The Celestina Empire, North of the Doors of The World, 20th April 1524 / 225

“Is everyone ready?”

Rokari looks at her Legion. The Legion has formed following the subjugation of the Demon Lord Nosgorath five months ago. The Council names it the Adventurer Expeditionary Fleet. The purpose of this fleet was to explore and investigate the Pandemonium Continent. Due to the harsh weather, the expedition was put on hold until the recon team manage to obtain suitable information of when the weather will be perfect for departure.

Numbered one thousand, all of them are at least B rank adventurers. On the sky itself, a heavily customized Firefly-class Heavy Frigate, two Coalition-class Astral ships, fifteen pairs of League-class and Empire-class Astral ships are holding positions above the sky of the Doors to the World.

“We’re ready!”

“Then, let’s depart! All units! Commence the exploration!”

The adventurers immediately summons their mounts to hasten themselves to the destination. The base camp that will be used as the Headquarters of the Adventurers Expeditionary lies 400km North of the Doors to the World. It has terrain and geographical advantage since the adventurers can establish their camp, and the patrol parties can observe any possible threat that may come to the Headquarters.

Pandemonium continent, the reason this continent was difficult to explore is that it's often winter due to the harsh weather. For that, thorough preparation was necessary, and the adventurers are wearing their winter gear for this expedition, save for those who wear armor that has body temperature adjustment augmentation.

Two hours later, Frozen Bracelet Bridge, nine thousand feet

“Do we have the advance team ready for headquarters construction?”

“Yes, we have. The advance team will reach the destination in around thirty minutes.”

The Second-in-Command of the Adventurer Expeditionary Fleet, Hugmand Carlyle, was looking at the holo table. They are now 50km from the nearest settlement. The Secondary Flagship, Rogdor of Kirah, is moving to the Headquarters site to oversee the construction of its operations base.

Hughmand Carlyle was an SS Rank adventurer, a rank below Rokari Migurdia. His swordsmanship is excellent, using a dual sword as his weapon. When sparring with Luciana, he lacks body flexibility as he relies on his sword too much. He trains to make up for such disadvantages, and because of that, he was able to reach SS rank.

“Ma’am. We got unknown anomaly ahead of us.”

“I see it…”

Rokari stares at the red cloud coming their way. She saw some sparks of lighting from the cloud. Her instinct tells her that she needs to evade it.

“Evasive maneuvers! Full port side!”

“Aye! Full port side!”

“Ma’am! The wind is heading this way!”

“We can’t dodge it in time! All crew, brace yourselves!”

When the Frigate was caught in the storm, it struck several parts of the ship. The lighting drained the energy shield protecting the ship to the point where the storm scores enough power to shut the engines down. The alarm rang as an unknown phenomenon shuts the engine down due to the malfunctioning at the engine control room. Ironically, some parts become damaged following the bird strike when the Frigate starts descending.

Since Frozen Bracelet was designed for adventurers, some parts were damaged faster than the original class.

“That bird is huge!”

“Watch out!”

“Ma’am! We lost the steering! Our readings become chaotic!”

“What?!”

Because the shield was down, the Frigate was vulnerable to electric disturbance. The readings are chaotic as the bridge crew tries to bring the engine back online.

“Aaah, shit! The engines won’t start! Systems went chaotic!”

“Shield won’t recharge, ma’am!”

“Four Empire-class and two League-class Astral Ships were also hit by the magnetic storm!”

“I want full shield back online and make sure the underside is protected!”

“Yes, Ma’am!”

The mages inside the shield generator room quickly chant protection spell to protect the shield generator room. Once the shielding is back online, the bridge crew redirects the energy to the ship's underside. The engineer manages to bring the engine online as Frozen Bracelet escapes the Magnetic Storm.

“We’re losing altitude! Four thousand feet!”

“All hands! Brace of impact!”

Frozen Bracelet quickly loses altitude, followed by several Astral Ships struck by the magnetic storm lightning. The engine was finally repaired into full condition after the engineers struggle to fix it. When the engine went back to full strength, the bridge quickly restores its thrust and maximizes the hover strength on the Repulsor Engine.

“Come on… slow down… Go up…”

They can feel the momentum is slowing down while the crew quickly try to raise Frozen Bracelet's nose. They need to suppress as much damage as they could while the crew continue to brace for impact.

Meanwhile, near the city of the unknown kingdom, there are some soldiers stationed there for training. Then, they saw a large ship falling down from the sky along with six smaller ships.

“What was that…?”

“It’s going to crash!!”

CREEAACCKK!!

Frozen Bracelet lands and drags itself for around 1km before it stops. The Astral ship crash around Frozen Bracelet as the Astral ship crews evacuate into the Frigate moments before the crash. The knights can feel the wind pressure generates from the crash as Frozen Bracelet make a crash of around 1,5km from their position.

