Trenches, Guns, and Magic

After Lieutenant Colonel Franz finished speaking, the bridge of the L34 armored airship fell dead silent.

The roar of the engines, the ticking of instruments, the crackle of static from the comms microphones... these usually ignored sounds suddenly became piercingly sharp.

Everyone's attention focused on the helmsman.

This senior airship helmsman, an eight-year veteran of the Imperial Air Force, had piloted various armored airship models through over four hundred takeoffs and landings in the past three years.

He showed no change in expression. He simply leaned sideways, glancing out the starboard window to confirm the general trajectory of the Magic Crystal shells via their dissipating blue trails... Then, he wrenched the helm hard to the right.

The L34 couldn't react quickly. A hull hundreds of meters long, massive deadweight, external armor plating, and weapon systems... But that didn't mean it was completely incapable of maneuvering.

Under the helmsman's control, the propeller thrusters on both sides of the hull outputted differential thrust: full power to starboard, half power to port. The massive airship began to sideslip in a manner completely incongruous with its colossal size.

In Imperial Air Force terminology, this was called an "emergency turn."

In plainer terms, the behemoth was drifting in mid-air.

At that moment, the first high-explosive Magic Crystal shell plummeted from the upper right.

The guiding soldier on the ground desperately maintained his gesture, trying to drag the glowing blue orb toward the airship. But there was a limit to how much "terminal guidance" could correct; it wasn't as if the shell could zig-zag freely across the sky...

Ultimately, the shell grazed past, missing the L34's starboard side by about sixty meters.

Gritting his teeth, the soldier detonated it at the closest possible moment. The blast wave and blue magical fallout washed over the hull, causing a massive ripple across the outer spell shield.

The L34 rocked from the close-range shockwave, but that was all.

"Spell shield nominal!" a bridge officer called out. "Magic Crystal shells still approaching! All hands, brace for impact!"

The helmsman remained calm, continuing to force the massive airship through evasive maneuvers.

Right behind it fell the second, third, and fourth shells...

Because Lieutenant Colonel Franz had noticed the anomaly and ordered the airship to climb and accelerate before the cannons fired, the L34 was already in a state of continuous displacement. This made the ground guides' job incredibly difficult.

Judging by the name, the "Magic Crystal Siege Cannon" clearly wasn't designed to hit moving targets.

The White Army guides had received less than two months of training from Britannian "experts." During this time, they had practiced mostly on infantry formations, city walls, fortresses, and static defenses.

Big, slow-moving, or completely stationary targets.

Now, they were dealing with a target frantically twisting in the sky. Even though the target was huge, at an altitude of seven hundred meters, a lateral shift of just a few dozen meters was enough to make their painstakingly corrected trajectories miss entirely.

The fifth shell, the eighth, the twelfth...

Everyone on the bridge clung to whatever they could grab. The airship lurched left and right under the helmsman's control, every lateral shift accompanied by the agonized groaning of its metal skeleton.

From the perspective of the observation windows, the airship's absurd aerial drift left most of the shells falling uselessly behind it.

Some White Army guides chose to detonate early. High-explosive and fragmentation shells burst in the air. The shockwaves and shrapnel did reach the L34, but with the spell shield at maximum power, it held firm against the glancing blows.

Sixteen, eighteen, twenty...

Franz counted silently. With every explosion that the airship survived, he let out a fraction of a breath.

"They can't hit us—they can't hit us!" The XO gripped the handrail, his voice trembling with the relief of a survivor.

Just then, the helmsman's expression changed.

He had shaken off the first twenty rounds while the airship still had room to maneuver. However, the continuous extreme maneuvers had built up the hull's inertia to an exaggerated degree.

Trying to change direction again now... was going to be too late.

And the guides for the final two cannons had clearly thought further ahead than the first twenty crews.

They held their fire until the end specifically for this moment. They had anticipated the airship's evasive trajectory as it climbed, waiting to fire.

So, when the twenty-first shell launched, these two guides didn't aim for the airship's current position. Instead, they corrected the trajectory to where the airship was going to be.

The helmsman on the L34 bridge clearly sensed this. He tried to alter course again, but the airship was simply too massive.

Having just completed a hard evasive maneuver, the giant hull's inertia kept pushing it along its previous vector. Even altering the differential thrust of the propellers couldn't instantly arrest its momentum.

