Industrial Revolution of the Mage Lords

Chapter 709 Counterattack
The last rays of the setting sun eventually disappeared below the horizon, replaced by a dimmer and thinner moonlight.

The battle on the icy snowfield has lasted for nearly three hours.

The roar of the artillery positions never ceased, and the shells that burst from the barrels were like a meteor shower streaking across the sky, standing out conspicuously on the icy plains shrouded in darkness.

As the first batch of solid incendiary bombs arrived at the front lines, the entire battlefield, which had become intensely heated, was completely illuminated... Every incendiary bomb that landed and exploded would directly ignite everything in a large area.

In particular, the giant conch beasts used as shields by the enemy at the front line, once hit by highly sticky incendiary bombs, their entire bodies will become like a moving beacon of fire, using the black water and flesh they contain as fuel to continuously provide light for humans.

On the first line of defense, the sounds of gunfire and beam weapons continued unabated. As reinforcements from the special forces bloodline warriors arrived from the rear, several defensive lines that had been heavily attacked and appeared to be on the verge of collapse were once again stabilized.

The airship force arrived nearly an hour late, and immediately launched a counterattack against the enemy's winged beings as soon as they crossed the line, quickly eliminating the trouble and harassment from the air for the ground troops.

Vaughn led several high-ranking staff officers to the watchtower closest to the front line, where he gazed silently at the battlefield in the distance with a solemn expression.

"Commander, if this continues... we estimate that in at most another hour, the enemy will collapse due to heavy casualties. If they do not choose to withdraw voluntarily, they may even be completely annihilated by us."

The judgments and suggestions given by the General Staff were not entirely based on blind arrogance or simply to boost morale.

After successfully eliminating the evolved humans sent by the enemy to raid the base, the pressure on the front-line troops was greatly reduced. Not only did they regain the fixed-point reinforcements from the special forces bloodline warriors, but they also regained air superiority with the assistance of the air combat mages. In addition, the deployment of powerful and targeted solid incendiary bombs on the battlefield completely made up for the biggest weakness of human night combat, which was limited visibility.

Seeing that Vaughn did not speak, Dickinson tentatively suggested, "Once the enemy is defeated and retreats, we should immediately set off to pursue them, heading straight for the vicinity of the Seventeenth Sea Surge, and take this opportunity to destroy the newly appeared Floating Island No. 4."

To everyone's surprise, Vaughn slowly shook his head and said calmly, "No... After defeating them, we need to immediately issue a counterattack order to the troops stationed near the Thirteenth Sea Surge, and at the same time send reinforcements from the base to completely destroy their second floating island before sunrise tomorrow!"

Is the commander planning to attack the enemy's second floating island first?

Dickinson and Ross exchanged a surprised glance and said in unison, "But we just defeated Floating Island No. 2. Its internal forces have been exhausted. Destroying it would be an easy task for us. Why not attack the new Floating Island, which poses a greater threat?"

Vaughn chuckled lightly, his expression unreadable. Recalling the teachings he had received during his recent conversation with His Majesty, he said calmly, "The enemy's main consciousness possesses extremely high intelligence. Once it realizes that the evolved beings have been successfully intercepted and killed by us, Floating Island No. 4 will definitely not remain in place to wait for death... After all, compared to Floating Island No. 2, which has already become bait and a scapegoat, this new floating island hidden in the misty sea still has sufficient consumables stored inside. It will not be willing to let it sink."

However, even if they leave the No. 17 swell, the floating island fortresses that submerge in the deep sea beneath the ice will eventually resurface. As long as humanity masters the highly mobile capability to move quickly across the ice sheet and can closely monitor all the swells near the coastal edge, the enemy's battle fortresses will be like whack-a-mole to them—they just need to set traps in advance and wait for them to fall into them.

……

At 3:00 AM, a base camp five kilometers outside the No. 13 Haiyong Estuary.

Benny huddled in a bunker submerged beneath the ice, wiping his magic gun as he silently counted the number of shells hurtling overhead.