“Send the knights to investigate quickly!!”

“Report this to the capital! A huge unidentified ship has crashed near the walls!”

The knights who are in training immediately went to the crash site.

“Uhhh…”

Rokari slowly gets back up as the crew also slowly recovers from the impact and back to their station.

“Damage report…”

“T-the underbelly seems intact, but we need to gather all engineers to repair the shield generator. It seems the impact damages the generator.”

“Please repair it quickly. We have to form a defensive perimeter until we can bring this airborne again.”

“Yes, Ma’am.”

“I bring news. The magnetic storm has destroyed four Empire-class and two League-class Astral Ship, and we have casualties of 50 Topa Knights killed in action. We can salvage the Astral Cannons, Artilleries, and some other parts, but the reactors are beyond repair. For the starship, the crash damages our communications, so it will take time to make a full repair. Our hull is fine, just a few scratches thanks to the energy shield.”

“Salvage it immediately and scuttle the ship that is beyond repair!”

“Yes, Ma’am.”

“Ma’am. We’ve got readings, two fronts. First is around six hundred while the others were around two to four thousand. It appears we got multiple readings scattered around two kilometers South-West.”

“It’s a possibility that we may crash near a settlement. Make contact with the natives around the settlement and don’t kill them. Knock them out if they want to fight us.”

“Yes, Ma’am!”

The orders from Rokari are immediately relayed to the entire adventurers that are taking the initiative to form up a defensive perimeter around Frozen Bracelet. They form the defenses on the three front, port side of the ship facing the settlements and both aft and starboard facing unknown threats. The ship's front side was facing a sharp cliff, as it doesn’t require further protection.

At least three jet black-armored knights are leading the assault at the front line, followed by ten Giant Trolls, a thousand orcs, and three thousand goblins. As soon as they saw a giant starship falls from the sky, they immediately changed course to the crash site.

“Commander! There’s a giant object falling from the sky! The entire army is diverted into the crash site!”

“What?! Send the knights to intercept immediately! Secure the crash site!”

“Sir!”

Around Frozen Bracelet, Hughmand leads the defenses on the Aft and Starboard sides. Rokari leads the Port side's defenses while the engineers are working to bring the defense guns back online. They form up the defensive line, medical tent, and also supply line. Some engineers are currently working on salvaging the destroyed Astral Ship while the medics are treating the crew that did not evacuate in time before the crash, with all of them are knocked out. The Topa Knights, who didn’t make it for evacuation and died from the crash, are being recovered and will be preserved temporarily at the cryo room before they can send the body back home to be buried by their family.

As soon as the knights' army approached the crash site, they saw figures forming the defensive line. All of them stop instinctively upon witnessing multiple races are flocking together to prepare for the attack. The commander looks at each of Celestina’s adventurers, and it seems they will not attack unless his knights attack them. However, looking at the mounts the adventurer used, it looks like they have plenty of mythical creatures and unknown machinery that he has never seen before.

A girl, the size of an early teen, steps forward. She wears a witch hat and a magician adventurer dress. In the knights' recruit view, they look at her as a child, but she’s the Supreme Commander for the expedition for Celestina's adventurers.

“Greetings. I’m Rokari Migurdia, Supreme Commander of the Celestina Adventurers Expeditionary Fleet. I apologize for the disturbance we caused because of the magnetic storm earlier.”

The knight commander steps forward once Rokari introduces herself.

“I’m Trun, Commander of the Knights Recruits unit from the Bastogne Kingdom. What is your purpose here?”

“We’re here to explore the Pandemonium Contingent under the joint operation of the Celestina Empire and the Kingdom of Topa.”

“What do you mean? Is there a Kingdom exist down there?”

“It is. Not only one, but more than a dozen.”

“I… I shall make a report to the King, then. Messenger! Send the message to His Majesty!”

“Yes, sir!”

“Ma’am, can you please come with us? I would like to hear more about the situation beyond our Kingdom.”

“It will be a pleasure.” Rokari turns to the adventurers, “Please inform Hugmand that he will take command of the expedition while I’m away.”

“Understood!”

“Ma’am! The monsters are coming towards the aft of the ship!”

“Leave the minimum of defense here! Protect it until the defense batteries are online!”

“Yes, Ma’am!”

“All right, recruits! You help those adventurers!”

“Yes, sir!”

Rokari went with Trun and several knights to the capital while the rest reinforced the aft and starboard of the Frozen Bracelet. At the aft and starboard defense perimeter of Frozen Bracelet, Hughmand looks at a jet black-armored knight, but somehow what caught his attention was the gemstone at the forehead when he looks at them with his telescope.

