Holy Mirishial Empire. Airspace over Cartalpas.

  Altitude 1500 meters.

  "Fang Knights! Break their formation! Attack!" The mental shout of Knight-Captain Ooji echoed in the heads of the twenty dragonoids of his flight.

  The elite unit of the Kingdom of Eimor—the Order of the Celestial Dragon—did not just enter the battle. It crashed down upon the enemy from above, like the wrath of gods.

  Unlike the clumsy wyverns of Leifor or the "shelves" of Mu, the Wind Dragons of Eimor were perfect killing machines. Their bodies, covered in emerald, shimmering scales, were protected by natural aerodynamic shields.

  Ooji merged his mind with his beast, Val-Ka. He felt the air currents with every scale.

  Below them, flights of gray, all-metal Antares fighters of the Gra-Valkas Empire were going into the attack.

  "Wind Acceleration!" Ooji commanded.

  The air thickened around the dragons. Magic compressed the space in front of them, removing resistance. The living creatures shot downward with the speed of a diving bomber.

  The collision was monstrous.

  Ooji chose the outermost wingman in a fighter flight. The dragon, folding its wings, fell like a stone onto the plane's tail.

  The aluminum skin, designed for bullets, could not withstand the strike of claws reinforced with diamond magic. With the shriek of tearing metal, the dragon latched onto the fuselage of the Antares. The plane jolted, its engine choking.

  "Die, hairless monkey!"

  With a swipe of his paw, Val-Ka tore off the cockpit canopy. Glass and frame flew away in a vortex of shards. The Gra-Valkan pilot in a leather helmet jerked his head up, his eyes widening in primal horror at the sight of the bared maw half a meter away.

  It was the last thing he saw.

  The dragon, obeying the telepathic rage of the rider, bit into the cockpit, tore out the pilot along with the harnesses and seat, and with a wet, squelching crunch, snapped his jaws shut. Blood spray was instantly blown away by the airstream.

  The mangled fighter, deprived of control, tumbled down toward the sea. Ooji pushed off the debris, spread his wings, killing inertia with a magical "sail," and immediately began searching for a new victim.

  But the enemy was not so simple.

  Gra-Valkas learned quickly. Seeing that Eimor's dragons were deadly in close combat, they changed tactics.

  "Break! Work in pairs! Don't let them close! Cut them with tracers!" commands rang out in the pilots' headsets.

  The Antares used their main advantage—engine power. They didn't enter the dogfight. They climbed vertically, candle-like, where dragons, even with magic, couldn't reach so quickly, turned around, and fell from above, showering the squadron with lead.

  "Losing altitude! Leginian! Leginian is not responding! They shot his wing off!" the desperate mental scream of one of the young riders cut Ooji's brain like a knife.

  He turned his head just in time to see his lieutenant's proud blue dragon turn into a bloody sieve under the crossfire of two Antares. 20-millimeter explosive shells tore flesh, shattered bones. The dragon roared—and this cry of pain through the neural link hit all members of the Order. The rider, losing consciousness from his beast's pain shock, fell with it into the waves like a limp doll.

  "Cursed magicless creatures..." Ooji hissed, tasting phantom blood in his mouth.

  The illusion of superiority cracked. Yes, every dragonoid was worth five, or even ten human pilots in skill. But there were not ten enemies. There were hundreds.

  The sky swarmed with gray machines. It was a swarm. A mechanical, soulless swarm of locusts knowing neither fatigue nor pain. For one shot-down fighter, two new ones took its place.

  A tracer streak flashed past Ooji.

  Thud!

  Val-Ka jerked. A shell pierced the membrane of the left wing. Pain, sharp as a hot rod, pierced Ooji's own left shoulder. Telepathic backlash. He gritted his teeth, driving the groan back into his throat.

  "I see him! Six o'clock! Coming in!"

  A Gra-Valkas fighter was getting on his tail, aiming for the dragon's vulnerable back.

  "Won't work! Fireball! Breath of the Abyss!" the captain commanded mentally.

  The dragon, despite the wound, performed a maneuver unthinkable for a plane—a somersault over the wing with a 180-degree turn practically on the spot. A "Cobra" performed by a living creature.

  Val-Ka's maw opened. Not red flame, but white-blue, concentrated plasma mixed with Wind magic pulsed in his throat.

  PHWOOOM!

  A clot of energy struck the Antares right in the frontal projection, into the spinning propeller.

  The plane's engine detonated instantly. The machine was torn apart from the inside. A cloud of burning duralumin and kerosene swept past Ooji, blasting him with heat.

  "Minus five!" he roared. "Hold formation! Close the ring! Cover your backs! We will make them pay for every drop of our blood!"

  "Board 14, you're on fire! Bail out! Bail..." a hysterical scream on the air drowned in static crackle.

  Fifty meters to the right of Captain Sart's flight, an Antares fighter turned into a fireball. A Wind Dragon, having withstood a burst to the wing, managed to twist out of a spin and spit a clot of compressed air straight into the Gra-Valkan machine's engine. Superheated oil flared up, ammo detonated. Duralumin debris mixed with pieces of the pilot rained into the bay.

  "Scum..." Sart spat contemptuously, pressing the rudder pedal to get out of the debris scatter zone. There was not so much grief in his voice as cold, professional anger. These creatures didn't know the rules. They flew contrary to physics.

  The cockpit of his fighter smelled of burnt kerosene, cordite, and male sweat. The vibration of the radial engine on afterburner resonated in his spine. Sart turned his head 360 degrees—in this "furball," death could arrive from any angle.

