The distant smoke and thunderous booming had long since alerted Moonstone Port to the enemy's approach, and the port guards had done everything they could.
They cleared the human and Half-Elves laborers from the port, urged the docked merchant ships to leave immediately and sail away from the battlefield, and mustered every available guard and volunteer to build a final defensive line around the docks.
All the port's mages took their places in the magic towers. Magical light flickered at the towers' tips as they prepared to repel the invaders.
But when the crystal balls enchanted with permanent Hawkeye Spells inside the towers clearly revealed the Storm's enormous outline, like a fortress at sea, uncontrollable gasps and cries of alarm filled the towers.
"Mother Tree above... wh-what is that?"
A young elven mage apprentice spoke in a trembling voice, nearly dropping the observation instrument in his hands. He had never seen such an immense warship.
Olarian, the master of Moonstone's main magic tower and the port's oldest, most knowledgeable chief mage, had seen similar vessels before. Precisely because he knew a little about them, a chill shot up his spine.
His keen eyes, which had witnessed centuries pass, remained fixed on the giant ship slowly approaching in the crystal ball.
Huge. Unprecedentedly huge!
Even a visual estimate put its displacement far beyond that of any vessel they knew.
Until now, the largest ship Olarian had ever seen was the Blue Flame Kingdom's pride, the Emerald Dream. Praised as an "unsinkable moving forest," that magical flagship could take on a small fleet by itself, yet even it would probably pale beside the monstrous warship before him.
"At least... two thousand tons. Perhaps even more..."
Olarian murmured to himself, his voice dry.
As a mage who had experienced naval warfare, he understood