Alice in the Land of Steam

Chapter 1310 Won't it hurt anyone?

It's hard to describe what a battle it was, or even to put it into words. But I'm sure this scene will remain in everyone's heart and become their most profound memory since they were born with emotions. No matter what fate awaits them—death or a miserable existence—this intense shock and indescribable feeling will never change.

Giant whales swept across forests and seas of clouds, their majestic bodies slowly gliding through the smoke-filled sky, casting shadows like the deepest abyss, instantly covering vast scorched swathes of land. In the distance, the battered, roaring steel whales seemed stunned by this sudden, incomprehensible behemoth, their bomb-dropping rhythm momentarily halting. Whales gazed at each other across the battlefield, perhaps long, long ago, when the sky was the earth and the earth was the sea, they too had looked at each other like this, yearning for rebirth from death, for freedom from life.

In the end, however, it was the instinct of weaponry that suppressed the emotions that shouldn't have existed, or perhaps the soldiers controlling the whales couldn't comprehend the boundary between the living and the dead; they only knew that what appeared on the battlefield at that moment could only be, and must be, the enemy. If not the enemy, how could they vent the burning rage within them?
After a brief pause, the piercing alarm ripped through the air once more. The pilot inside the cabin, in a desperate move, pushed the already near-destructive magic engine to its maximum power. Propelled by this force, the whales slowly raised their heads, as if their lungs had run dry and they desperately needed to surface for new life. Their bodies struggled upwards, attempting to surpass the height of the Cloud Whale Sky Island and gain a more advantageous position.

The magic engine groaned under its strain, struggling to withstand the sudden acceleration and high-altitude air pressure. The skeleton, encased in its tattered airbags, teetered on the brink of collapse. Yet, seemingly sustained by a survival instinct that transcended inanimate objects and resembled that of living beings, the whale ultimately did not crash but instead soared into the higher skies. The next moment, billowing black smoke and semi-contaminated magic flowed from the air vents at the rear of the airship. One after another, whales opened their massive jaws, revealing the cold, dark bomb bay doors. A chilling shriek followed, and another wave of burning death rain poured down on the remaining positions below, and also on the slowly approaching giant rocky shadow.

In the flower field, Ieta's eyes were tightly closed, her pure white eyelashes, as if covered by fine snow, trembled like the wings of a startled butterfly. Her small hands pressed deeper and more firmly into the warm soil beneath her, as if trying to grasp the earth's pulsating heartbeat. Her thoughts, like invisible threads, pierced through the rock layers and the void, gently yet firmly calling out the name of the colossal creature beneath her feet—you were once the Ronin Rift, later the Cloud Whale Sky Island, and in the more distant years I do not know, and have not yet visited, perhaps you were also the refuge of many lives?

What have you witnessed in the long and distant years? Have you seen the parched and fertile land? The rise and fall of a nation? Or how an ordinary little village has been constantly lost and reborn amidst human emotions and desires? If you have seen all this and been moved by it, then please allow me, as the wind angel of Avignon, the sower of the Salya plains, and the gospel maiden at the festival of abundance, to pray for your rebirth and for your help.

It wasn't a cold instruction, nor a forceful command. The angel never placed herself on a position of greatness or holiness simply because she had created the whale beneath her feet. She seemed to understand somewhat the thoughts of the mother she had never met: what emotions should a creator feel when facing their creation? For Ietta, it was resonance, compassion, and a silent call: to stop, to endure, to end this pointless destruction.

Sensing the will of its creator, the Cloud Whale Sky Island neither dodged nor collided, nor even showed a trace of hostility. It merely slightly adjusted its massive body, and with an almost compassionate posture, faced the oncoming torrent of destruction with its broad back covered by ancient rock layers and dense forests.

"Boom boom boom——!"

A deafening explosion erupted from its back! Flames and shockwaves instantly engulfed the rock's outline, smoke and dust billowing up like boiling waves. Even from afar, the sand and gravel beneath their feet trembled, and everyone on the battlefield held their breath. The soldiers instinctively closed their eyes, unable to imagine the colossal creature being torn apart.