  "Left, nine o'clock! 'Scaly one'! Coming in from above!" the radio crackled with the wingman's voice, full of strain from G-forces. "Suppressing!"

  The roar of two synchronized 7.7mm machine guns merged into a single shriek, immediately joined by the bass, dull thud-thud-thud of wing-mounted 20mm autocannons.

  Sart's flight—three Antares in a classic "wedge" formation—tried to pincer a lone but incredibly fast Wind Dragon that dove out of a cloud like green lightning.

  The tactic had been honed for years: drive the target into a cone of fire. The first fighter hit with tracers, driving the dragon into a turn where the shells of the other two should have met it. For any biplane or ordinary wyvern, this would have been the end.

  But this beast was different.

  The Wind Dragon, noticing the scatter of tracers rushing toward it, didn't try to escape with speed or bank into a turn a plane was capable of. It simply... stopped.

  It contradicted all aerodynamics Sart knew. The beast spread its huge, four-fingered wings across the flow, creating monstrous drag. Mana swirled around its body, visible as a distortion of hot air.

  It was "Pugachev's Cobra," performed by a living creature capable of controlling the density of the atmosphere around itself.

  Bursts of heavy 20mm shells, calculated to lead the flying target, swept through empty air, ripping the clouds where the dragon should have been, but where it no longer was. It shifted along a vector inaccessible to mechanics—sharply down and sideways, as if sliding off an invisible slide...

  At the same time.

  Flagship Battleship of the Holy Mirishial Empire's Southern Fleet, the Armis.

  On the flagship's spacious bridge, usually sparkling with cleanliness and order, a scent unfamiliar to Imperial officers now reigned—the acrid, sour smell of fear, mixed with the burnt ozone of the magi-comms.

  Admiral Pattes, Commander of the Southern Fleet, stood at the tactical table, which now displayed not orderly rows of ships, but a chaos of red casualty markers. He looked phlegmatically, almost indifferently, at the sailors and communications officers scurrying back and forth, shouting out damage reports. Illuminated by the anxious flickering of magic lamps, the Admiral's face looked like the wax mask of a corpse that someone had forgotten to remove before burial.

  He slowly turned his head toward the captain on the bridge.

  "Captain," Pattes's voice was quiet, yet in the momentary silence that followed, it sounded like a gunshot. "Forget etiquette. Who do you think... will make it out of this hell alive?"

  Nium averted his gaze from the viewing screen, where the remains of a wind dragon were burning out.

  "Admiral, I beg of you, it is the truth—we are suffering defeat," Captain Nium said firmly. "The intelligence proved woefully inadequate. We did not account for their air superiority. The Gra-Valkas fighters... their speed and firepower are simply incredible. Our newest Alpha-3s are burning like dry leaves, and Eimor's elite forces are taking losses they won't be able to recover from in a century."

  Nium clenched his fist so hard his leather glove creaked.

  "And those we called partners... Russia... Their ships are gone. They are watching us bleed out. We are alone, Admiral."

  Pattes chuckled bitterly.

  "So, Gra-Valkas is winning."

  He shifted his gaze to the map of the strait.

  "Their goal isn't just to destroy us. They want to cork the bottleneck. If the Atlastar positions itself in the Falk Strait, Cartalpas will become a trap. We will have only one choice left: surrender or die."

  The Admiral sighed heavily, took a long cigar from his case, bit off the tip, and, striking a magic lighter, exhaled a cloud of blue-gray smoke with pleasure. This was a breach of protocol, but right now, protocols weren't worth the paper they were written on.

  "That means we are the last line of defense. The walls of Cartalpas are not made of stone. They are made of our hulls."

  At the same time, the manacomm at the communications post exploded with new, panicked reports. Screams for help broke through the crackle of static.

  "ALARM! Visual contact! Low-flying targets! Azimuth two-seven-zero!" the lookout lieutenant barked, his voice cracking. "They're fanning out! Direct course for the formation!"

  Pattes instantly shook off his stupor.

  "Fleet—AA defenses to battle stations! Maximum fire density! Put up a barrage wall! Do not let them reach drop distance!"

  "Yes, sir! Relaying!" the lieutenant began rattling off commands into the communication crystals.

  "Attention! I see twenty-four objects! Rigel-class torpedo bombers! High speed, altitude—five meters above the waves!" the second observer clarified.

  To Mirishial's magic radars, tuned to search for ethereal trails in the sky, these low-flying machines were almost invisible against the backdrop of the water. They had emerged from the haze too close.

  "All ships—evasive maneuvers! Hard to port! Break formation! Every man for himself, objective—survive!" screamed the Southern Fleet Commander, realizing that the orderly line of battle was about to turn into a graveyard.

  The ships began to turn clumsily. Silver-class heavy cruisers, built for artillery duels, could not dance with aviation.

  Their "Water Aegis" magical barriers flared, trying to shield their flanks, but Gra-Valkas torpedoes were designed to kill underwater.

  Five cables off the flagship's starboard beam sailed the new magic cruiser Suz. It tried to turn its bow toward the attacking planes, but it was too late.

  BOOOOM!

  A deafening explosion sent a giant, dirty column of water the height of a mast shooting up right at the cruiser's midships frame. The hydrodynamic shock of the torpedo—packing a 450 kg TNT warhead—simply snapped the ship's keel.

  "Suz is hit!" a voice reported hysterically over the speaker. "Direct hit below the armor belt! Reactor compartment flooded! Magic unstable! We are breaking up! I repeat, hull fracture!"

  Before Pattes's eyes, the beautiful white ship, pride of the shipyard, shuddered and began to fold in half like a toy. The bow and stern pitched upward, being sucked into the vortex.

