The moment the warning alarm rang, everyone in the command cabin snapped to attention.
The airship's first officer lunged toward the dense cluster of speaking tubes in the command cabin, opened one leading to the observation post atop the airship, and roared into it, "What's happening?"
"Large-scale fighting on the ground! Nine o'clock direction, twenty kilometers away!"
"Large-scale fighting on the ground! Nine o'clock direction, twenty kilometers away!"
A voice came through the speaking tube, loudly repeating the report twice before falling silent after the first officer acknowledged, "Understood."
For a moment, everyone turned to look at Zhang Tie. When it came to ground battles like this, an airship such as theirs could choose to take part or stay out of it. As a "civilian armed force" that had voluntarily headed for the Selnes War Zone, no one could force them to do anything—or forbid them from doing it. Everything depended on the airship captain's decision. Only after arriving in the Selnes War Zone would their actions be subject to certain restrictions.
"Sound the battle alarm aboard the airship. Prepare for ground attack. Turn the airship around—we're going to take a look!" Zhang Tie gave the combat order without the slightest hesitation.
Three days after leaving the Jin-Yun Kingdom, the Fool's first battle alarm finally sounded. At once, everyone aboard the airship busied themselves with excited haste. The massive triangular hull of the Gale-class airship nimbly adjusted its angle in the sky, tilted slightly, and immediately accelerated toward the distant battlefield.
Zhang Tie adjusted the downward-viewing imaging mirror in front of him. In only a moment, he caught sight of the battlefield twenty kilometers away—
A human army was withdrawing from a valley, while Demonized Puppets gave frantic chase behind them. Behind the human army, a large number of women