Chapter 946: Return to Seagaze
The officer entering the room was fairly young with long brows, a slim face, and a fairly clean, civilized demeanor. He seemed like the easily-bullied type no matter how one looked at him.
His face was handsome, but there were no special features, the type that people would forget after seeing. There were dozens if not hundreds of such people in Dark Flame.
Qianye had indeed never seen this face, but he recognized this person. Moreover, he was fairly familiar.
“Young Miss, how come it’s you?” Qianye’s expression was calm.
This young officer was, in fact, Ji Tianqing in disguise. Wherever she was, trouble would emerge out of nowhere. It would seem Qianye had no choice to follow along on this trip, lest she messed things up.
Ji Tianqing asked in disbelief, “How did you figure it out?”
Her disguise was virtually perfect. Not only had she changed her appearance, but even her body size was different. She had grown somehow taller and was on par with Qianye’s stature. People would rightfully feel that this was an unfamiliar young man and never connect him to Ji Tianqing.
It was no wonder that she would feel depressed after such a disguise was so easily seen through. Qianye didn’t know how to give her a proper answer, so he replied honestly after some thought, “Intuition.”
Ji Tianqing felt the urge to go berserk. She was ready to doubt whatever answer that came from his mouth, but the word intuition deprived her of ways to retort.
Song Zining said at this point, “All prepared? Qianye arrived a bit early, but that’s good as well. Go quickly and return fast, get the job done. I’ve already prepared the men and cars, you guys can set out anytime.”
Song Zining’s work efficiency was quite high. In just half an hour, two jeeps were waiting at the entrance to the command center and began charging toward the airship port after picking the two up. There was already an airship waiting at the port.
What made people speechless was that the airships had actually lowered their gangplanks, allowing the two jeeps to drive straight into the cabin. The doors shut tight following the retraction of the gangplank, and the airship flew toward Segaze. Qianye and the others didn’t even need to get off their cars during the entire process.
Sensing the pressure of the ascension, Qianye said, “This should be a regular imperial transport ship, right? What’s the point of the disguise if they’re going to drive this way?”
Indeed, the airship’s vertical and linear acceleration wasn’t any weaker than a warship since the military transports needed to operate together with the entire fleet. Although it had been disguised as an ordinary cargo ship, the speed betrayed its true identity. What kind of cargo ship would be that fast? High-speed civilian airships could not even reach half of its current speed.
Additionally, loading armed vehicles onto the airship via gangplank was a feature unique to military-grade transports. All of this made the good camouflage rather meaningless.
Ji Tianqing had kept her eyes closed all along. “We have no plans to hide anything on this trip. Those families will only submit after seeing our strength.”
Qianye nodded. “We have to fight if they don’t obey us, right? We didn’t bring any expert, either.”
Ji Tianqing pointed at herself. “Isn’t this general an expert? You’re not so bad, either.”
Qianye refused to comment. Instead, he took the time to think back and analyze the experts he had seen in Seagaze in preparation for the battle ahead.
Seagaze wasn’t too far from Southern Blue. Although the high-speed transport was swift, it wasn’t really that much faster than Qianye and Ji Tianqing running over on their own. The vessel accelerated to max velocity and sped toward Seagaze like a shooting star.
Chaos descended upon the walls of Seagaze. A sharp alarm echoed throughout the city as the ballistae atop the two turrets did their utmost to turn and lock onto the unwelcome guests, but those seemingly old cargo ships were just too quick. The cannoneers were already beet red, but the rotating ballistae still couldn’t lock onto their targets.
If even the ballistae couldn’t lock on, then the ones fired by the archers had even less of a chance at finding their mark. The defense captain on the city walls was drenched in sweat, cursing and sweating as he ran about commanding the city guards.
This highspeed airship was definitely showing off and establishing might. It rushed straight into the sky above Seagaze before returning outside and eventually turning the side of its vessel toward the city walls.
If it were a warship, this would be a standard volley-fire stance. Although one couldn’t see any ballista cannons on this airship, no one knew how many of them were hidden inside this rapid-flying airship. Perhaps it could destroy a gate tower in just one volley.
“Take cover! Take cover!” The officer’s desperate cries echoed across the city walls. At this point, some soldiers hadn’t even reached their posts and the ballista cannons were still turning back from the direction of the city center. From the warship’s perspective, there were live targets everywhere.
The warship hovered calmly in the air for a good while, completely motionless. Only when the two ballista cannons were about to lock on did it retreat out of their range.