“Can you identify what was at the forehead?”

“Let me see.”

Wulfe, a member of the Zealot Strike Force from Cecilia’s unit, looks at the gemstone at the jet black-armored knight's forehead. Also, analyzing how it behaves, it seems like the knight was controlled by something.

“It’s a mind-control gem. Take those gems out, and we knock that armored knight out as well. It should disarray their ranks.”

“Have your units went to the front line to search the source?”

“Yes. We already search for it.”

“Good.”

As soon as they are about to launch the assault, the messenger came in.

“Report! We have friendlies coming from the port side of the ship!”

“Excellent. Boys! Defend this place until the ship is airborne!”

“Yes, sir!”

“Engineers! What’s the status of the repair?”

“We need more time! The complement parts need to be done first before we can work on the engines, but we need to secure the salvaged equipment first!”

“We will buy you as much time as we could.”

When the reinforcements arrive, so are the enemy, and the Zealots quickly move to the attack. Their aim is to knock out the jet black-armored knight by knocking the head with the “Gem Killer” Hammer that was specialized in destroying any equipped gemstone.

“Every time I saw the Zealots make their move, it’s always a sight worth seeing.”

“They’re the ones who run the Empire behind the shadow, after all.”

Under Maya Lyliat and Tohriu Shiki's guidance, the Zealot Strike Force members are one of the most lethal personnel. Many countries attempt to counter op them, but they fail miserably. The intelligence network and strength are the most notable things that display how strong the Celestina Intelligence Network is.

Silvano and Jill manage to infiltrate the Papaldia Empire as the officials and high-ranking personnel to obtain intel without any problem during their assignment at the Papaldia Empire. Jill works as Emperor Ludius’s personal maid and the head of Apprentice and Low-class Maid. In contrast, Silvano now works as Head of Third Department of Foreign Affairs personal secretary, directly under Kyeos.

THUNK!

As soon as the gemstone breaks, the jet black-armored knight quickly loses consciousness. With their leaders gone, the monsters start to put into disarray.

“Fire!”

The mages chant their magic together, and it turns into a series of magic anomalies such as firestorms and glacial storms. The archers, rangers, are casting their spells without chanting, further breaking the ranks of the demon army. The tank adventurers, such as Knight and Paladin, stood at the front to draw the demon's attention to them while the damage dealer, such as the assassin and the fighters, immediately dispatch the monsters as quickly as possible.

The supports maintain the buff of their party while also tending to the wounded. The Demon Army starts to demoralize as soon as the jet black-armored knights are knocked out. After several Giant Trolls are defeated, they are retreating.

“Don’t chase after them! We need to keep protecting Frozen Bracelet!!”

“Repairs and salvage complete! We’re ready to fly! Defense systems online!”

“Everyone, form up! We’re boarding the ship!”

All adventurers immediately withdraw into the Frozen Bracelet as soon as the ship open fires to cover the retreat. As soon as everyone manages to board the ship, including the casualties, the knights, and the jet black-armored knight that was unconscious, Hughmand instructs the engineers to lift off from the crash site.

“Crash site is clear! Take off!”

“Roger! Taking off!”

The kingdom knights that join Frozen Bracelet were astonished to feel the starship once it was airborne. Leaving the crash site, it stays at one thousand meters as it holds position around the Bastogne Kingdom, waiting for Rokari to return.

Celestina Empire, Pandemonium Headquarters

The communications officers find the communications with the Frozen Bracelet have been restored to full operation.

“Sir! We restore the connection with Frozen Bracelet!”

“Patch me through to them!”

“This is Frozen Bracelet! Our engines are in good condition, and we got some damages from the magnetic storm!”

“We hear it. We also confirm the sighting of magnetic storms. At least six Astral Ships have been taken out, is that correct?”

“Yes. How’s the construction of the Headquarters?”

“We’re in kind of messy, right now. The Zealots have identified the main target. The target was identified as having small wings on the back, possibly the Ravernal Empire's remnants. They are launching a massive assault to our camp, and we’re holding them off at the moment.”

“Please hold them off until we got new orders from Rokari and regroup there.”

“Will try to hold out as long as we can.”

The base commander, Setzer, an S+ rank Adventurer, leads the defense personnel while the engineers start constructing the base of operations.

Due to the sudden arrival of the Celestina Adventurers Expeditionary Fleet, the monsters are surrounding the place that has been set up by Rokari to make a Headquarters and base of operation. Numbering ten thousand local creatures, they charge head-on into the base camp while the Adventurers and the Topa Knights are holding them off and keeping them at bay.

Pandemonium Continent, somewhere around the volcano mountain, 150km West of Celestina Adventurer’s Headquarters

There was a crater of the dormant volcano, and this is where the Zealot Strike Force is tracking the origin of the mind-control devices. Upon taking a closer look, they can feel the source of magic power around the mountain. It’s most likely a resting place for a beast that was more dangerous than they can expect.

