Castle of Black Iron

With a splash, Zhang Tie exposed his head out of the water. Watching the skyline and the surrounding ridges, Zhang Tie let out a deep sigh, ’Wuh, finally came out of the water.’

That was a deep pool in the valley, right on one side of a river. There were flourish woods in the surroundings. A waterfall flushed off in the distance. A brook flew by this place. A subterranean river was under the deep pool. It was 8-9 o’clock in the morning when the sun had just risen up. The thin mist in the valley had not completely faded away.

Two small beasts like David’s deer were drinking on the side of the deep pool. At the sight of the ripples caused by Zhang Tie, they hurriedly ran away.

As was imagined, after Zhang Tie rushed out of that huge underwater swirl and circled around the watercourse system which was as complex as a three-dimensional maze, he finally got lost although he racked his mind.

In that case, as long as he swam against the current and moved upwards, he would get closer to the ground. Therefore, after determining his mind, Zhang Tie rushed upwards along one watercourse.

On the halfway, the water flow converged into a new surging subterranean river and flew towards the south. Watching this, Zhang Tie became reassured. He just rushed as fast as a bolt along the flow. 2 days later, after seeing a new water flow above the subterranean river, Zhang Tie chose to move upwards once again. After repeating this a few times, he finally saw the sunlight under the water. Therefore, he accelerated towards the sunlight and finally exposed his head out of the deep pool.

The distance of this journey might match that when Zhang Tie went to Ice and Snow Wilderness by sea-route for the first time. The scenery in the subterranean river was really fantastic.

With the protection of his protective battle qi, Zhang Tie was still dry all over even though he had traveled 2 days in the water.

After looking at the surroundings, Zhang Tie instantly flew out of the deep pool like a rocket before the Catastrophe. In a split second, he had already flown 3,000-4,000 m in height, from where he could see everything below his feet clearly.

At the sight of the undulating mountain range, Zhang Tie knew it was Kalay Mountain Range. However, its location should be the southern edge of Kalay Mountain Range. Therefore, Zhang Tie could see the plain and the outline of a city in the distance from here.

Zhang Tie bore the surrounding terrain in mind. Besides, he made marks all the way out of the underground space. If he wanted to return to that underground space, he only needed to follow his marks back.

After identifying the direction, Zhang Tie straightly flew towards the city in the distance.

As long as he was close to that city, Zhang Tie would be able to identify his precise location after referring to the urban map on the south of Kalay Mountain Range in his memory. After that, he would be able to choose the proper route to go back to Huaiyuan Palace...

Whereas, Zhang Tie didn’t know that after he appeared in the sky for less than half a minute, his movement had been caught by a pair of bright and sharp eyes.

...

On the top of a bald mountain being covered with gravel and weeds over 10 miles away from Zhang Tie, there was a trivial rock. Two low bushes were on the side of the rock. A pair of sharp eyes were gazing tightly at Zhang Tie behind a high-powered military anti-reflective telescope. Some soldiers in mountainous camouflage uniforms were hiding in a narrow space beneath that rock. They kept gnawing dried rations while gazing at Zhang Tie. They all looked a bit nervous and excited.

After staying here over 1 month, they felt bored every day. The appearance of Zhang Tie made them spirited at once.

This was the significance of these soldiers here. Even though they had not found anything useful over the past months, once they found it, they would enable human countries in the north of Kalay Mountain Range to make a response in advance.

After the human defense in Selnes Theater of Operations collapsed, especially after the battle of Upton City came to an end 2 weeks ago, many human countries close to the south of Kalay Mountain Range and Blackson Central Nations Federation had arranged a large number of scouts and observation posts in Kalay Mountain Range so that they could monitor the situation here around the clock. This observation post was a hidden post arranged by the Blackson Central Nations Federation in Kalay Mountain Range.

"Speed?"

The human soldier who was holding the telescope asked his partner who was gazing at the optical velometer.

"0.6 Mach!"

"Send the warning right away. An unidentified knight is breaking through D16 observation area and flying towards Barlin City at the speed of 0.6 Mach from the north..."

Another human soldier in the narrow observation post instantly took out a portable remote-sensing crystal communication device and sent out the message at once.

Closely after he sent out the message had Zhang Tie got rid of this observation area and turned into a blurry black spot.

"Knight!" The soldier holding the optical velometer swallowed his saliva and said excitedly, "I’ve not imagined that we could really discover a knight in the sky. It’s my first time to see a knight!" After saying that, the soldier found that his team leader was still gazing at the telescope, "Boss, what are you looking at?"

The guy, who had just commanded the other scouts to send out the message in the observation post, moved his eyes away from the telescope as he let out a deep sigh, "I was watching whether that guy was flying towards us. If so, we have to escape in different directions! If we’re lucky enough, one of us might survive."

"Ah? No way. That guy is so far away from us. How could he discover us?" The soldier who was holding the optical velometer asked out of amazement.

