Some soldiers who were returning received hot food from the camp's temporary kitchen, huddled in the corner and in the shadow of the rope pile, took a brief rest, and saved the remaining portion for the next meal.
Their movements were half a beat slower than in the morning, and some people sat against the wall, not talking, just letting their bodies recover as much energy as possible in the short respite.
Several resting teams were sorting out their equipment next to the fire, redistributing arrows, passing skins filled with water to each other, and each maintained a steady rhythm to complete each step without panic or unnecessary words.
Redd walked out of the tent before lunch time and walked around the inside of the camp. He noticed that some of the kerosene and spare arrows piled along the road had been consumed.
He walked on, past fires being rekindled and watchtowers adjusting knots and canvas edges.
Passing several soldiers who were talking in lowered voices, they consciously stood up straight when they saw him passing by and gave way to the passage.
But the corner of his eye still stayed in the direction of the returning Demon Dragon. Occasionally, someone would look up and glance at the position where they were landing.
Confirm whether there is enough open space on the side of the next batch of landing areas for the following individuals to continue falling in order.
King Ghidorah still remains at the predetermined high-altitude position. From the ground, only a very small dark outline partially obscured by gray-white clouds can be seen.
Every once in a while, it will move a small distance in a certain direction, as if adjusting its coverage and angle, and then stabilize again.
Although its presence is greatly weakened by clouds at high altitudes, its constant gaze still covers the entire area steadily.
Like a continuous anchor, it always maintains a stable presence in a location, keeping all potential threats underground and above ground under constant surveillance.
Later that afternoon, Redd returned to the tent and sat for a while. He pulled out a larger-scale terrain map from the bottom of the desktop, spread it out, and looked at the marked locations again.
The margins of that map have been marked with multiple annotations in different colors of ink, recording regional divisions, supply points, and observed unusual terrain features.
He looked at it for a moment, closed the picture, picked up the quill and wrote a line of notes in the margin of the page.
The ground has begun to radiate heat again, the temperature released by the surface soil heated by the sun during the day.
There is still no obvious change in the sky. The clouds above Fourteen Flames maintain a uniform thickness distribution, but the light on the ground is already softer than before noon, and the flames are gradually turning to a warmer tone as the brightness rises again.
The fuel in the fire is about to bottom out before the next round of replenishment. It is necessary to put in some wooden parts removed from the damaged equipment and the remaining charcoal blocks to maintain the continuous burning required throughout the night.
Not far away, Douglas was talking with the person in charge of the transportation team to confirm the unloading location of the new batch of kerosene.
The two stood in front of a flatbed truck that was unloading goods, and took turns using gestures to indicate the width of the open space between two adjacent tents.
Redd paced back and forth in the tent, his eyes never leaving the Valyrian Peninsula topographic map spread out on the table.
The edges of the parchment have been turned over too many times, the corners are slightly rolled up, and there is a light sheen of wear on the creases.
His finger paused at the edge of the map, moved south along the coastline, and finally stopped at the Volantis port, where he drew an irregular circle with ink.
He has already sent someone to take care of the food issue. The fleet should be loading cargo at the port of Volantis, crossing the water called Smoking Sea batch by batch, transporting bags of grain and barrels of dried meat to this cursed land.
Theoretically, this cycle can be maintained as long as the route is not interrupted.
But theory is just theory after all. In a place like Smoking Sea, the gap between theory and reality is often so large that people doubt whether they really belong to the same world.
Redd pressed his finger on the circle again, then straightened up, left the table, and walked to the door of the tent.
He opened the door curtain and looked at the sea in the distance.
Smoking Sea cannot be seen from here, but he has walked through the channel leading to that sea area more than once.
He could recall the specific feeling of that sea - the gray steam floating on the surface, the constant heat from the water as it rolled under the ship, and the steam columns that suddenly emerged from the deep water and then quickly dissipated.
Those irregular steam columns are one of the most unpredictable features of the Smoking Sea. They may appear at any time and in any location. Sometimes they are just a single point, and sometimes they form a long series of eruption zones at varying intervals along the direction of the seabed the Rift.
It is difficult for any inexperienced ship in this environment to ensure that it will not become the fuel for the next steam.
Redd stood at the entrance of the tent for a moment, looking in that direction. Smoking Sea That sea area has never really cooled down since the day of the doomsday catastrophe.
The high temperature of seawater is not heated from the surface, but is conducted upward from the depths of the seafloor. The stratum continuously heated by the underlying volcanic activity transfers the temperature to the water body, forming a stable but long-lasting warm state.
Although those seafloor Fire Peak experienced the most violent explosions during the catastrophe, their active state did not end after the explosion, but maintained intermittent, low-intensity continuous activities for hundreds of years afterward.
They are still releasing heat and gas, still slowly changing the topography of the seabed, and are still waiting for the next unstable geological activity to release their energy in a more unpredictable way.
Redd has experienced that kind of release firsthand.
At that time, he did not have the scale and configuration that he does now, nor did he have a systematic response plan. That incident nearly killed him.
He didn't want to go through it again.
He stood there and watched for a while, until he confirmed that there were no abnormal clouds or smoke gathering in the direction of the route, then he put down the curtain, walked back to the desk, sat down, and traced the route mark near Volantis port a little deeper on the map.
At this moment, there was a low, continuous vibration from the ground, with a muffled sound like when something heavy touches the ground. It passed through the soil at the bottom of the tent from far to near, passed through the stones at the foot of the table, and reached his fingertips.
He raised his head and listened for a while - it was the Demon Dragon Legion returning to the camp.
Their flight height gradually decreases, and the wind pressure caused by the flapping of their wings passes through the gaps between the tents and the walls, forming short-term airflow disturbances in the air.
Then it was quickly absorbed by the surrounding buildings and terrain, and turned into a slight gust of wind. The air flowed past his face and lifted the edge of the piece of paper closest to the wind outlet on the table.