  "Crew of the Suz—abandon ship! Rescue parties—do not approach until after detonation!" the Admiral commanded harshly, turning away. There was no time to watch the agony.

  In mere minutes, the cruiser vanished, leaving only an oil slick and debris. But this was only the beginning.

  "Report from the Mu fleet!" the radioman shouted. "Their flagship, La Kasami, has taken two torpedo hits! Propulsion lost! And... Admiral! Worst of all! Magic bearings confirm: the super-dreadnought Atlastar has entered sector four! Distance to the strait—seven kilometers! Its guns are traversing!"

  It was checkmate. The King—the Gra-Valkas flagship—had moved within striking distance to seal the exit from the mousetrap.

  Pattes tapped the ash from his cigar onto the map.

  "If he blocks the strait, Cartalpas will burn. We have no choice."

  He looked up at the bridge officers. There was fear in their eyes, but they awaited his order.

  "To the entire Southern Fleet... what remains of it. Full speed ahead. We are breaking through to the strait. Close with the Atlastar."

  "This is suicide, sir," Nium said quietly.

  "It is duty," Pattes replied. "Execute!"

  "Aye! Full steam ahead! Set course for the Atlastar!"

  Southern Fleet of the Holy Mirishial Empire.

  Time: 16:30.

  Six of the seven remaining Silver-class heavy cruisers and battleships, spewing steam from their cooling relief valves and trembling through their entire hulls, were steaming toward the strait at the limit of their capabilities—30 knots. Their magical engines howled, burning through their stock of mana-crystals at a catastrophic rate, but Admiral Pattes knew: they could not slow down. Behind them, hopelessly lagging in the smoke and fumes, trailed the ragtag "Allied Forces Fleet"—ships of Mu and minor powers that no longer influenced anything.

  It was a race not for speed, but for firing range.

  On the bridge of the flagship Armis, the air was electrified.

  "Magic Station! Report!" the Executive Officer's voice drowned out the whine of the turbines.

  "Attack circuit activation!" the clear recitative of the technomage controlling the battery rang out in response. "Shield power switched to passive mode, forty percent! Beginning main battery shell infusion! First rune—Ifrit [fire]—stabilization... check! Second rune—Sylph [wind]—ballistics confirmed! Third rune—Swift [speed]—maximum acceleration! Saturation one hundred percent! Ammo matrix locked!"

  Every word was not a prayer, but a command from the operator of a highly complex system. Mirishial's magic guns fired rarely, but terrifyingly.

  "Targeting data!"

  Captain Nium was the only one who maintained contact with the surviving observers in the sky.

  "I have visual. He is on an intersecting course. Speed correction... is massive. Range—twenty-two thousand meters. Lead angle four degrees... Elevation—thirty-six!"

  The barrels of the bow turrets crept upward with a low hum, groping for the steel mountain in the haze of the horizon.

  "On target! Target lock stable!" the gunner barked, unable to hold back his emotions. In the officers' headsets, his voice sounded like a gunshot. Adrenaline was spiking.

  Pattes froze for a second. Now. The moment of truth.

  "Drop active protection! Deactivate Aegis in the forward sector!" his order was tantamount to an order to take off body armor under fire. "All ships—centralized targeting! MAIN BATTERY GUNS... SALVO!"

  "SALVO!"

  The flagship shuddered so violently that Pattes almost dropped his cigar. Six ships fired almost in unison.

  VOOOSH!

  It wasn't the crack of gunpowder. It was a sharp release of compressed magic. A dozen azure comets, leaving an ionized trail, shot into the sky, described a high arc, and rushed downward toward the distant steel silhouette blocking the horizon.

  An agonizing pause hung over the bridge. Shell flight time.

  "I see splashes!"

  Giant fountains of water and steam rose like a wall around the super-dreadnought Atlastar. Four shells fell short, churning up foam.

  But two shells found their mark.

  The magical munitions struck the enemy ship amidships.

  FLASH!

  A bright white-blue radiance illuminated the gray hull.

  "Counted two straddles! Two out of six!" the observer screamed, glued to the magic sight. "I see fire on the enemy deck!"

  The joyous yell stuck in the officers' throats as return flashes glinted on the horizon through the smoke of the explosions. Yellow, angry, gunpowder flashes.

  "The enemy... He is firing back! Immediately!"

  They didn't have to wait. Gra-Valkas supersonic shells flew faster than magic.

  WHEEEE-E-E-EW!

  The howl of the heavy "suitcases" tore at their ears.

  Six 460-millimeter shells crashed down around the Armis.

  KA-BOOM!

  The ocean exploded. Pillars of water rose higher than the bridge, covering the ship with hundreds of tons of salt water. The Armis, with a displacement of fifteen thousand tons, was tossed on the wave like a woodchip. Officers were knocked off their feet. The magic barrier, which they managed to raise at the last second, rang out, taking a hail of shrapnel—each piece the size of a human head. The shield held but cracked.

  Pattes struggled to his feet, holding onto the railing. The cigar was crushed in his fist.

  "How?.. How do they hit with such precision?! The very first salvo—and a straddle! Without ranging shots?!" the senior gunnery officer spoke in surprise, with a note of horror.

  "The enemy has opened fire again! Second series!"

  The next hits were closer. Hydrodynamic shocks from explosions near the hull shook the keel. The Armis was tossed about so violently that men rolled across the floor.

  You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.

  "We have a chance as long as they don't hit us directly!" Pattes wheezed, feeling himself shaking—whether from the ship's vibration or from nerves. "They are burning! We got them! To the entire fleet! Rapid fire! Drown them in magic! Sink the bastards!"