The team leader didn’t say anything. He just pointed at a terrifying scar from his left face all the way to his neck and explained, "Last time, we were 5 miles away from the demon knight. When we gazed at him, we were sensed. That b*stard flew towards us and attacked us from 100 m away like patting flies. As a result, only 1 of all the 24 scouts survived. That was me. I was almost buried alive..."

After hearing this, everybody in the observation post became shocked.

"This is...too exaggerating."

"Dawson, remember, unless you could promote to a knight one day, run away as far as possible when you see a demon knight flying towards you, no matter whether you’re a regimental commander, division head, army commander or corps general. Never think that demon knight could not discover you; never think that you could survive a demon knight’s punch. Small figures like us had better not be too eye-catching in front of a knight. If we could survive a knight’s strike unfortunately, we’d better remain still. In that case, the only way to save ourselves is to disguise to be dead on the ground. In that case, even if the demon knight knew that you’re not dead, he would not waste a strike on small figures like us."

Everyone in the observation post nodded solemnly at the same time.

"Alright, hurry, prepare for it. We will transfer to No. 2 observation post. I don’t know whether that knight has discovered us or not. Perhaps he had discovered us, yet he didn’t feel like wasting time on us. Those who can fly at the speed of 0.6 Mach are always tricky among knights. If it’s a demon knight, it might move back to exterminate us all!"

After hearing the team leader’s words, everyone in the observation post became flurried. They hurriedly prepared to evacuate from the observation post. Before leaving, they set a small colorful smoking jar in the observation post. When this smoking jar was attacked by the demon knight, the smoking jar would crack and release the smoke. They would know that the knight was coming back.

Scouts always used this trick. Although being trivial, it was very useful.

...

Zhang Tie indeed had sensed that he was being observed by someone, who might be hunters in the mountain, scouts dispatched by human countries in the south of Kalay Mountain Range or wanderers. He ignored them. Because demons’ force had not reached here for the time being, it was unnecessary for him to waste time on killing them.

Zhang Tie flew at the speed of about 200 m per second, namely 720 miles per hour. Zhang Tie felt that he could fly all the way to Huaiyuan Prefecture at this speed easily.

At this moment, Zhang Tie didn’t know how amazing his ability was among all the knights. After promoting to a knight, Zhang Tie thought that all the knights had such a long-distance flight ability. He thought that all the knights were accomplishing long-distance movement in this manner.

At this speed, the city soon appeared in front of Zhang Tie. On the east side of the city, there was a big river. After matching the big river to the terrain surrounding the city, Zhang Tie immediately remembered a city called Barlin City among the countries in the south of Kalay Mountain Range.

Barlin City was still 10,000 miles away from Huaiyuan Palace. After confirming his own coordinates, Zhang Tie slightly adjusted his flight direction and flew towards Huaiyuan Palace.

...

Zhang Tie didn’t know how many people had he scared on the way towards the south. After the observation post in the south of Kalay Mountain Range sent out the first message, the intelligence center of the headquarter of Central Nations Federations in Blackson Humans Corridor had become busy. Messages were constantly sent to member nations from the intelligence center one after another. Those member nations gave more feedbacks to the intelligence center. Zhang Tie didn’t know how many eyes were gazing at him wherever he passed.

The moment he flew over Barlin City had a commissioned officer hurriedly ran off the observation post and sent out another message as fast as possible.

...

"An unidentified knight is flying over Barlin City at the speed of 0.6 Mach per hour; direction angle 14 degrees southwest..."

...

40 minutes later...

"Investigation airship outside Sedina City of Nio Kingdom finds an unidentified knight flying towards the south at the speed of 0.6 Mach in the direction angle of 14 degrees southwest..."

...

20 minutes later...

"Observation post on Campbell Mountain, Saint Cru Alliance finds an unidentified knight flying towards the south at the speed of 0.6 Mach in the direction angle of 14 degrees southwest..."

...

30 minutes later...

"Bronique Star Observation Platform finds an unidentified knight flying towards the south at the speed of 0.6 Mach in the direction angle of 14 degrees southwest..."

All those who paid attention to this message were shocked inside. ’Flying over 1,000 miles in less than 2 hours. What for?’

After drawing a straight line along Zhang Tie’s flight route, they found a major city on the line being aligned with the flight direction of that unidentified knight, the capital of Raymlan Empire being not far from Bronique City.

Given from the map, after leaving Barlin City, that unidentified knight was rushing all the way towards the capital of Raymlan Empire like a sharp bolt!

After figuring it out, many people became startled.

...

Zhang Tie didn’t know how many people had been scared on the ground. After flying over 1,200 miles over the past 100 minutes, Zhang Tie found that his way forward was blocked by almost 1,000 battle airships in different sizes and a knight.

The knight looked as old as those elders in Huaiyuan Palace. Being strong in a navy blue armor and snowwhite mustache, he was holding a brilliant battle sword while suspending in the sky with a solemn look.

"Jaray, the No. 1 knight of Raymlan Empire invites the arriver to stop!" The knight said solemnly as he waved his long sword, releasing a sharp sword qi across 200 m in front of Zhang Tie.

...