I Pioneered Scientific Magic - Chapter 327: The Damaged Airship and the Aerial Battle at the Border

In the land of wizards, griffins were unheard of. However, before their departure, the grand wizards had briefed them about certain elite Imperial troops, one being the Griffin Knight Order.

“Retreat, quickly!” Hami shouted, swiftly changing the airship’s course toward the kingdom’s borders and immediately engaging the optical invisibility button.

A spherical shield enveloped the airship, swiftly vanishing into a distorted array of light.

The pursuing griffins emitted sharp cries, not behaving as Hami had anticipated. Rather than scattering aimlessly upon losing their target, they regrouped swiftly and organized themselves into a tighter formation, doubling their previous speed…

“Damn, these fellows are too resilient. They saw through our invisibility!” Hami cursed under his breath.

Unaware of the griffins’ heightened sensitivity to magic creatures, Hami knew that these beings could smell prey’s blood even kilometers away. Mere visual disappearance posed little hindrance, especially when it was face-to-face invisibility…

However, one couldn’t fault Hami and the crew for their lack of caution. While the polarizing magic enchantments on the airship were effective, concealing such a colossal object consumed a significant amount of magical energy, a resource too valuable to waste when not crucial!

Considering the possibility of being stranded outside for months, the crew had been conservative with their use of magic crystals, necessary for activating invisibility, saving them only for critical moments.

“Hurry, hurry…” Hami and the crew urgently maneuvered the controls to the maximum. The massive airship underwent a challenging turn, converting a large amount of magical power into hydrogen gas, running the internal combustion engine at full throttle!

The rest of the crew tightened their grip on their rifles, refraining from firing due to the distant proximity.

The airship’s speed increased, surprising the griffin knights, who had seemed on the brink of encircling it, with this colossal airborne vessel surpassing even the swiftness of griffins.

Devi, the captain of the Griffin Knights, hadn’t foreseen this. To him, such a massive alchemical contraption should have been slower in operation. Yet, the airship’s speed exceeded expectations…

If this continued, they could only watch helplessly as their target slipped away before their very eyes…

Devi’s gaze turned ice-cold. Based on this brief encounter, he had already classified this peculiar alchemical creation as a significant threat!

Devi was acutely aware of how impactful a manned, invisible, and high-speed flying object could be in warfare!

They had to capture it, intact if possible!

With this in mind, Devi immediately communicated with the griffin beneath him, estimating the positions and distances of both parties. Northeast direction, approximately six hundred meters away!

This height was beyond the reach of a bow and arrow, yet Devi was confident because before becoming a Griffin Knight, he was a clergyman!

…

“Thank goodness we escaped!” Seeing the airship rapidly breaking free from the enemy’s encirclement, Hami and the crew breathed a sigh of relief, joyously feeling as though they’d narrowly escaped disaster.

Although they were prepared for sacrifice, nobody would complain about prolonging their own lives if the chance arose…

Once they distanced themselves enough, losing the enemy’s bearing, they would be completely safe.

The crew members, who had been on edge, relaxed collectively.

However, the deputy, always vigilant of enemy movements, sensed an impending danger. Without hesitation, he lunged towards Hami, pinning him down inside the cabin.

Almost in the next second, a violent shockwave surged from a distance, striking the airship’s cockpit directly.

The massive airship shuddered violently, shattering one side’s panels.

Except for Hami and the pinned deputy, the rest of the pilots were thrown out by the force, crashing heavily against the cabin walls…

Before they could recover, the second wave of attack descended upon them!

“Praise [Eira]—Sacred Light Impact!”

Devi and several other cleric Griffin Knights shouted loudly again. Intense beams of light struck various parts of the cockpit.

Although the airship had been crafted with special materials and embellished with alchemical arrays such as [Resilience], [Solidification], [Lightness], and [Windproof], it couldn’t withstand successive divine assaults.

If Devi and his team hadn’t aimed to capture the peculiar alchemical creation, the airship would have been downed already.

Nevertheless, under the second wave of attacks, the aerial airship suffered severe damage, its speed dwindling rapidly.

“Damn, the external propellers must’ve been damaged!” Hami, having studied airship constructions, knew what this meant. Losing power implied losing their hopes of escape…

“Everyone, since these bastards won’t let us escape, we have no choice but to fight them!” Hami turned to the people around him, yelling hoarsely.

“Let’s fight them!” “Killing one or two won’t be a loss; it’s a gain!”

The pilots, gunners, and observers all shouted together, wearing determined expressions on their faces.

Their lives were insignificant; usually, nobody cared about them. But in Iyeta, it was different, as they could earn a whopping ten magic gold coins!

If they could eliminate a few enemies, it would be a huge win!

After the shouts, Hami and the crew stopped dodging and instead picked up their rifles, firing at the swiftly approaching Griffin Knights…

The continuous gunfire echoed in the sky. As it was the Griffin Knight Order’s first encounter with firearms, they hadn’t prepared for such strange weapons. Consequently, several griffins were hit…

However, their achievements were meager. Griffins, as a magical beast, possessed incredible vitality. Unless struck directly in the head or repeatedly by gunfire, the shots weren’t fatal…

One particularly bold Griffin Knight maneuvered skillfully through a seemingly unpredictable flight path, narrowly evading the first round of gunfire, reaching the airship just before the second round of ammunition could be loaded.

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