  The Imperial fleet responded with the rage of the doomed. The barrels of the magic guns were shrouded in the haze of overheating. A swarm of shells, saturated with elements of destruction, rushed toward the Atlastar with peals of artificial thunder.

  The observer, whose eyes were watering from the strain, cried out:

  "YES! Direct hit on the superstructure! I see black smoke! It is burning! The enemy tub is smoking!"

  But they were interrupted by a new series of flashes on the horizon. Nine flowers of fire bloomed on the enemy's silhouette.

  "Enemy opening fire! Full broadside salvo!"

  "Activate the magic shield!"

  The ship was instantly covered by a protective dome of water.

  The blow came not as a sound, but as a tectonic shift.

  One of Atlastar's nine monstrous 460-millimeter shells struck the flagship's starboard beam. The Water Aegis, operating at its limit, absorbed the kinetic energy of a train car flying at hypersonic speed. The barrier flashed in a blinding indigo sphere, dispersing the explosion, but the momentum of the impact went nowhere.

  The 15,000-ton battleship didn't just rock—it was kicked across the water like a child's toy booted by a heavy boot. The hull emitted a groaning, grinding sound of snapping frames. The deck dropped out from underfoot at a thirty-degree angle.

  People were hurled against the bulkheads like dolls. Someone screamed as bones broke. Sailors rolled across the floor mixed with shattered instruments.

  "B-bitch!" Captain Nium spat viciously.

  He tried to hold onto the chart table, but his fingers slipped on the polished wood. The Captain's head slammed hard into the steel railing of the fire control station. The ring of the impact was audible even through the roar of battle. His eyes rolled back; the world swam in red circles. If not for the stiff frame of his cap, his brain would have been smeared on the bulkhead. He struggled to his feet, shaking his head and blinking away the blood flooding his left eye.

  Admiral Pattes, having miraculously stayed on his feet by death-gripping his bolted-down chair, didn't even look at his ally. His face had turned into a stone mask of concentration. Right now, he wasn't a man, but a computing module calculating the time until death.

  "Report damage!" his voice was cold, cutting through the panic.

  "Hull integrity is green, sir! No direct penetration!" screamed the Senior Magic Defense Officer, his hands trembling over the pulsating crystals of the console. "But the generators are in the 'red zone'! Barrier efficiency dropped by thirty-three percent! Crystals are cracking from overheat! Another salvo of that caliber... it will just punch right through us along with the field!"

  The Admiral gave a curt nod. His fingers blindly found the crumpled cigar in his pocket, but there was no time to light it.

  The situation was worse than critical. The shields were "leaking." One more full salvo—and the Armis would go to the bottom.

  He quickly analyzed the enemy's tactics. This steel monster didn't fuss. It hit rhythmically, like a metronome. Salvo. Pause. Correction. Salvo. About forty seconds passed between shots. Pattes had this time. A window of opportunity to deal damage from which the enemy would choke.

  "Need to break their tempo. Stun them," he muttered under his breath, biting off the tip of the cigar and spitting the tobacco on the floor. "They think they possess impunity. Mistake."

  He straightened up abruptly.

  "Do not cease fire! Pound them until the barrels melt! First a concentrated salvo from the Main Battery—break their structure! Immediately follow with rapid fire from secondary batteries with high-explosive, saturate the deck, burn their gunners! And then—a sharp evasive maneuver to starboard! Don't let them zero in!"

  "Yes, sir! To all ships—attack pattern 'Thunder'!" the communications officer barked into the manacomm. "Synchronization on flagship! Load!"

  A few seconds later, the six remaining ships of the Southern Fleet, lined up in formation, were shrouded in the haze of magical exhaust. Hundreds of guns of different calibers, from heavy 305mm magi-cannons to rapid-fire "light-casters," barked almost simultaneously.

  The air over the strait vibrated. Azure streaks of the main projectiles, accompanied by a rain of hundreds of medium-magic fireballs, rushed toward the distant gray silhouette.

  It was a majestic sight. Magic capable of leveling cities flew to kill technology.

  Officers glued themselves to viewing slits and magic screens.

  "I see tracers... Approaching target... STRADDLE!" the observer screamed, forgetting insubordination. "YES! Direct hit from central salvo! Three shells impacted the hull! I see multiple explosions on deck! Enemy ship is burning! Smoke! Black smoke!"

  On the horizon, where the hulk of Atlastar loomed, bright buds of magical explosions blossomed. The superstructures were shrouded in clouds of smoke.

  Pattes took a greedy, lung-searing drag on the finally lit cigar. Smoking. Means we penetrated. Means they are mortal.

  "Don't press... " he whispered through his teeth. "Now they'll go berserk. Wait for reload. Conserve the shield."

  At that second, the gray smoke on the horizon was cut by orange flashes. The response was not long in coming. The enemy had lost neither tempo nor control.

  "FLASHES! ENEMY OPENING FIRE! FULL SALVO!"

  "To the entire fleet—maneuver! Barriers to maximum!" the Admiral shouted, but he knew he was late. Shells fly faster than words.

  A second later, the ocean around the Armis boiled.

  Water rose like a wall. Close bursts of heavy high-explosives, falling ten meters from the side, yanked the ship. The magic shield crackled, absorbing the shockwave.

  The lights on the bridge flickered and went out, replaced by emergency red.

  "Report!"

  "Armis is intact! Close misses!" the mage's voice was on the verge of hysteria. "But the barrier is destabilized! Power dropped to twenty-five percent! We won't withstand the next hit! Crystals are melting!"

