Alice in the Land of Steam

Chapter 1321 Is there nothing to be afraid of?
The impact did not produce a deafening roar.

It was a deeper, more primal sound, as if two universes were destined to rub against and annihilate each other at the very beginning of their creation. On the solidified dark surface, where the giant whale struck, countless spiderweb-like black ripples instantly spread out, more profound than the deepest ink, silently devouring everything at the point of contact—light, sound, and even the immense magic that constituted the whale's body. Sand and dust fell in torrents, cascading down like a waterfall from the sky, and the roots of plants vanished and melted in an instant, dissipating into nothingness.

As if wrestling with a tangible will, the colossal whale's massive body, inch by inch, with a suffocating heaviness, was embedding itself into the dark sea. Each forward thrust was accompanied by the violent evaporation of its own "flesh" and the slight tremor of the dark barrier. The battlefield groaned in response, the already fragile ruins collapsing further under the invisible pressure, the rising dust swallowed by the solidified darkness before it could even rise, like a stone thrown into a deep pool.

Caraboss stood atop the wave, her skirt unmoved by the invisible storm whipped up by the whale—a storm powerful enough to tear steel apart—like an ancient, unchanging reef. She didn't raise a hand, but the darkness seemed to possess its own will. From the solidified sea of ​​darkness, countless viscous black tentacles, seemingly composed of pure nothingness, suddenly emerged. Ignoring the laws of physics, they twisted and coiled around the giant whale's body, like abyssal serpents strangling their prey. Wherever the tentacles touched, the rocks and earth that formed the whale's body emitted even more mournful cries, quickly turning a deathly inky black before crumbling away. These tentacles not only devoured matter but also eroded the free will that had painstakingly sprouted on the Cloud Whale Sky Island under its master's careful nurturing. A chilling despair spread along the tentacles, attempting to freeze the burning flame of its soul.

The whales responded with a deafening roar, their long, mournful songs echoing between the clash of darkness and storm, as if summoning other beings with free will to join them. In an instant, the colossal beasts, frozen on the battlefield, their bodies constructed from circulation and cyclones, seemed to truly come alive. Their massive forms, moving from stillness to motion, caused the surrounding broken clouds to churn violently, forming swirling pillars of cloud, before rumbling forward, outlining their majestic silhouettes deep within the clouds and mist.

Towering behemoths tread on invisible steps, each stomp of their four feet seeming to strike solidified air, producing a deep, thunderous roar that sent dust tumbling down from the already crumbling ruins below. The clouds could not conceal their forms; their massive, mountain-like bodies were composed of rapidly spinning hurricanes. The wind speeds were far beyond the limits of the naked eye, and beneath their translucent shells, it appeared as if a bluish-white light flowed, a surging, translucent galaxy. Those with wings on their backs had wingspans that blotted out the sky; each flap of their wings stirred up a raging torrent that stretched across the heavens, the hurricanes sweeping up rubble and debris into the air, forming swirling bands of wind connecting heaven and earth. The wind was no longer a howl, but a deep, resonant pulse like the beating of ancient mountains, each beat drawing in the air currents of the entire sky, creating visible, layered, circular storms.

The colossal beasts born of the storm moved slowly but steadily forward. Their pace seemed slow, yet they possessed an unstoppable, crushing force, distorting even space itself with their immense pressure before crashing irresistibly into the black ocean. Though they had gained freedom from the power of royalty and resembled wild beasts, they were not truly living beings, thus incapable of wielding claws or snapping teeth. Their sole instinct in combat was collision; the wind itself is ephemeral, but collision generates energy.

When winds collide with each other, the originally chaotic wind speeds, forces, and even circulation paths will continuously coordinate, assimilate, and eventually resonate, thus forming visible gales, storms, and even hurricanes. When storms collide with their enemies, thousands of wind blades with the same speed, force, and even identical circulation paths in the atmosphere will sweep away their enemies at an astonishing frequency in an instant. Whether it is the most solid mountains or the most lush forests, they will be crushed, destroyed, and conquered by the power of this disaster.

