The Skyship’s patrol radius wasn’t far, because the purpose of the patrol was to provide early warning. In the absence of comprehensive communication equipment, too large a radius would mean that even if demons were spotted, there would be no way to report it in time.
Therefore, when Rocky left Backhill Village aboard a Skyship, it didn’t take long to reach the destination, the demon gathering site.
Upon arrival, Rocky ordered the Skyship to lower its altitude, then stood at the bow and looked down carefully.
At this moment, their location was still a desolate land, but the ground was riddled with several large pits, clearly the result of magic cannon bombardment. Looking closely, one could see some bodies around these large pits, the bodies of demons, which undoubtedly confirmed that Felly hadn’t lied. Previously, demons had indeed gathered here and had been bombed.
After confirming this, Rocky issued a new order.
“Felly, inform the other Skyships to thoroughly search the vicinity. We must find the traces of the remaining demons.”
“Yes!”
With an affirmative reply, Felly immediately used the communication equipment on the Skyship to convey Rocky’s command.
Rocky had just carefully counted and found that there were only two or three demons that had been killed by the bombing, which was quite normal since Felly had only brought two Skyships at that time, each equipped with only four magic cannons. Achieving such a result was already quite good.
But if there had really been more than twenty demons gathered together at that time, a problem arose. Where were the other demons scattered by the bombing?
Where had the other demons, scattered by the magic cannons, run off to?
Rocky was determined to find these fleeing demons; otherwise, once they regrouped, Backhill Village would be in danger!
Under these circumstances, ten Skyships began to act separately, like a huge net cast in the sky, searching for prey on the ground.
Time went by, and the blazing sun overhead moved slowly from east to west in this process, finally being swallowed by the horizon, and nightfall came soon after.
Strangely enough, after almost a day of spread-out patrolling, the ten Skyships failed to find any trace of demons. Not a sign of a large group, nor even scattered demons could be found.
This was obviously very abnormal because the area around Heavensplit Mountain was an unending wasteland with no forests or similar places for concealment. The dispersed demons, even if scattered, should have appeared sporadically on the wasteland rather than disappearing without a trace.
In light of this, Rocky did not skimp on the mana for the Skyships; instead, he ordered the expansion of the reconnaissance area to continue until traces of demons were found!
Meanwhile, he did not return to Backhill Village but joined the Skyships in the reconnaissance, wanting to see where these demons were hiding.
Thus the night deepened, and Rocky, persuaded by Felly, returned to his cabin. But just as he was about to rest, Felly came to him again.
“My lord! We’ve found the demons!”
“Where?!”
The moment Rocky, who had just lain down on his bed, heard this, he sat up.
“It’s the third Skyship that spotted the target, five kilometers away from us.”
“How many are there?”
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“The report says… at least thirty…”
Thirty…?!
Hearing this number, Rocky involuntarily took a sharp breath, thought for a moment, and then immediately ordered, “Command the third ship to monitor the demons’ movements on the spot, and report immediately if there is any movement.”
“Have the other Skyships immediately converge on the third ship, but before I arrive, no one is to engage in an attack!”
“Yes!”
With his order received, Felly immediately turned and left, and Rocky had no more intent to rest.
Now, he wasn’t thinking about anything because the demons’ actions had clearly gone beyond common sense. In such a situation, any prediction made in advance was unreliable and could even lead to misleading conclusions. Therefore, he decided to wait until he saw the demons with his own eyes before making any decisions.
A distance of five kilometers was not far for a Skyship flying in the sky. In just over ten minutes, Rocky was called to the deck; they had already met up with the third Skyship, and in addition, three other Skyships had already arrived.
As soon as Rocky stepped out of the cabin, he heard a cacophony of hissing roars!
Having clashed with the Demons multiple times, he immediately recognized the sounds and hurried to the bow of the Skyship to look down.
With that single glance, his heart sank.
The Skyship was not too high above the ground, about forty to fifty meters, allowing him to clearly see everything below from the bow.
Looking down from the bow, Rocky saw a dense throng of Demons beneath the Skyship, bunched together in large numbers, at least thirty strong!
At the same time, the Demons clustered on the ground were roaring at the Skyships, their combined cries not only deafening but also unbearably cacophonous.
What’s more, some Demons were picking up huge stones from the ground and hurling them at the Skyships, each stone flung to a height of over ten meters!
Fortunately, with the Skyship being forty to fifty meters above the ground, the stones thrown into the sky couldn’t reach it, which allowed Rocky to observe these Demons more safely and carefully.
“Black-eyed Demons…”
“Bull-horned Demons…”
“This kind of Demon… I don’t recognize…”
Carefully observing the thirty-odd Demons below, Rocky found that the most numerous were the Black-eyed Demons, with about twenty or more; next were the armored bull demons, covered with scales and with bull-like horns on their heads, but not just the three that Felly had mentioned—there were five!
In addition to these two types of Demons, there was one more kind that Rocky had never seen before, with only three present.
In other words, the group of thirty-plus Demons now had not only increased in number from the daytime, but the variety had also grown!
This undoubtedly proved Rocky’s earlier thought: the Demons near Break-Sky Mountain had been gathering together!
“Sir, shall we open fire?”
As he furrowed his brow, Felly couldn’t help but ask beside him, his tone and voice betraying his fear.
“How many Skyships have arrived now?”
“Six.”
While Rocky was observing the Demons, another Skyship had arrived.
“Wait a bit longer, let’s bombard them when all the Skyships have assembled.”
The Skyships Rocky commanded, though all outfitted with Magic Cannons, were old models of Reconnaissance Ships, each with only two cannons on board, so a single ship’s combat power was not strong. Only when a sufficient number converged for a collective bombardment would they achieve the best effect.
So he had to wait until all ships were present to launch the attack.
In the time that followed, Skyships arrived one after the other, but during this same process, the number of Demons also grew!
Yes, as the Skyships arrived one by one, scattered Demons also emerged from all directions, one after the other.
And by the time ten Skyships had finally assembled, the number of Demons gathered together had swollen to over forty!
The rate of this increase was chilling to Rocky’s spine! He didn’t dare to imagine how many Demons would have gathered if they hadn’t been discovered today, and how many there would be after a night had passed.
Fifty?
Or a hundred?
Or even more!
So when all the Skyships had assembled, he immediately gave the order for the ten Skyships to carry out free bombardment on the Demons below!