  Now! Or never! Pattes wiped cold sweat from his eyes with his sleeve. He saw Atlastar emerge from the clouds of smoke. It was burning, yes. Something blazed on the deck. But it was moving. It hadn't slowed down by a knot. The turrets continued to turn.

  Why won't you sink, you beast?! We pumped enough energy into you to demolish a mountain!

  "Fire when ready! All barrels! Aim for the waterline! Sink him!"

  A new, deafening roar rang out. The remnants of the Mirishial fleet put all their rage, all their mana into this strike.

  Dozens of heavy magic shells, leaving vapor trails, found the target again.

  "DIRECT HIT!" exclaimed the observer again. "Two main battery turrets covered! Explosion on the spar deck! Three more fires!"

  Pattes grabbed his binoculars. He saw explosions. He saw magic energy melting the metal of railings and burning radar antennas. But...

  The gray walls of the armored citadels, from which the barrels protruded, remained unharmed. The paint was scorched, exposing metal, but the armor didn't buckle.

  No list. No trim by the bow. No signs the ship was dying. This dreadnought simply shook off the hits like a bear shaking off bees.

  Is it impossible to penetrate it at all?! a childish, almost tearful resentment gnawed at the mind of the gray-haired admiral who had been through a dozen wars. What metal is this?! What the hell is it made of? From the legendary adamantite of the ancient gods? Or from fear itself?

  The super-dreadnought Atlastar on the horizon was hidden in clouds of black, greasy smoke from magic shell hits. But this was a deceptive success. The enemy giant did not lose speed. Its fire control systems, hidden under thick armor in the bowels of the hull, continued to work with the dispassion of clockwork.

  Seconds later, new, angry orange flashes burst from the smoke screen. Retaliatory strike.

  The shells flew for seconds, but to the Armis crew, it seemed like an eternity.

  "Incoming! Bloom on the scanner! They are bracketing!"

  The blows landed straight on the overloaded, flickering Water Aegis. Magic, exhausted by continuous combat, howled.

  "Defense circuit breached!" the mage lieutenant's voice broke into a squeal. He stared at the crystal, across which black cracks snaked. "Field stability—zero! Breakthrough! Power reduced to ten percent! Mana Core going into critical overheat! Cooling circuits melting! Admiral, if we don't vent pressure, we'll explode from the inside!"

  Bitch... bitch... bitch! cold sweat broke out on Pattes, soaking his dress tunic through. His hands gripping the railing turned white.

  It took him just a second to suppress panic and regain the composure of a commander who knows he will die.

  "Deactivate barrier! Vent mana into atmosphere!" he screamed. "Hard to port! Sharp! Evasive maneuvers! Rapid fire to guns! Burn them while we breathe!"

  "Aye! Rudder left thirty!"

  The Armis began to list into the turn, but the inertia was too great. The magic guns barked for the last time, sending a swarm of shells at the steel monster.

  Splashes. Flashes. Smoke.

  The familiar report of a direct hit amused no one on the bridge anymore. Through binoculars, Pattes saw magic plasma spread over the armor of Atlastar's turrets, causing no harm to the mechanisms inside. What is the point of hits if the enemy is invulnerable? It felt like they were throwing stones at a cliff.

  And then time ran out.

  "Enemy opening fire! Range—point blank!"

  This time, there was no miss.

  A 460-millimeter armor-piercing shell, falling on a steep trajectory, struck the bow section of the Armis, just ahead of the first turret.

  There was no barrier. Only steel, mithril, and the magic of material resistance.

  The impact was of such force as if a meteorite had hit the ship. Kinetic energy of 300 megajoules turned the ship's bow into twisted scrap metal in a fraction of a second. The shell passed through decks like a knife through butter and detonated in the forward magazine.

  The world collapsed into a single blinding-white flash.

  The ship was tossed up. The floor went out from underfoot, the ceiling collapsed. Pattes was hurled across the bridge. He hit his back against the tactical table, heard the crunch of his own bones, and then came Darkness.

  Consciousness returned in spurts, through cotton wool and pain.

  An unbearable, high-frequency whine of concussion drilled into his brain. Through it, as if through a dense wall, distorted sounds broke through: the hysterical wail of the emergency siren, the crackle of magic discharges from shattered consoles, the screams of people burning alive, and... swearing.

  The Admiral opened his eyes. The world swam, doubled, and spun. He tried to inhale, but acrid smoke and fumes filled his lungs. Someone was shaking him by the shoulder. Roughly, persistently.

  "...miral! Admiral! Wake up, damn you!"

  Pattes focused his vision with enormous effort. Right in front of him, on his knees, amidst broken glass and blood, sat Captain Nium. The captain's face was slashed by a shard, but his eyes burned with the clear, cold fire of survival.

  "Admiral, glory to the Gods, you are alive..." he exhaled with relief, though his voice sounded hollow, like from inside a barrel.

  Pattes tried to sit up and groaned. His head was splitting; something sticky and warm flowed down his face, flooding his eye—blood from a gash on his forehead. He stupidly wiped it with his sleeve, smearing it over his face.

  "What... what happened?" his tongue was tangled, thoughts confused. "Why are we... stopping?"

  Nium grabbed him by the collar, bringing him to his senses.

  "Cough-cough... We took a hit in the bow, sir! Forward section!" The Captain coughed from the smoke. "It's simply gone. Sheared off. Engine room flooded. Mana-conduits ignited, fire is coming this way. The ship has taken on thousands of tons of water, trim by the bow is critical! We are sinking, Admiral! We need to leave immediately, or the vortex will drag us to the bottom with it!"

  "Sinking?.." the word sounded alien, impossible.

  Nium didn't waste time. He helped the Admiral up, and they headed for the external ladder.