As the wildest forces of nature, they don't need to learn the fighting skills of mortal creatures; they only need to follow their instincts and unleash their inner impulses.

The simplest collision, the most extreme destruction.

Boom——!
A dull, earth-shattering roar, like the collapse of an ancient mountain range, finally shook the heavens and earth. Each collision between the storm behemoth and the dark tentacles unleashed visible circular tremors. These were not ripples in the air, but terrifying folds created by the brutal ravages of space itself by two supreme forces. The ripples swept across the battlefield below like invisible giant plows, lifting up the remaining barricades, collapsed houses, scattered corpses, and even the scorched earth, only to be pulverized into finer dust by subsequent ripples in mid-air, ultimately swallowed up by the sweeping darkness or storm.

On the edge of the battlefield, in the area swept by the shockwave, Countess Neville's Silver Moon Isle, raised by bat wings, swayed violently. The moonlight flickered, and the protective circle was forced to shrink. The edges were torn apart by the dissipating darkness and storm power, and the lives under its protection were like candles flickering in a storm, about to be extinguished. The withered body of Grayhill Eagle Carson Borg was violently thrown into the air by the invisible shockwave. He tumbled in the air like a withered leaf, crashing into a half-collapsed, charred stone pillar before coming to a stop. Debris and dust buried most of him. The sound of bones cracking was as piercing as breaking rotten wood, but this extreme pain caused a brief glimmer of clarity to flash in his cloudy eyes, stimulated by the external force, allowing him to vaguely "see" the unimaginable collision.

On the battlefield, whether it was the defending soldiers driven by bestial instincts and hacking wildly in the darkness, or the rebel warriors shrouded in despair and on the verge of collapse, all were forcibly brought to a standstill by the immense power that transcended human reason. The moving storm and absolute darkness instantly overwhelmed their instincts. Like blades of grass in a gale, they were tossed about, crushed, and shaken until they bled from all seven orifices. They could only cower in instinctive fear, uttering silent howls, feeling the insignificance of living beings in the face of natural disasters, less than dust.

The impact of the storm behemoths was both awe-inspiring and tragic. As they tore apart the tentacles that continuously emerged from the dark sea, they themselves disintegrated and were swallowed by the darkness at an alarming rate. Each violent collision was accompanied by the complete annihilation of a storm behemoth. Some were completely shredded and assimilated by the dark tentacles, their massive bodies turning into churning dark gas; some exhausted all their strength upon impacting the dark sea, silently disintegrating like weathered sand sculptures, leaving only scattered specks of dust carrying a faint will; and others, to protect the cloud whales, willingly faced the densest dark tentacles, transforming into all-encompassing storm currents amidst deafening explosions, briefly tearing open a void before it was filled by even denser darkness.

Saint Tumi once recorded the extraordinary scene of the battle between the extraterrestrial beasts in his travelogue, but even that scene is probably far inferior to the battle taking place in Suarez City today. The battlefield at this moment has transcended the scope of mortal warfare and is more like two gods walking in the world, unleashing a power that can reshape the land and tear the sky apart.

When the young queen unleashed her power without reservation, even heaven and earth wailed, and the universe wept. Was it sorrow for the war and endless sacrifices on earth, or was it remembering their creator, the goddess who had returned to the Sea of ​​No Light, and whether she had witnessed this scene in a dream?

Outside the atmosphere of Mirror Star, Xinuo wielded the Holy Lance White Thorn, its blade condensing into countless frost-covered arrows that rose like a vast rain of arrows, meeting the destructive crimson streak of light. The collision of ice and fire produced no violent sound, only a silent annihilation of energy and a burst of violent particle streams. The intense heat, comparable to the burning of a star, instantly vaporized these still-chilling arrows. The dissipating heat and magical remnants formed a cumulonimbus cloud spanning three countries and two deserts above the planet. The sunlight was abruptly blocked by this cloud, plunging the earth into a premature, oppressive darkness. Panic spread like a plague, causing even the smallest creatures to tremble and prostrate themselves in prayer.