Since receiving the counter-offensive order from the front-line command at midnight, the bombardment from the artillery positions has continued for nearly three hours. Every five minutes, dozens of shells are launched from the rear of the fighting positions, quickly passing over the bunkers and then crashing onto the floating island standing in the center of the estuary five miles away.

At first, the Lizardmen were able to react somewhat. Nearly a thousand Black Lizard warriors poured out of the floating island, led by a few hundred Winged Ones, and charged towards the Northern Army's defenses. However, they were quickly routed by the well-prepared human soldiers, who used dense machine gun fire and continuous bombardment from portable artillery. With the solid incendiary bombs constantly dropped from the airships, they no longer had to fire blindly in the dark. Illuminated by the intense flames, the fearless alien races charging towards them were no different from moving targets.

As the enemy's floating islands deployed fewer and fewer troops, until now even the winged beings have stopped appearing... everyone knows that achieving final victory is only a matter of time.

The only problem this vanguard force, tasked with completely destroying Floating Island No. 2, is currently facing is that the Floating Island fortress is too large to be sunk by artillery fire in a short time.

The two battalion commanders of the main combat battalion, Newman and Chiron, were even discussing whether they should dispatch an engineering demolition team to land on the island directly and carry out demolition operations under the cover of air combat mages.

To keep bombarding it with shells like this is simply a waste of resources.

In order to conserve ammunition and protect the gun barrels from overheating, deformation, or bursting, artillery positions have begun to gradually lengthen the firing intervals.

Fortunately, the arrival of the first wave of reinforcements from the Ice Sea Base successfully ended the somewhat awkward stalemate.

The reinforcements brought the high-explosive aerial bombs that the vanguard troops desperately needed. They only needed to be loaded onto bombing airships and, with the cover of the fast airships, approach the target and drop the bombs directly. This alien main fortress, which was firmly nailed to the mouth of the Thirteenth Sea, would, like the No. 3 floating island on Great Bear Lake, completely disintegrate and sink amidst the roar of human artillery fire.

After the bombing airships slowly took off, the enemy's floating island main fortress seemed to sense something... or rather, their main consciousness sensed the approaching danger.

The top of the massive floating island, as large as a small mountain, suddenly cracked open with numerous fissures. Many black water nozzles that had been destroyed in the bombing quickly began to writhe and mend themselves, attempting to regain the ability to shoot black crystal spikes into the sky before destruction struck.

Thousands of demon lizardmen appeared at the edge of the estuary, dragging a small number of jet worms, and once again launched an attack on the human positions.

Both sides seemed to realize that the most critical moment of the battle was approaching, so they spared no effort in terms of troop deployment and attack methods. On the battlefield, which was less than three kilometers apart, human machine guns and portable artillery fired fiercely, almost overturning an entire layer of hard ice.

The demon lizardmen also accelerated their approach without fear of death, using the blasted and damaged ice trenches to maneuver and advance. When there was nowhere to go, they simply crawled on the ice. Once they got close to the human lines, they immediately turned all the black water stored in the weapon canisters on their backs into crystal spikes or spears and threw them at their targets without hesitation.

Red and black flesh and blood covered the area in front of the human front, like a death flower blooming abruptly on a snow-white earth.

The fierce battle continued for nearly another hour.

The last bomber airship, under dense air cover, flew over the floating island and smoothly dropped the fifteenth high-explosive bomb.

The No. 2 floating island, whose top had been flattened by nearly ten meters, finally collapsed under the weight... As several huge fragments disintegrated and fell off, the main body of the floating island also began to slowly sink, and a thick layer of black liquid floated on the surface of the entire estuary.

The aerial mage immediately raised his gun and fired, instantly setting the entire sea surface ablaze. The raging flames that shot into the sky illuminated the entire night sky.

The second floating island sank... Humanity finally won the first victory in the counterattack in the icy sea!
(End of this chapter)