A man, wearing silver armor, looks like a human at first glance. But, when the Zealots can get a clear sight of it, he has a pair of small wings on his back. The Zealots immediately report this discovery to Frozen Bracelet and CIISA to deliver the intel.

“Lord Miglione, the meal is ready.”

A humanoid demon with two horns bows in front of him, informing him that the meal is ready. When the demon looks at his wings, it was a pair of black and white wings.

“Tell me, Diobolos… What happened to those that we sent to the Kingdom of Topa several months ago?”

“N-news indicates that they are being intercepted by the bunch of adventurers from the Celestina Empire. Other than that, we didn’t get any details.”

“Tch, adventurers. Their magic is not even comparable to our ancestors. How are the preparations for the capture of the Kingdom of Bastogne?”

“Y-yes, sir. With our current forces, it will be sufficient to capture it.”

Diobolos seems confident about their victory, but he was curious why Miglione wants it captured.

“Why you need that place, my lord? We long the resurrection of the ancestral Empire, the Ravernal Empire, where our winged people will reign over all creatures once more.”

“Hrm… It’s because they hid a beacon that we need to hasten the return of the Ravernal Empire. One of the beacons is buried inside the Kingdom of Bastogne. It still works if left alone. However, we should take it so those lower species won’t get it.”

The actual reason Miglione came to this place was to test out the mind-control devices. So far, it works for the demons, but unfortunately, when the Demon Lord Nosgorath was resurrected months ago, he could not control it due to a lack of magic power. Because he can’t control it, the Demon Lord sets out after gathering the army to attack the Kingdom of Topa, where Sacchito repels it along with Battalions of Adventurers. He has several underlings with him, and each has their own assignments.

The Annonrial Empire sends the Resurrection Division from the Resurrection Countermeasures Agency to take any measures possible. Paving the way for the Ravernal Empire’s return by subjugating countries, retrieving beacons to hasten the return, and cripple any powerful countries that are deemed threatful against the Annonrial Empire.

Ravernal’s satellite, Mystar, was currently under investigation by the Celestina Empire. The Celestina Empire did not investigate one, but all of the satellites. In order to identify and examine the remains of the Ravernal Empire, Shiki redirects some of his Zealot Strike Force members to assist Feena’s Engineer Team that was already on station, to study it.

There is no further information from CIISA, but it seems the Zealot Strike Force is on the right track.

“Well, well…”

“It looks like we will hit the jackpot soon.”

“Let’s report this finding to the CIISA.”

“Hey. We found more of those small-winged people at the Demon Kingdom.”

“How did you find them?”

“We’re from Cecilia’s team, remember?”

“Ah, sorry.”

The Zealot Strike Force has their own assignments to track down every one of the small-winged people. Cecilia’s team was in charge of tracking the target, Maya’s team will identify the target for rescue, and Shiki’s team will plant a tracker on them. Right now, it’s up to Cecilia’s team that has some bug tracker to be infested on the target’s bodies for tracking. This action must execute in secret to prevent exposure.

The goal was to obtain ways to infiltrate the Annonrial Empire, observe the Annonrial Mainland's defenses, and prepare for subjugation to draw their attention. They will take their time in advance, following the art of war and one of the famous quotes for “Si vis Pacem Para Bellum” or known as “If you want peace, Prepare for War.”

The Celestina Empire constantly prepare themselves for the war to achieve peace. Most of the New World's Superpowers are taking wars too lightly since they always try to expand without thinking about what will happen next such as the Papaldia Empire, for example. The Papaldia Empire is constantly at war for years, or even decades, barely entering the non-war times to prepare themselves further.

There was not much intelligence on the Holy Milishial Empire and Mu, but both are quite docile and steadily increase their technology. The Main Councils are more interested in Mu than Holy Milishial since they develop new technology through their own will. On the other hand, Alicia dislikes the Holy Milishial Empire since they are unable to reverse-engineer any legacy left by the Ravernal Empire properly. If it was Celestina, they probably could reverse-engineer it in around one to four years, depends on how complex the technology is and how much they can improve.

“Anyway, we need to keep an eye on them. Keep our magic concealed.”

“Right.”

They take a picture of the targets and sending it to the CIISA for identification.

On the first day of the expedition itself, the situation has become troublesome for Celestina Adventurers Expeditionary Fleet. Rokari has been summoned to the Bastogne Castle, while the Fleet that escorts Frozen Bracelet is reinforcing the front line to support the Adventurers Base of Operations' defense where Rogdor of Kirah is stationed at along with several Astral Ships that serve as its escort.