Aboard the Sunchaser, Celestina Balfour stared out from the bridge at the landscape below, her expression unreadable as she calmly asked, "How long until we arrive?"
"The closest settlement to the estimated origin of the explosion should be coming into view shortly, General," Allina Crest, her trust adjutant and second-in-command responded after quickly checking the scenery against the map spread out before her.
Having set off roughly 30 minutes after first detecting the great explosion, Celestina Balfour and an elite group of her subordinates had traveled at maximum speed through the night and would soon reach their first planned stop.
While she wanted to head straight for the source of the explosion, General Balfour knew that doing so would be impossible. It wasn't difficult to surmise that after such a massive disturbance, the entire Great Western Forest would be in a state of chaos, making it extremely dangerous to launch an investigation with the small force she had brought with her, no matter how powerful its individual members were.
There was also the matter of the Wild Beasts which would surely come pouring out of the forest and pose a serious threat to all nearby settlements.
As one of the Rockwell Kingdom's 10 Generals, Celestina was quite familiar with the distribution of military and noble forces throughout the nation, so she was well aware that the South-West Province had very little in terms of combat capabilities.
With no significant military presence nearby, this entire area would likely be overrun by a Beast Tide and suffer serious damage before a proper response could be mounted.
Celestina's suspicions were quickly confirmed when a few minutes ago she began spotting packs of Wild Beasts running rampant across open fields and attacking small villages.
Fortunately, these villages seemed to have been abandoned, probably a result of the inhabitants fleeing after witnessing the terrifying explosion in the distance.
Although most ordinary farmers wouldn't be able to predict the consequences of such a disaster, there were always be a few smart people around that could smell danger and would thus evacuate, setting off an inevitable chain-reaction.
That was not to say that there were no casualties, however. Even from some 500 metres up, it was still easy for the powerful True Cultivators aboard the Sunchaser to make out numerous human corpses below.
The members of Celestina's unit, influenced by their leader's morals and sense of righteousness, all took the protection of the ordinary citizens of the kingdom as their personal responsibility, so they wanted nothing more than to go down and slaughter the rampant beasts.
However, they also understood what their priorities were.
Right now, their primary objective had to be reaching the largest settlement closest to the disaster zone as that would be the place most in need of aid right now.
Saving the living was more important than avenging the dead.
Just as her adjutant reported, Celestina soon spotted a small town up ahead, or rather, she spotted long columns of smoke rising into the air from where the town should be. Seeing this, General Balfour narrowed her eyes slightly, pondering if this was a good, or ominous sign.
The presence of long-burning fires could imply many things. It could be a sign that there were still people alive down below, or it could mean that beasts had trampled through and disturbed torches and braziers, setting buildings ablaze.
Celestina didn't bother thinking too much about this issue, though, as whatever the case was, she would know soon enough.
"Begin our descent. We'll do a low pass over the town and assess the situation from above before dispersing accordingly."
"Yes, General!"
Less than a quarter-hour later, the town up ahead was now fully visible and the Sunchaser had just reached its outer farmlands. They were now close enough that Celestina, using her powerful Soul Sense, could just barely make out what was going on.
Scanning the town, she raised a brow slightly before frowning deeply.
To put it bluntly, the town was teetering on the edge. Beast corpses littered the western quarter as what seemed to be makeshift barricades were being defended by exhausted militia.
In truth, calling them militia was being extremely generous. From what Celestina could tell, this was more like a gathering of untrained peasant who had weapons shoved into their hands and were forced to fight for their lives.
Despite the rag-tag nature of the defenders, however, they seemed to be putting up a decent fight, even using some standard military tactics like forming a shield wall and using spears to attack from behind it. This could be explained by the presence of some former soldiers among the townsfolk though, so it wasn't too surprising.
What really shocked Celestina was the presence of a Mid-Rank Spirit Initiate!
"Hm? This aura…" Celestina frowned as she focused her senses on a certain figure fighting with a massive snake just to the west of the town.
Although from this distance she couldn't make out the person's face, she could tell it was a woman from the outline of her figure and the way she moved. On top of that, there was something familiar about this Spirit Initiate's aura.
The female Spirit Initiate was in a dangerous situation, but it wasn't critical just yet, so Celestina put this unexpected discovery aside for the moment and continued her investigation, soon noticing that although the barricade defenders had held back the vast majority of enemies, a number of beasts had still managed to get past them and slip into the town.
Most of these beasts were engaged with what seemed like hunting parties tasked with intercepting them, but one of them, a Vile Coyote if Celestina wasn't mistaken, had somehow slipped through all the defenders and made it to the what should be the local lord's manor, where it was attacking the defenseless civilians.
Seeing this situation and swiftly judging the distance, General Balfour ordered, "Adjust course towards the central manor and activate the Wind Burst Array."
Without waiting for her subordinates to respond, Celestina grabbed her azure longbow, opened the bridge door, and ran out onto the deck.
Immediately upon exiting the sheltered interior of the ship, Celestina was smacked in the face by harsh winds. Had she been an ordinary mortal, it would have been quite difficult to even move forward facing such resistance, but as a Complete High-Rank Adept, Celestina was hardly impeded at all.
Reaching the Sunchaser's bow in the blink of an eye, Celestina felt a jolt as the Wind Burst Array activated.
This Spirit Array essentially overloaded the Sunchaser's Propulsion Array, granting it a temporary burst of speed in exchange for a massive consumption of World Qi from the Spirit Crystals powering the ship.
Focusing her Soul Sense and circulating her Spirit and Martial Qi, Celestina channeled strength into the bow to reinforce it while nocking an arrow, taking aim at the Low Second Order Coyote that was still about 3,000 metres away and 200 metres below.
Just as Celestina was about to fire, she caught sight of a boy diving to the ground, covering 2 younger children from the coyote's attack, while a slightly older girl lunged in and stabbed the beast with her sword.
What brave little ones! Looks like I don't need to take the risk, Celestina relaxed her arms and lowered her bow.
Even for her, hitting a small-sized beast from this distance while moving at high speed in strong winds was very difficult.
In order to guarantee a kill from where she was currently standing, Celestina would have to use a considerable amount of her strength, enough that if her aim was even slightly off, it would pose a life-threatening danger to anyone who was even brushed by her arrow.
If the young girl could finish off this beast without her needing to act, Celestina felt it would be for the best.
As she watched this fight play out with her Soul Sense, a glint flashed across Celestina's eye as she noticed the distinctive flaming red hair of the young girl.
Interesting!
Celestina watched as the girl, who she suspected was somehow related to her, brought down the coyote and was about to nod in approval when she witnessed the latter make a terrible mistake; failing to confirm her kill before turning her back to the enemy!
"Shit!" Celestina cursed as she hurriedly channeled her strength, drew her bow again, and fired; but, despite having reacted almost instantaneously, she could tell she was still a moment too late.