However, as the billowing dust was slightly dispersed by the air currents it stirred up, the scene revealed astonished all who witnessed it. From afar, they saw only patches of charred marks and a few shallow craters on the rock's ridge. The primrose fields and the dense forest still swayed in the wind, and the cracks where plant roots intertwined seemed to brighten for a moment, like the slight, instinctive contraction of a giant beast under attack, before quickly regaining its deep, weighty, and unshakeable essence.

It withstood firepower powerful enough to destroy a fortress, yet it was like waves gently touching a reef, leaving only a few insignificant marks. Those deadly shells were nothing more than stones thrown into an abyss before it. This was not merely a manifestation of Ietta's power, but more like the ancient silence and resilience of this land itself, negating all acts of mutual harm in the mortal world.

Ieta, too, faced the barrage of fire from the sky, yet she did not retreat an inch, but calmly gazed at the group of wounded whales. At this moment, she could feel the surging geothermal heat within the Cloud Whale Sky Island, like the rushing of blood; she could feel the immense power of its massive body churning the air currents, like its ceaseless breath. She unreservedly conveyed her unwavering will, her compassion for her wounded kin, and her yearning to end the tragedy of mutual harm. Responding to the call of its creator, the Cloud Whale Sky Island let out a longer, deeper cry. Its enormous tail fin slammed downwards, stirring up an unprecedented, visible ring of air currents.

In an instant, the air was violently churned like solidified seawater, forming invisible, raging currents. A storm was visible to the naked eye, but this storm was not meant to destroy; rather, it was meant to drive away. It swept precisely across the airships that were still trying to open their bomb bays, like a storm engulfing a naval fleet.

The first to be hit, an old airship, its half-exposed metal frame groaning in the raging air currents. It lurched and tumbled violently, like a young whale caught in a deep-sea whirlpool. Inside the cockpit, the soldier trying to maintain balance was thrown out of the hatch by the immense centrifugal force before he could only utter a short cry of alarm, becoming a tiny speck of despair plummeting through the air.

Deprived of its controller's will, the already overburdened magic engine erupted with a series of ominous howls, like the dying cry of a whale. Airbags tore apart, the skeleton snapped, and the engine burst into flames, billowing smoke like foul blood gushing from a wound, staining the entire sky. As Ieta had wished, the steel whale, born as a weapon, finally broke free from human control in its final moments of destruction, plunging headlong into the scorched earth below, trailing a trail of smoke and fire. At the moment of impact, a massive fireball soared into the air, scattering fragments of steel like the spray from a whale's carcass hitting the seabed.

Whether it was a hallucination or not, everyone on the battlefield heard a sigh of relief at that moment, but when they came to their senses, they realized it was just the deafening roar of the shells that hadn't yet been dropped from the airship. The Narwhale Sky Island continued forward, bearing all the artillery fire for the people on the ground—whether friendly or enemy—while slowly and heavily flying towards the pod of wounded whales. The armored mechs surrounding the whales, like silver-white seabirds drifting alongside the whales, rushed forward, trying to stop its advance. But this resistance was more like a desperate gamble in a dead end; the Narwhale merely flicked its tail fin, its wings stirring up a storm, and the seabirds were powerless to fly back the way they came. On the lonely sea, birds are not the masters of the wind and ocean currents; these ancient spirits born from the deep sea are.

However, the Cloud Whale Sky Island's demeanor didn't resemble that of a warrior. It was more like that of the eldest, wisest, and most mortal-wise elder of the whale pod, urging his lost, dangerous, and equally weary kin to leave this place and return home. Stop being enamored with the beauty of the mortal world; those things on earth ultimately do not belong to you. Stop indulging in meaningless slaughter; the mutual harm between the inanimate and the living will eventually be soothed by a greater force.

