredibly efficiently and already helped us wipe out those snow beasts! Thank you so much, Boss! Wishing you a long and peaceful life!]
After sending that message, Quan Shazi immediately opened a private chat with Cheng Qisheng.
Quan Shazi: [Boss, your combat strength is truly unbelievable! I honestly feel like the 399 I paid was almost an insult to someone of your caliber. How about I send you some extra crystals as a token of my gratitude?]
Gratitude that Blue Sea had really come for the Skywing Dragons…
…and not for Puya Safe City.
After witnessing the entire battle against the Skywing Dragons with his own eyes, Quan Shazi silently swore to himself:
Even if he somehow managed to offend every single city lord in the group chat…
…he must never, ever offend Blue Sea.
Just look at those Skywing Dragons.
There had been hundreds of thousands of them—at the very least well over a hundred thousand.
They had once dominated this entire region, ruling it like undisputed overlords.
And yet…
Eighteen hours.
Blue Sea had needed only eighteen hours to reduce them from an overwhelming swarm to a mere few dozen survivors fleeing in panic.
The more Quan Shazi thought about it, the more ingratiating his tone became.
After all, there was nothing shameful about trying to stay alive.
Blue Sea Safe City: [No need. I’ve already gotten what I wanted. =v=]
Quan Shazi blinked.
Huh?
So…
What exactly had Blue Sea wanted?
Blue Sea Safe City remained in the region for another three days.
On the fourth day, after fresh snowfall had completely buried the blood-soaked battlefield beneath a blanket of pristine white…
Countless residents rose into the sky above Blue Sea Safe City.
Black wings spread wide behind them as they flew out with barely concealed excitement.
Watching the scene, Cheng Qisheng smiled in satisfaction.
Once again, the sky was covered by a vast expanse of black, sinister wings.
But this time…
The force blotting out the heavens was Blue Sea.
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