  At the exit, Pattes suddenly stopped. He braced his legs firmly against the floor, forcing the Captain to freeze in place, and turned his head to the right.

  What appeared before his gaze stunned him, like a sailor seeing something incredible.

  The bow of the Armis, the pride of the Empire, that very sharp, predatory nose that cut the waves of all oceans, was gone. Instead, a sea of fire and steam churned. The ocean rushed inside the mangled hull with a greedy roar. The huge carcass of the battleship slowly, majestically, and eerily tilted forward, preparing for its final dive.

  Reflections of the flames devouring his life's work danced in his horror-glazed eyes.

  A storm raged in his soul. Childish resentment at injustice, black hatred for the iron barbarians, and finally, a deafening, grave-like emptiness. It is all over. The Empire didn't just lose a battle. It lost history.

  The magic PA manacomm, miraculously surviving on the wall and working off an emergency crystal, continued to repeat the same phrase in a dead, mechanical voice through the crackle of sirens, sounding like an epitaph:

  "...Attention all hands. Critical flooding. Threat of detonation. Abandon ship. I repeat: abandon ship..."

  Nium yanked the Admiral toward the lifeboat.

  The flagship of the Holy Mirishial Empire's Southern Fleet, having taken a direct hit to the heart, shuddered for the last time and, raising its stern to the indifferent heavens, began to rapidly go underwater, taking the era of magic with it.

  At the same time. Central World. Waters of the Fоlk Strait.

  Flagship — Super-dreadnought Atlastar.

  The colossal ship, slicing through the waves with its prow, moved through the smokescreen of battle. The vibration from the main turbines resonated as a fine tremor through the steel decks.

  The three main battery turrets—nine 460-millimeter barrels, heated to such a degree that the paint on them had bubbled and turned black—were slowly returning to the centerline. Just moments ago, they had been operating at the limit of their loading mechanisms: a salvo every thirty-five seconds. For this world, such fire density was unthinkable. For the Atlastar, it was hard labor that made the metal groan.

  On the battle bridge, it no longer smelled of sterility as it had at the start of the campaign, but of burnt insulation, sweat, and anxiety.

  Captain Luxtal, hands clasped behind his back until his knuckles were white, stared unblinkingly into the large binoculars. Through the eyepieces, he watched as the proud white battleship of the "natives," its bow section sheared off, slowly and eerily sank beneath the water. Lifeboats and people swarmed around it.

  "Target number one destroyed. Submersion confirmed," the senior gunnery officer reported dryly, without a shadow of triumph.

  "Stand down from battle stations. Purge the barrels. Report casualties and damage," Luxtal's voice was hoarse. He ran a hand across his forehead, wiping away the sweat.

  The executive officer stepped toward him, holding a tablet with a preliminary summary. His face was gray.

  "Direct hits from magic shells to the superstructure and near the second turret. The citadel armor was not penetrated, but... the shrapnel effect is monstrous. The searchlight control post is destroyed, the left rangefinder is disabled. The fire on the boat deck has been contained."

  The officer stumbled for a second.

  "Regarding personnel: fifty-six dead, fourteen critical. The majority are anti-aircraft gun crews and damage control parties caught in the magical blast wave. Technical services promise to restore system combat readiness in two to three hours, sir."

  Luxtal nodded slowly. He continued to watch the death of the enemy.

  Fifty-six...

  This fight was as different from the execution of Leifor as fighting a wolf is from beating a puppy. These ones, on that white ship, snapped back. When the first magic shells struck the Atlastar, making the 72,000-ton machine shudder, Luxtal broke into a cold sweat for the first time in the entire campaign. This wasn't the arrogance of savages. This was power. Magic capable of piercing even Krupp steel, had they gotten closer.

  He felt a strange mixture of relief and respect.

  "Cease fire. All ships in the formation—all stop," he ordered.

  His reflections were rudely interrupted. The clicking of heels on the metal deck plating sounded like a machine-gun burst in the silence of the bridge.

  "What is the meaning of this, Captain?!" a sharp, ringing female voice, trembling with indignation, hit him in the back.

  Luxtal slowly, reluctantly tore himself away from the binoculars and turned around.

  Before him stood Cielia Oudwin. Her impeccable diplomatic suit was slightly rumpled, and in her eyes—usually cold and calculating—an unkind fire now burned, mixed with fear. She had seen the smoke on the deck of "her" invincible ship, and the sight had unsettled her.

  "What exactly do you mean, Madam Diplomat?" he asked coldly.

  "Why are we standing still?!" Cielia hissed, pointing a slender finger at the sinking battleship and the lifeboats around it. "Why are your guns silent? These cursed savages dared to scratch the pride of the Empire! They killed our people! Finish them off! Grind them into dust so that no one dares to raise their head!"

  Luxtal looked down at her the way one looks at an unreasonable child getting under a surgeon's hand. He stepped toward her, and Cielia involuntarily retreated, hitting the icy wall of his professionalism.

  "This is not within your jurisdiction, Ms. Oudwin," he said quietly, but in a way that every officer on the bridge heard him. "I am in command here. We are soldiers, not butchers. The enemy ship is destroyed. The flag is lowered. They are saving their wounded. I will not waste shells shooting at lifeboats."

  He turned away, his whole demeanor showing that the audience was over, and pressed his eyes to the eyepieces again, watching the agony of the Armis.

  "Your diplomatic protocols are merely recommendations here. Leave the battle station immediately. You are interfering with the crew's work."

  "You... you will regret this soft-heartedness," Cielia gasped, choking on her indignation.

