Chapter 77 - Attack
Wallace woke up due to a loud noise coming from an engine. The noise from it was so disturbing that his body is feeling the vibrations it exudes.
He stood up and noticed that furniture, utensils, and other objects in his room is also vibrating like there's an earthquake.
A few moments passed and the loud sound lessened like it was able to successfully stabilize its a machine.
"Where did that come from?"
Wallace still felt sleepy and asked himself. Such noise didn't come from a car, there wasn't any huge factory in the small town and he's also aware that there weren't any nearby constructions going on.
He tried looking where was it coming from and opened the window in his room. It should be around eight in the morning but the sky still seems to be a bit too dark. The sun should have been up more than an hour ago.
Wallace remembered that there wasn't any report yesterday about possible rain or storm for today.
As the engine noise could still be heard though not as loud a while ago, it was still annoying and not polite at all.
Wallace saw that their neighbors went outside and seems to be looking at the sky. Wallace couldn't see in the window what was it they're looking at since they were looking on the eastside and his room is located on the northside. He had to go outside and look at it as he was quite curious right now.
He didn't bother to change his clothes or fix himself as he took his slippers and went outside.
As he headed downstairs, he saw his father was also about to go out.
"Oh, dad. What could that be?"
Wallace asked his father. He just arrived here in the town yesterday so he asked him just in case that this happened before.
"I'm not sure as well. This is the first time that this had happened. Oh, your mom is almost done cooking breakfast, you can eat first." Chase replied to his son.
"It's fine. I'll go with you." Wallace said as he couldn't contain his curiosity.
"Alright." His father agreed and headed out together with Wallace. His little sister may still be sleeping or together with his mom in the kitchen.
The father and son saw their neighbors and greeted them casually but as they noticed that they didn't respond and just continued looking up in the east, they decided to look as well.
There they noticed a huge disc that could almost cover the whole sky.
Not only that, the floating disc doesn't seem to be alone as they could even vaguely see a dozen more silhouettes of this gigantic floating disc slowly descending to the ground. They felt that that the other floating monstrosities were just waiting for the first vanguard to descend before they complete their own.
A few moments later, they saw a clear view of the floating machine.
Looking carefully, the disc is just actually a base of a floating city or island. This large and dark floating ship hovers effortlessly without any visible means of propulsion. They also noticed a rotating colored lights underneath the ship that seems to gauge the distance from the ground and looking at the top portion of the ship, it has a well lit structure where they could identify things that look some kind of tall buildings.
Everyone was so surprised on this and couldn't say a word until someone broke the silence.
"W-what is that?" A young man asked. He was scared hearing his tone of the question. But this question was in everyone's mind and no one could answer.
"It landed near Stella Region, I hope that people already vacated that place." An old man besides Wallace muttered. The man was still able to worry about others and remain calm although he couldn't explain what is happening.
"I'm scared."
"Everything will be alright. Let's eat breakfast first."
A young child being carried by her mother felt scared about the monstrous ship that has descended. The child's mother comforted him by reminding him about their breakfast even though she was scared of herself. The ship emits a scary presence with its dark color design and some even felt hostility coming from it so the child's reaction was normal.
"Should we go there?"
"Have you called the police?"
"Are we still safe here? That huge thing doesn't seem to belong to our country."
"That's right, it's impossible for us to have this kind of technology."
Everyone was curious about the origin of the floating giant and only feeling a little bit scared because it hadn't done anything yet. It could destroy the Stella Region where it is located or it may just be a project of the government and is there to protect the region itself, no one knows the truth until the thing in the sky started to do its purpose.
Chase frowned at this because as a licensed Magic Engineer he's aware of the limitations of his country. It could never create something like that at the moment. He was worried as they were too close on the floating city or island so he planned to tell his family to move away for the meantime while they weren't sure about its purpose yet.
He looked at his silent son and he saw the dread and frightened Wallace staring silly at the floating thing. His eyes were open wide and his body couldn't stop shaking. Chase noticed his abnormality and immediately tried to comfort Wallace.
"Wallace, you have to keep calm during this time. We have to get your mom and little sister and move away from here for now." Chase said to get Wallace's attention. The latter only looked at his father but didn't move. He struggled to open his mouth and said.
"T-that's Meredith Empire's Conqueror Starship." Wallace felt weak upon seeing that there's even dozen of this giant starship waiting to descend.
"What do you mean?" His father was confused.
"I can't explain for now but we have to get away from here." Wallace answered after recollecting his mind.
'Where's pathfinder when I need it? What should we do from here? The empire will not do anything peaceful as long as they can accomplish their task brutally...and if the magicians here couldn't fight against the advanced technology of the empire, then this planet may be another source of slaves for the empire. I couldn't just let it happen.'
Wallace said in his mind but he was still so weak that he may not be able to change anything at all for the country.
'Just how unlucky I could be for them to descend near my place. Tsk.'
As soon as they planned to move away from their place. The starship made flickering lights and several hundreds of small black and elongated battleships were released. Most of these battleships aimed at the large Stella Region but a few couples of them turned their sight in their small town.
Wallace couldn't relax anymore, he immediately grabs his dad's hand to head back home.
"They are a dangerous existence we have to get away from here." Wallace said grimly after getting his mom pack up. He carried his little sister who doesn't understand what was happening.
After getting surprised and scared of Meredith Empire's abrupt appearance, Wallace came to his mind that he needed to calm his mind to make the right decisions. He couldn't panic at this critical moment.
"The capital should be safe. The strongest magicians were all hiding there."
His father suggested after carefully considering their options. The capital may also receive heavily focused fire from the starship but it should be able to defend itself. After all, if their capital falls, then their whole country is doomed.