Return to your homeland. If you come from the deep sea, return to the boundless ocean; if you come from the earth, return to the embrace of rocks and soil; if you come from the sky, merge into the warm realm of wind and clouds. Everything created will eventually return to its homeland—all living beings, including you and me.

It was carrying out Ietta's will, bidding farewell to the pitiful and sorrowful whales. Yet, within that surging, immense power, within that almost compassionate act of driving them away, something deeper seemed to be contained—like ocean currents having their own direction, and mountains having their own silent will. It was not wisdom, not reason, not the various emotions acquired after being given life, but something that transcended the boundaries between the inanimate and the living, a sense beyond the ordinary, feeling an instinctive, ineffable sorrow for its kind lost in the slaughter. This sorrow seemed to resonate with Ietta's compassion, making its actions no longer confined to a simple relationship of control and being controlled, but imbued with an almost resonant divinity.

One airship after another was propelled, their engines roaring in vain, turbulent smoke billowing from their exhaust pipes, yet unable to resist the immense force of the earth. Forced off course, they were pushed away from the heart of the battlefield, like being swept away by an invisible tide. Some, overloaded by the violent turbulence, erupted in a final burst of fire and smoke, leaving long, black trails as they tragically and heroically plummeted to the earth, becoming part of the scorched earth in the deafening crash, completing their final and only homecoming, as described in ancient legends.

The suffocating bombardment from the sky gradually subsided, leaving only the long, mournful cry of the giant whale echoing in the still-smoky world. People looked at each other in disbelief, a brief moment of stunned silence before they realized what had happened. The whale in the sky seemed to be an ally of our forces. Although we didn't know which great being possessed such power to summon such a magnificent and sacred beast to aid us, the fact was that the enemy's reinforcements had been defeated, and there were no more obstacles ahead.

At the commander's order, the soldiers charged fiercely once more towards the enemy's position. This time, neither the magic tanks, the construct soldiers, nor the enemy's painstakingly constructed fortified defenses could stop their advance.

As the whales before her eyes sank to the bottom of the sea, returning to the ancient graveyard, Ieta, the girl revered as a god yet believing herself to possess only meager power, slowly withdrew her hands. She ceased resonating with the emotions of her creation through her own will, instead letting it float quietly in the clouds, its fins beating with a long, drawn-out rhythm like breath. The sky was filled with thick smoke, flames, and shattered steel debris, yet only her clear blue eyes still reflected the silhouette of a vast, gentle rock. She had been moved by its resolve, unaware that its resolve stemmed from herself.

Legend has it that most whale pods are led by an elderly and wise mother whale. She may not be the strongest, but she possesses wisdom and experience accumulated over the years. She leads her people in following the tails of monsoons and ocean currents, avoiding dangerous whirlpools, hidden reefs, and malicious human vessels. Every whale is born, grows, and slowly dies under her watchful gaze. In the legends of coastal peoples, she is no longer a concrete entity, but has gradually evolved into an abstract concept, like a shared "grandmother" to all the whales in the sea.

Perhaps she couldn't be as great as that "grandmother," Ietta thought, but at least she could guide these lost children to live like real whales, even if only for a brief moment.

The instant this thought crossed her mind, the girl seemed to hear echoes from the battlefield on the ground, as if across time and space: she heard the insurgent soldiers shouting inspiring slogans and launching a fearless charge against the enemy; she heard the Axis soldiers finally losing their will to fight, fleeing in disarray, their cries of agony cut off by bullets piercing their throats...

She heard all of this, and in a daze, she realized that although she had accomplished something, she had actually accomplished nothing. The whales had fallen asleep, but mortals had not escaped the abyss of mutual harm; instead, they were sinking deeper and deeper. She was not there to end this war, but to end its beginning, and then to begin its end.

"It's ok."

Miss Angel gently clenched her fist and said, word by word, only Saint Charlotte, who was closest to her, could hear what she was saying: "At least, genuine feelings will never hurt anyone."

　Give me some cats
　　(End of this chapter)