  Behind his back, he heard angry sniffling, followed by the rapid, nervous clatter of heels receding toward the hatch.

  She'll write a report to the Imperial Chancellery. I don't care, Luxtal thought indifferently.

  He had given a respite. A gesture understood by a sailor of any world. Let them take their survivors. Let them tell the capital what they saw. The fear of living witnesses is more useful than dead bodies.

  Luxtal checked his watch. The time for "chivalry" was ending.

  In thirty minutes, he would give the command to the aircraft carriers. A new wave was already warming up engines on the decks. The war continued, and there would be no room for mercy when he approached Cartalpas itself.

  Central World. Port City of Cartalpas.

  Imperial Embassy Building. Operational Defense Headquarters.

  Time: 17:15.

  The luxurious halls of the Embassy, where just a week ago the fates of the world were debated, now resembled an anthill that had been poked with a stick. Expensive carpets were trampled by the muddy boots of couriers, and tables were piled high with coastline maps and casualty reports. The air was heavy, stale, and permeated with the smell of overheated communication mana-crystals and the sticky sweat of dozens of frightened people.

  Imperial Defense Lieutenant General Shmill Pao, appointed as the city's commandant, stood over the tactical map. His tunic was unbuttoned, his eyes sunken from strain. He watched the fleet markers snuff out one by one, unable to force himself to believe the reality of what was happening.

  "Report," his voice was dry and brittle, like old parchment. "I need the truth. What is the operational situation?"

  The adjutant, a young officer with a gray face, tore himself away from the manacomm. His hands shook so violently that he could barely hold his stylus. He took a deep breath, as if before jumping into an abyss.

  "Critical, General. Even worse... It is a catastrophe," he exhaled. "Data confirmed by coastal posts and surviving Eimor observers. The Southern Fleet under the command of Admiral Pattes... is destroyed. Completely. The flagship Armis has sunk. The combined fleet of the allied powers is broken and scattered."

  The headquarters went quiet. Even the telegraph operators froze.

  "The Order of the Wind Dragon has lost combat effectiveness and retreated deep inland," the adjutant continued, and every word fell into the silence like a stone onto a coffin lid. "There is no one in the sky. The sky is gone, sir. It belongs to Gra-Valkas. The enemy's vanguard squadrons are moving here at full speed. Estimated time of contact—less than an hour."

  Shmill Pao closed his eyes. Legends were crumbling. The Superpower turned out to be a naked king in the face of an iron storm.

  "What about the city's defense?"

  "Imperial Defense forces are deployed according to Plan 'Citadel'," the adjutant began speaking quickly, trying to find even a drop of hope in the dry lines of the report. "Coastal magic cannon batteries are at combat readiness. Evacuation of embassies and nobility is proceeding normally; trains are departing every ten minutes. Garrison troops have taken positions. Air defen..."

  His report was rudely, barbarically interrupted.

  A wail rose over the city, over the port, over every house.

  It was not a horn. Not a bell.

  It was the piercing, rising howl of the magic siren, "Voice of the Guardian," which was activated in only one case: during a direct, imminent attack on the capital or key cities.

  OOOOOOOO-WUUUUUUUU!

  The sound penetrated bones, teeth, the very soul.

  The people in the headquarters froze, looking at each other with eyes wide with horror. No one—from the general to the last scribe—could believe in the depths of their soul that this day had come. That war—real, dirty war—had come to their "white city."

  No one could believe that the alarm would be for combat, and not a drill...

  Second Transport Node. Imperial Defense supply column.

  The ammunition trucks—open-topped mana-mobiles resembling trucks from the 1940s without cabs—were stuck in traffic, jammed in by a panicking crowd.

  AIR RAID! SCATTER! the driver of the lead vehicle screamed frantically, his face twisted. He saw what the others didn't: the predatory silhouette of an Antares fighter pulling out of a combat turn right onto the street line.

  The quicker soldiers spilled out of the beds like peas onto the pavement, trying to roll under wheels or into doorways.

  The plane opened fire.

  RAT-A-TAT-TAT-TAT!

  It was a sound that stopped hearts. The nose-mounted 20-millimeter cannons and machine guns ripped open the cobblestones, kicking up fountains of stone chips, and swept through the column and the crowd like a broom made of fire.

  One shell struck the side of a truck. The explosion scattered the soldiers sitting inside like broken rag dolls.

  Aaagh... mph... oo... mo... ma-a... a young private mumbled on the sidewalk, lying in a pool of his own filth and blood. He tried to inhale, but pink foam bubbled from his mouth. His legs below the knees were missing—sheared off by the machine-gun burst. His hands groped the asphalt, trying to feel for what was no longer there. A second later, he twitched and went still, his glazed gaze fixed on the burning sky.

  Screams of pain and agony battered the ears and brains of the survivors, far more terrifying than any siren. Some shook with the violent tremors of shock; others crawled along the ground, leaving a wide trail of blood and whimpering. A young recruit sat with his back pressed against a wheel, staring with mad eyes at his intestines spilling out onto his lap, trying frantically to stuff them back into his torn abdomen with shaking, slippery hands.

  BI-I-I-ITCH! TAKE THAT! TAKE THAT, YOU SCUM!

  One of the fighters, cracking into hysteria, jumped to his full height. Snarling and spraying spittle, he raised his magic rifle and began firing wildly into the sky at the receding silhouette of the fighter, wasting mana charges uselessly.

  CEASE FIRE, YOU IDIOT! GET DOWN! shouted the First Sergeant of the Imperial Defense, sweeping the madman's legs out from under him. Adan, Salen, take his rifle! Inject him with a sedative! Report casualties!