This meant they likely couldn't dodge these last two shots.

"Can't dodge the last two! Brace for impact!"

A second after the helmsman shouted, the guide detonated the twenty-first shell—a fragmentation round—about a hundred meters above the L34.

The guide deliberately calculated this distance. Knowing a direct hit was unlikely, he aimed to maximize the shrapnel spread.

BOOM—!

Thousands of mana-infused shrapnel fragments rained down instantly, sparking a dense cluster of light across the spell shield.

Ripples violently expanded across the shield. The entire airship bucked, and the clatter of colliding metal rang out from every compartment.

But the overcharged spell shield units gritted their teeth and held. Aside from a vicious shudder, this attack caused no structural damage.

Franz didn't even have time to sigh in relief.

The twenty-second shell arrived.

This one was a high-explosive round. While the Magic Crystal Cannon—essentially a magical mortar—lacked armor-piercing capabilities, the payload packed into its 900mm caliber was terrifying.

This massively destructive shell detonated less than forty meters above and to port of the L34.

Though not a direct hit, the explosive yield at that range...

The bridge crew had no time to react. A terrifying shockwave swept in from the left. An invisible, giant hand seemingly slapped the L34's massive hull, violently tilting it to the right and sending it plummeting.

Inside, everyone was thrown off their feet. Franz cracked the back of his head against something hard, his vision going black.

Alarms blared from all directions. Bulkheads shook, floorboards trembled, and the sound of things shattering echoed continuously.

The translucent spell shield completely collapsed under the blow. The ripples on its surface expanded violently, shifting from pale blue to deep blue, then to purple, before dissipating entirely.

Shield units across the airship overloaded simultaneously, several core components burning out in an instant.

Stripped of its shield, the residual shockwave slammed directly into the L34's exposed armor.

The multi-layered armor plating mid-ships on the port side buckled. The underlying skeleton groaned with the horrific sound of twisting metal.

More fatally, the airship completely lost its attitude control.

Right before the eyes of the National Army soldiers in the Kyiv trenches, the L34 nose-dived to the lower right, its hundreds-of-meters-long bulk tilting as it plummeted toward the sea of black smoke.

The bridge was a mess. Franz's head rang. He lay on the floor, trying to get up, but his legs had no strength.

A few meters away at the helm, the battered helmsman remained in his seat, saved by his specialized restraints.

He had cracked his forehead against the console. Blood streamed down his nose, but his hands maintained a death grip on the wheel.

The moment the airship began its uncontrolled descent, the helmsman had reacted instinctively.

Counter-steering... pushing the lift compensation units past their limits.

But it wasn't enough.

He reached out and slammed a red button on the console—one strictly forbidden to touch under normal circumstances. The emergency mixed-gas generator.

High-pressure cylinders housed within the airship instantly flooded the gas cells with a specially formulated gas. Reacting with mana, this gas provided buoyancy far exceeding standard levels for a short duration.

The airship's descent began to slow.

Five hundred meters... Five hundred and ten... Five hundred and twenty...

On the west bank trenches of Kyiv, countless eyes watched the scene unfold in the sky.

The sky-blotting behemoth was first engulfed in a blue explosive glare, then rapidly plummeted over a hundred meters. Everyone watching felt their hearts leap into their throats... It felt like watching a mountain collapse.

Just when everyone thought it was going to crash, the fall stopped.

As if invisible hands caught it from below, the airship's descent slowed from blindingly fast to a crawl, finally coming to a complete halt.

Then, it began to shakily climb once more.

A tsunami of cheers erupted from the National Army lines.

But they would never know that in those brief dozen seconds, Lieutenant Colonel Franz and every officer on the L34 bridge had fully prepared to die for their country.

Once the altitude stabilized past six hundred meters, the XO finally pulled Franz up. The gash on his head was still bleeding, but he couldn't care about that right now.

"All units, report status!" he bellowed through the wired intercom system connecting all vital compartments.

Replies trickled in. The first was bad news.

"Spell shield units completely offline! Core components burned out. We must land and replace them to restore function!"

The rest of the reports were a mixed bag. The gearboxes for several port thrusters were making abnormal noises, and buckled mid-ship armor plates needed cutting and replacing... A whole host of problems.

Fortunately, there were no fatal injuries, and the core power and main gun systems remained operational.

