Chapter 735 735 Window Seats
Once the cargo plane was pushed back to line up with the runway, the copilot waved back at the passengers.
“If you don’t mind, could one of you activate the auxiliary wind and gravity inscriptions for us? If you do it, it will be much stronger than what the two of us can manage.” She asked.
“I’ve got it. Start your takeoff preparations.” Wolfe agreed.
With a surge of mana, the spells came to life, and the plane began to hum with magical power.
The turbines spun up to speed with a whistle, and the aircraft shuddered as the wind picked up, providing lift to the wings as they began to roll down the runway. The Gravity array pulled them upward and forward, offsetting the natural gravity in the area, and the plane lurched into the air, carefully not tilted too nose high so that they wouldn’t disturb their cargo.
The pilots both had extensive experience with this craft lately, and restacking cargo was not on anyone’s list of favourite activities. Even if the plane got there a little earlier, it would leave later if they had to rework the shipment, so the smooth takeoff actually saved them time in the long run.
“How does this thing even fly? There are no propellors. I saw propellors on the other ones.” One of the Demons asked.
“They’re enclosed in the nacelle. There are a few rows of them, and they’re driven by fire magic in a chamber behind that, which is fed by compressed air. Sorry, that’s about all that I know of it, but the witches who design and maintain these things know a lot more about how they’re made.
I learned how to make the motor ones with propellors, as they run on lightning magic, and I’m at the Adept Proficiency with that Element, and have been for some time. My fire skills only caught up when I advanced to the Saint Rank.” Wolfe explained.
“Interesting. I will have to talk to them. We are moving so fast through the air that I don’t think any Demon could keep up with us. It would change everything about travel between the regions.
Well, as long as you had a Demon on board that was strong enough to keep the barrier up. There are still the firestorms, the perpetual lightning field, and the mana winds to consider when you’re flying somewhere, and you would hit a lot of them per second at this speed.”
The others nodded, looking out the windows and considering the possibilities. The Demon Realms were enormous, far larger than this planet was, so high-speed travel that didn’t involve portals would be quite the change, but the environment was not nearly as friendly as the blue planet’s, and the sky itself was a threat in many regions.
“Keep a watch for any groups of creatures. I heard that it might be undead, so from this height it might look like a gathered army.” Wolfe reminded them.
That was a great excuse to stare out the windows at the clouds passing by. The plane was flying lower than usual, keeping below the cloud cover so they didn’t miss signs of the Monster Tide, but they would have to climb soon, or they would have to detour around the mountains to where they had received the reports of undead sightings.
Actually, that might be better. What was happening in the mountains was less concerning than what was trying to come out of them and enter populated areas.
“Pilot, skirt the mountains and stay near the border of the Myrrh Coven as we go. That should give us a hundred kilometres or so worth of visibility near the defensive positions so we can warn them of movement in advance.” Wolfe ordered.
“Understood, Saint Wolfe.” She replied in a singsong voice, turning the reply into a friendly joke.
Every witch in town had known each other for so long that even if they rarely spoke, every face was familiar. A few hundred faces that you saw every day during meals, or at work, or even just shopping in the small market square became familiar in only a month or two, and Wolfe was a fixture in the town, always around doing something, and always in everyone’s minds, as they needed his assistance with all sorts of random projects.
The Fae and Demons all snickered at the ‘Saint Wolfe’ reference, even though he really was one now. Normally, every saint would get some reverent title based on their powers, personality, or a great task that they had accomplished. But for Wolfe, his most notable accomplishment was just being himself, and he had progressed so insanely fast that there were no decades of legacy for a name to be based on.
That in itself could be the basis for a title, but so far, nobody had put forth a suggestion to the wider group of Saints who would officially bestow him with the title. If he were a Fae or Demon it would be so much easier, as the Royals would just come up with something for the Nobles that reached Rank Seven, and they would usually have enough time that it would have been decided and accepted well in advance.
But those who were with Wolfe on this trip were pretty sure that nobody expected him to advance this quickly, especially since he had just reached Rank Six a few weeks earlier when he was in the Demon Realms.
By any sort of normal logic, they should have still had a decade to prepare.
“Oh, look down there. Angry midgets.” One of the Demons called out, drawing everyone’s attention to the starboard side of the aircraft.
The Angry Midgets turned out to be a military patrol of witches, nearly five hundred strong, and headed north in the same direction that the plane was travelling.
Wolfe wasn’t sure whether they had spotted the plane, but he was certain that they would find the reason for such a large deployment soon.
“The target should be coming soon, and there they are. It looks like it’s mostly snow beasts, and they’re spreading frozen ground with them. That’s got to be the easiest identification I’ve ever done.” One of the Fae laughed.
“Well, let’s go say hello. Is there another military force in the area? If there is, find us somewhere to land. I’ll top up the mana pool if we need to make a sudden transition.” Wolfe instructed.
“There is a defensive fortification ten kilometres from the leading edge of the monster tide. It looks like they’re well-
prepared, but do we have anyone here who belongs to this region?” Ella asked.
One of the Fae raised his hand. “I do. My boss should be here somewhere, but this is within our assigned region. What’s the plan?”
Wolfe smiled at him.
“How do you feel about an airdrop?”