  A corporal crawled up to him. His face was black with soot, his uniform turned to rags.

  Sir... Second Platoon... took a direct hit. Only fifteen men survived... Oof...

  The corporal's legs gave way, and he fell to his knees, vomiting bile.

  Bitch... the First Sergeant exhaled helplessly. He grabbed his head with dirty, bloodied hands, pulling his hair hard, trying to drown out the pain of what he had seen. Where the fuck is our fleet? Where is the air cover?! We're just being slaughtered!

  Meanwhile, hell was creeping toward the very heart of the city.

  Bombs began bursting near the Imperial Embassy, which was now acting as a field operations headquarters. Explosions uprooted centuries-old trees in the magnificent park and smashed white marble statues of ancient heroes, turning art into gravel.

  But there was no panic here. There was only doomed work.

  Crews of stationary magic anti-aircraft guns, coughing from the smoke, sent shell after shell into the soot-choked sky. Trucks, weaving between craters, brought up crates of mana-accumulators. Mirishial troops, stepping over civilian corpses, loaded into surviving vehicles and moved not to shelters, but to the front—to the coastline, to take up positions right within the burning city limits. Imperial Defense fighters, teeth gritted, helped them, knowing that most likely, none of them would see the next sunrise. The city was preparing to die fighting.

  Central World. Outer Roadstead of Cartalpas.

  Bridge of the super-dreadnought Atlastar.

  Time: 18:40.

  The colossal 460-millimeter main battery guns had finally fallen silent, but a haze of superheated air still rose from their barrels, distorting the horizon. The hollow, cottony silence that replaced the artillery hell pressed heavily on the ears.

  Acting as the armored battering ram of the Empire, the Atlastar had cleared the road just as an icebreaker carves a path through the ice. There was no longer an organized force in front of its bow—only chaos. Those ships of the "Allied Fleet" that hadn't managed to flee were now merely smoking hulks drifting with the current, or oil slicks on the water marking the graves of hundreds of sailors.

  Out from behind the smoke screen, like hounds returning to their master, emerged three Swift-class escort destroyers. Their flanks were soot-stained, and their railings bent by blast waves, but they sailed in precise formation, assuming an anti-submarine screen around the flagship.

  Captain Luxtal stood by the armored glass. He had lowered his heavy Zeiss binoculars but continued to look at the city. Cartalpas was burning. Columns of black smoke rose from the port facilities and the noble quarters, obscuring the setting sun. This was not the triumph of a victor. This was a grim, dirty job executed flawlessly.

  Heels clicked on the metal deck plating.

  "Captain, sir, report from the air group commander," the Lieutenant XO's voice sounded hoarse but clear. "The second and third waves of attack aircraft are completing their work. All designated coastal batteries have been suppressed. The port's military infrastructure has been 80% disabled. Air group losses: seven machines, three pilots rescued by destroyers. A full analytical report will be on your desk in fifteen minutes."

  Luxtal nodded slowly, not turning around.

  "Copy that. Recall the air wings. Regroup. You are dismissed, Lieutenant."

  The XO saluted crisp and by the book, touching his hand to the visor of his cap, and, turning on his heels, headed toward the hatch.

  "And one more thing, Meyer..." Luxtal's quiet but firm voice stopped him right at the door.

  The Lieutenant froze and turned slowly.

  "Yes, Captain?"

  Luxtal tore his gaze away from the burning city and looked at the oily water overboard, where tiny dots could be seen among the debris—the heads of people clinging to life.

  "There are a lot of people bobbing in the sea. These are not cowards or politicians. These are soldiers and officers who fought honestly for their families and their country against a force known to be superior. Relay to the destroyers and support ships:" he paused, as if weighing the decision. "Slack speed. Lower the boats. Pick up everyone they find. Bring them on board, feed them, warm them. Render aid to the wounded."

  He met the Lieutenant's surprised gaze. The man clearly hadn't expected such an order after the total annihilation of the enemy fleet. The Empire's Regulations did not prescribe mercy toward "barbarians."

  "What is it, Lieutenant? Is something troubling you?" steel notes slipped into the Captain's voice, but his eyes were tired. "We are sailors, not executioners. The fight is over. There are no enemies in the water, only drowning men. Treat people the way you would want to be treated in such a situation. Tomorrow, that could be us." He turned back to the window. "I won't keep you any longer. Carry out the order."

  "A... Aye, Captain!" the Lieutenant exhaled. His voice contained not just submission to regulations, but sincere respect.

  While the destroyers on the horizon slowed down to pull former enemies from the icy water, history was tallying the results.

  During the battle, the Southern Fleet, as well as the combined forces of the Second and Third Civilizations, had suffered a catastrophic defeat at the hands of a single super-dreadnought, the Atlastar, and its air group. Cartalpas was ablaze. The reputation of the Holy Mirishial Empire as an invincible hegemon, built over thousands of years, had collapsed into the abyss along with the wreckage of the battleship Armis.

  And half an hour later, the door to the radio room flew open. The communications officer, eyes red from strain, walked onto the bridge holding a form stamped "Urgent. Top Priority." It was a cipher from Ragna. A dispatch with a direct order from the Commander-in-Chief.

  The text was brief: "Mission accomplished. Show of force completed successfully. I order the fleet 'Empire's Justice' to wind down the operation and return to base."

  Luxtal exhaled smoke. They were not going to occupy Cartalpas. This was not an invasion. It was a punitive expedition.

  A resounding, deafening slap from the Gra-Valkas Empire had been delivered across the face of the entire world, and the mark from it would burn for a very long time. The fleet and aviation had done their job. The time had come for politicians—and other, darker forces.