But after melting away all the frost, the cation destroyer launched by the Dyson Sphere had also exhausted most of its energy and was at its last gasp. It didn't even need Hino to forcibly intercept it and slowly came to a stop outside the atmosphere. The remaining energy triggered a small-scale secondary explosion in the high sky. The light of the explosion was not dazzling. The orange-red flames rapidly expanded and collapsed, completing the energy dumping and annihilation in a fraction of a second. Finally, it left behind a short-lived, mottled, and blurry corona-shaped halo, which looked like a dying sun, with the colors of decay and decay, lamenting its fate.

The crimson streak that abruptly ended in the sky seemed to foreshadow the end of this war, and the end of everyone involved. Hino didn't understand why she suddenly had this strange thought; it was like a premonition, intruding into her mind without warning, carrying a cold sense of destiny that made her unconsciously tighten her grip on White Thorn. She could feel the Dyson Sphere's energy intensity decreasing; each cation-destroying cannon shot was weaker than the last. Was it because the Dark Witch was using most of her magic for ground combat? Even so, the Dyson Sphere itself should have sufficient magic reserves; otherwise, how could it support such a dense and continuous barrage?

Her brow furrowed, utterly lost, but then, on a distant land, a storm, like a messenger, brought a deafening echo, interrupting her thoughts. The young knight hurriedly turned, her gaze piercing through the thin outer atmosphere and the eerie energy cloud below, landing on the azure planet. At this distance, the Eastern Continent had become an insignificant piece of the Mirror Star Plate, and the Underreal subcontinent, the Kingdom of Noah, and the Gray Hills region were even smaller, barely describable as dust. Yet, she still clearly saw the scenes of the battlefield, including the collision of storm and darkness, and the sight of giant whales struggling through the sea.

Before the battle began, no one could have imagined that the reinforcements the Seventeenth Legion was waiting for would be the Dark Witch Carabosse; even less could they have imagined that the one who would stand up to fight Carabosse would be Ietta, that gentle, weak, yet very strong girl.

It seemed that Caraboss hadn't lied; the power of the young queen was the power of the heart. Therefore, as long as one was determined, even Ieta, who had never seriously studied combat, could use this clumsy, almost reckless method to block the Dark Witch's attacks and even seize opportunities to counterattack. However, watching this scene, Shino couldn't help but frown, and her horse Brandi also cried out, her cry filled with unease and worry.

“You’re right, Brandy.” The young knight patted her horse’s neck, feeling the tension in Brandy’s muscles and the anxiety it conveyed, and gently comforted her companion: “Ietta… she’s about to give up.”

"Therefore, we need to speed up our pace even more."

She looked out into the sky, her gaze passing over the fading afterglow of the sun. The giant shadow of the Dyson Sphere had already emerged in the endless darkness. Such a magnificent object, suspended in its outer orbit on the Mirror Star, had not been discovered by anyone and had not had any impact on the Mirror Star's celestial phenomena or climate. It was entirely due to the power of Carabosse.

Darkness is like a curtain, concealing the shadow of the calamity, but by overdrawing her power like this, did the Dark Witch not consider the possibility of her failure at all?

Or perhaps, it was precisely to ensure victory that she was pushing her limits so hard, even if the price was likely to be... Carabosse seemed to be making a huge gamble, with stakes that were unimaginable.

He shook his head slightly, banishing these irrelevant thoughts from his mind. Now was not the time to delve into the enemy's motives. This was a battlefield, and as a knight, he should focus on the battle at hand. As for what would happen later, he could think about it then.

The knight galloped across the stars, stepping on an invisible bridge to the heavens, and once again charged toward that crimson harbinger of doom.

……

Unlike Hino and Brandy, Ietta felt that she was in great shape, in fact, she had never felt better.

My body felt so light, as if the wind was carrying me forward; the battle wasn't as terrifying as I had imagined, because my heart was filled with resolve; even the darkness before me felt as thin as a sheet of white paper, and with a light leap, I could cross this obstacle that I had once thought insurmountable, and then fulfill everyone's expectations of me.

Sure enough, as long as I'm with my sister, my friends, and everyone else...

Then there's nothing to be afraid of.

Give me some cats