"Gas cell status?!"

"Minor leaks in port cells Two and Three, but compensation systems are nominal... Also, Captain, there's too much emergency gas. We need to vent it immediately, or the internal pressure will exceed safe limits!"

Franz roared back into the tube: "Then vent it! Don't wait for my order, handle it yourselves!"

He then walked over to the console, looking at the bloodied senior helmsman.

"Beautiful work! The whole ship owes you their lives now."

The helmsman grinned but said nothing.

Franz patted his shoulder. Having handled the immediate crisis, he leaned against the console, his hands trembling.

The more he thought about it, the angrier he got... and the more the after-fear set in.

They were so close... so damn close... The entire airship and the hundreds of souls aboard almost remained in the Kyiv skies forever.

"Observation deck! Sync the coordinates of those mana signatures we captured to the Gunnery Officer!"

"Yes, sir!"

"Gunnery Officer!"

"Here!"

"I don't care if you can't see the targets. Rake that entire grid with the 203s!"

Franz's voice carried unrestrained fury.

Orders received. As the L34 adjusted course to put distance between itself and the smoke wall, its four twin-linked 203mm turrets rotated.

Eight naval guns fired in sequence, the recoil shifting the entire airship slightly to the right.

Massive shells plunged into the smoke with a vengeance. High-explosive rounds detonated continuously, flashes of orange-red blooming rapidly within the black wall, causing the earth to tremble.

Shockwaves temporarily tore gaps in the smokescreen, but the thick black smoke sealed shut a second later.

This prevented the observation deck from confirming the bombardment's effectiveness.

Franz clenched his fists, staring at the roiling wall of smoke. Finally, he exhaled.

"...Retreat over Kyiv and switch to a conservative patrol route."

He made a decision he loathed, but one that was undeniably correct.

An airship without its spell shield lost a massive amount of its defensive capability. If they took another hit from one of those things, they wouldn't just "almost crash."

The L34 slowly turned, dragging its battered hull back toward the skies above Kyiv.

Franz's final action was ordering the comms officer to transmit a truthful report to the Eighth Army Headquarters: attacked by Magic Crystal cannons, shields offline, retreating temporarily.

On the east bank of Kyiv, along the river under the cover of the smoke wall.

The crossing White Army infantry suddenly heard a commotion from behind. It was a heavy tread that made the earth tremble.

Thud...

The soldiers lined up waiting to board the pontoon bridge instinctively looked back, but they could see nothing through the dense smoke.

Only the intensifying tremors beneath their feet told them something massive was approaching.

Seconds later, the first silhouette emerged from the black smoke.

Over six meters tall, legs as thick as city gate pillars, its torso and shoulders clad in overlapping, rounded layers of heavy armor plate.

Only a blurry silhouette was visible in the smoke, but its sheer size was enough to make the surrounding infantry hold their breath.

The "Linebreaker Mark III"—the mainline Armored Knight of the old Rus Orthodox Paladin Orders.

The steel giant marched step by step to the riverbank. It didn't slow down, nor did it stop.

Its disproportionately broad feet stepped through the queuing infantry, marching straight into the Dnieper River.

Water splashed high. The river parted around its calves and closed back up.

It continued forward. The water rose from its knees to its waist, then to its chest.

The White Army soldiers stood on the bank, watching the steel giant steadily submerge.

When the water finally swallowed its head, only continuous streams of bubbles and swirling eddies remained on the surface, indicating it was still marching along the riverbed.

Right behind the first "Linebreaker" came the second, the third...

A total of twelve Armored Knights, divided into four squads, stepped into the river at various crossing points.

Their immense weight allowed the steel giants to shrug off the river's current. Their specially designed, broad feet distributed their weight evenly. Though each step sank slightly into the mud, pulling it out for the next step was effortless.

The infantry crossing the pontoon bridges didn't dare stop under the urging of their officers, but they couldn't help glancing at the water as they ran.

The water was murky, hiding everything. They could only feel the pontoon bridge swaying rhythmically beneath them—the turbulent wake of the giants walking below.

Several minutes later, the first "Linebreaker" rose from the waters on the west bank.

As the Armored Knight stepped ashore, water cascaded from the seams of its rounded armor plating.

Soon after, more "Linebreakers" surfaced.

They landed just outside the firing arcs of the Pechersk Fortress batteries.