The defense general was sweating profusely. This was a standard evasive maneuver usually performed by high-performance warships. How could there be such powerful warships in the neutral lands? This general could hardly believe his eyes for he had only seen such a maneuver in textbooks.
Only at this point did the airship descend slowly.
Inside the cabin, a tall man arrived beside the jeep and gently rapped on the windows. “General, I think we’ve played with them quite enough. You can come down now.”
Ji Tianqing nodded. Soon, several jeeps exited the transport ship in a single file and made straight for Seagaze.
At this moment, the defense general was gazing cautiously at the incoming motorcade. His face twitched as he heard a sudden click in his ears. Turning back, he saw a soldier currently taking aim and pulling the bolt back, ready to fire.
Furious, the captain ran over and slapped him to the floor. “Who told you to move? Listen, everyone! No one opens fire without my orders! Don’t even aim!”
The guards were immediately speechless. They soon lowered their guns and the cannon turrets also stopped turning about. The situation was obvious—the people coming down from this unprecedented airship seemed completely fearless of the city’s defense cannons. If they were to fire randomly, things would look bad if they provoked a true expert.
This order stopped Seagaze’s momentum but ensured the lives of their men.
The city guard general jumped down from the wall and stopped the incoming jeeps at the gates.
There was no movement on Ji Tianqing’s side. Only an officer came down from the leader car and said to the defense general, “Hand this to the Xue family, they will know what to do. Additionally, our superior is very busy, we’ll only wait ten minutes.”
The defense general was shocked out of his wits. Ten minutes was only enough for him to run to the Xue family and back. Even if he could meet the clan lord immediately, there wouldn’t be enough time for a prolonged report. Unable to care about the origins of the insignia that had been placed in his hands, he left immediately to report the matter.
Fortunately, he ran into a group of soldiers running toward the city gate and their leader was a Xue family elder. The defense general handed the insignia over in a hurry and quickly summarized what had transpired.
The elder’s expression changed drastically upon seeing the insignia. He merely asked where these people were before breaking out into a run.
Moments later, Qianye and Ji Tianqing entered the Xue family mansion and were duly seated.
Some old men arrived in succession and sat down across from the duo. Judging from the lineup, it would seem that all of the family’s elders were present, Xue Wu looking fairly eye-catching in their midst.
At first, some of the elders looked fairly aggressive during their entry. However, their expressions shifted drastically upon seeing Qianye. Their anger quickly subsided as they opted to sit down obediently. From the beginning to the end, there weren’t many who dared to look straight at Qianye. His fight at Seagaze back then was deeply etched into their hearts.
After everyone was in their seats, the Xue family lord glanced deeply at Qianye. “Guests, you must be tired from your long journey, yet I must ask, what is the meaning of this insignia, please explain.”
Qianye remained silent since he was only in charge of fighting and sitting beside Ji Tianqing, who would handle everything else.
The young officer beside Qianye chuckled gently. “Clan Lord, do you really not recognize this?”
She was fairly young in appearance, and her strength wasn’t anything to write home about. Add to that her somewhat frivolous attitude, the elders from the Xue family were highly dissatisfied. It was just that they could really do nothing with Qianye around. No matter how hateful or weak this little gigolo was, his companion was more than enough to make up for him.
The Xue clan lord coughed. “I really do not know.”
Ji Tianqing said, “It’s fine if you don’t know, I’ll explain. But, there are so many people here, are you sure it’s fine for them to hear?”
A commotion descended upon the elders. Now, Ji Tianqing was directly questioning their qualifications to learn important secrets.
The Xue Clan Lord’s reply was clear. “This matter regards the family’s continued existence. I cannot decide everything alone, we’ll need all the elders for a conclusion.”
Ji Tianqing said with a carefree laugh, “And here I thought the clan lord was a man who could make decisions, who would’ve imagined? If we’re on the brink of war, will you also hold an elder assembly to decide? If someone doesn’t agree, you’ll stop doing anything?”
Someone among the elders finally flipped out. He was just about to start cursing, but Qianye suddenly opened his eyes and shot him a glance. Whatever he was about to say was caught in his throat, which he duly swallowed as he sat back down.
The Xue clan lord said, “It’s not that I’m indecisive, but this matter is too important. Only such a decision will convince the entire family.”
“Since you’ve decided this, I’ll start speaking. I just hope you don’t regret later on.” Ji Tianqing knocked on the table and was just about to speak when Xue Wu suddenly stood up. “Please wait! I think everyone except the grand elder should withdraw temporarily.”