The elite White Army infantry who had already crossed felt their spirits soar at the sight of the Armored Knights emerging.

A White Army captain with a dashing handlebar mustache even pressed three fingers of his right hand to his forehead, crossing himself—up, down, right, left—toward the nearest "Linebreaker."

"Reinforcements have finally arrived..."

The twelve "Linebreakers" didn't pause after landing, immediately advancing toward the city of Kyiv.

Their cumbersome forms didn't move quickly through the smoke, but their heavy steps were incredibly steady.

The elite White Army infantry followed behind, using the Armored Knights' massive bodies as mobile cover.

Meanwhile, in the Rzhyshchiv sector.

The Southern Army's second wave hit harder than Morin had anticipated.

After his probing attacks were repelled across the board, Denikin seemingly had zero intention of giving the Instruction Brigade a moment to breathe.

Massive numbers of White Army soldiers pressed forward from even more directions. The number of crossing boats multiplied several times over.

Simultaneously, more army-group-level artillery units commenced full-coverage carpet bombing, even committing their precious 122mm howitzers to the assault.

While their accuracy was still pathetic, when you throw enough shells, something was bound to hit by sheer luck.

Amidst this overwhelming full-front assault, those heavy silhouettes also appeared at several crossing points downstream of Rzhyshchiv.

Aboard the L15, Morin was the first to notice these new red markers on the system map.

Their unit tags read: 【White Army Southern Army - Orthodox Paladin Orders - "Linebreaker" Heavy Armored Knights】.

The count: eight.

Morin's gaze paused on the system map before he used the bridge's optics to look downstream.

On the east bank, several metallic figures—distinctly several sizes larger than the soldiers beside them—were marching toward the water at an excruciatingly slow pace.

"Finally meeting, eh? Russian Armored Knights..." Morin muttered.

Lieutenant Colonel Andreasia stepped up to the window, took a look, and raised his head. "Enemy Armored Knights? General, shall we blast them with the 150mm guns?"

"Hold on. Continue providing fire support for the main defensive line. Prioritize enemy staging areas."

Morin activated the magitech comms, connecting to the Thunder Warriors serving as ground comms nodes.

"All ground units, be advised— enemy Armored Knights have appeared on the east bank. They are approaching the west bank via the river! Armored Instruction Regiment 'Fire Support Vehicles' and brigade anti-armor guns, prepare to engage!"

Shortly after the order was relayed, replies came from the ground.

The "Fire Support Vehicles" belonging to the Armored Instruction Regiment's Heavy Weapons Company had already spotted the crossing White Army Armored Knights.

Three Fire Support Vehicles deployed into firing positions behind a slight rise about three kilometers downstream of Rzhyshchiv.

The vehicle commanders locked onto the nearest "Linebreaker" through their sights. The machine had just reached the bank and was about to wade into the water.

"Target confirmed, range 650!"

"Armor-piercing shell loaded!"

"Fire!"

An RAK15 50mm anti-armor gun fired first.

The muzzle flash was stark. The AP shell, dragging a faint trail, shot toward the "Linebreaker."

The commanders pressed their eyes to their sights, awaiting the result. Then—

CLANG!

The previously invincible AP shell struck the "Linebreaker" dead-center on its torso.

Sparks exploded. Metal fragments sprayed. But as the smoke cleared, the "Linebreaker" was still advancing.

Its speed and trajectory hadn't changed. The only difference was a new mark on its front main armor... Not even a crater, more like a scrape left by something brushing against it.

"Ricochet!"

The lead Fire Support Vehicle commander looked up from his sights, his face falling.

"Reload! Adjust aim! Stop hitting the thickest part of its armor!"

Aboard the L15.

Taking in the situation with the Fire Support Vehicles, Morin realized that his anti-armor guns had hit a true wall for the first time...

Meanwhile, he spared a glance at the system map to check the situation in Kyiv.

A massive gray zone, labeled 【City-Level Concealment Smoke Wall】, covered nearly six kilometers of the Kyiv east bank front.

Behind this gray fog, the system map could still display the rough positions of red unit tags, but the accuracy had plummeted. None of the tags showed detailed info.

And over the icon representing the L34 armored airship, a red status glared piercingly: 【Damaged - Spell Shield Offline】.

"So Kyiv is taking a beating too, huh..."