Bang! A gunshot rang out!
The Marleyan officer's head burst open, yellow-white pulp splattering across the face of the brown-haired Eldian soldier.
But the Eldian soldier calmly pulled the bolt, ejecting the spent casing from the chamber, then said in front of everyone, "For the Eldian Revival Army!"
Almost at the same time, the soldiers around him all echoed in low voices,
"For the Eldian Revival Army!"
This abnormal behavior terrified the Marleyan enforcement squad under the officer. Some of them turned pale with fear, while others shouted harshly at the nearby Eldian soldiers,
"Are you rebelling? Have you all gone mad? Damn Eldians!"
Click! The brown-haired Eldian soldier pulled the bolt again and, without hesitation, raised his rifle to aim at the Marleyan soldier who was still shouting wildly.
The Marleyan soldier, panicking, immediately raised his rifle to confront him. Clatter! Influenced by him, the remaining Marleyan soldiers all raised their rifles and aimed at the surrounding Eldian soldiers.
However, their dozens of rifles were facing over a hundred pitch-black gun barrels from the Eldian soldiers.
All the Eldian soldiers turned their gaze toward the leading brown-haired Eldian soldier.
"Leitner! Should we take them out?" one soldier shouted.
The brown-haired Eldian soldier was named Leitner, a core member of the Eldian Revival Army. Calm and courageous, he had been sent by Serena to develop the Eldian Revival Army within this unit. Leitner had not disappointed her expectations—this awakening of the Eldian soldiers was entirely his achievement!
Holding his rifle, Leitner stepped closer to the Marleyan soldiers step by step, speaking coldly as he advanced,
"Hasn't Marley done enough? How many more Eldians do you want dead? We fight for your country, we sacrifice for you—yet how do you treat us? Just because of our bloodline?"
Watching Leitner approach, the Marleyan soldier completely lost his composure. Cold sweat covered his forehead, his body trembling uncontrollably, and he could only roar in futile rage, "Don't come closer! Stay where you are! Damn it! Don't come any closer! Do you think I wouldn't dare shoot?!"
Under extreme tension, the Marleyan soldier's finger on the trigger suddenly pulled it unconsciously.
Bang! The bullet grazed past Leitner's sleeve. Leitner stopped in his tracks, his gaze turning completely cold.
"Let me tell you, Marleyans—we Eldians are done playing along!"
Bang bang bang bang bang!! Continuous gunfire erupted as all the Marleyan soldiers collapsed into pools of blood. The leading Marleyan soldier didn't even get another chance to pull the trigger.
Before his consciousness faded, he wondered—if he hadn't pulled the trigger, would surrender have given him a chance to live? In the final moments of his life, he suddenly thought: what would the world be like if there were no hatred between Marleyans and Eldians? But it all seemed meaningless now. There was only regret… In his last letter to his wife, he had said he would return soon, and he had promised his son a toy. It seemed he would break that promise. Truly… what a pity…
Gunfire like this echoed across different positions, but amidst the thunderous artillery of the battle at Fort Slava, it was barely noticeable.
Serena closed the notebook in her hands, densely filled with writing, her expression solemn. This battle of Fort Slava was not only Marley's decisive war in the Middle East, but also the best opportunity for the Eldian Revival Army to grow.
"Everyone, I'm counting on you… Eldia's hope rests in our hands!" Serena silently thought as she put away the notebook.
"Fire! Open fire now!" A Middle Eastern captain with bloodshot eyes lay over the ship's railing, pointing at the sea as he shouted frantically at his gunners.
Beneath the sea, the faintly visible white shadow had already become the embodiment of a white Grim Reaper in the eyes of the Middle Eastern navy. Whenever the white shadow approached a warship, that ship would soon shatter before their eyes, breaking into fragments. The sailors aboard would either sink with the wreckage or struggle futilely on the surface.
Of the nearly forty warships in the entire Middle Eastern fleet, nearly half had already sunk. The sea surface was filled with struggling sailors.
The captains of the remaining ships were on the verge of madness. Half their fleet had sunk, yet they hadn't even seen what the enemy looked like.
Whether it was massive battleships or fast destroyers, once approached by the white shadow, all met the same fate—shattered into pieces and sinking into the sea.
"Captain! But our soldiers are still there!" one gunner pointed at the struggling sailors in the water.
But the captain was already on the brink of collapse, roaring irrationally,
"What did you say? Do you want to disobey orders? I said fire! If that damned white shadow gets close, and you don't fire, you'll sink with them and feed the fish! Fire! Anyone who disobeys will be executed on the spot!"
Under the captain's rage, the gunners dared not disobey. They could only silently apologize to their comrades in the water, grit their teeth, and fire.
Boom!! Water columns over ten meters high exploded from the sea. The blue ocean instantly turned crimson, countless sailors torn apart by the shells—never imagining they would die under their own side's fire.
The thick smell of blood even attracted sharks from the depths. But the terrifying bombardment and the dreadful pressure in the sea kept these predators lurking below, too afraid to approach, though the overwhelming scent of blood made them linger unwilling to leave.
Unfortunately, the hysterical bombardment of the Middle Eastern forces failed to even scratch the skin of the Sea-Diving Titan. In the ocean, its streamlined body allowed it to move freely at incredible speed.
The razor-sharp dorsal fins on its body turned the Middle Eastern warships into prey. Even the thick steel hulls of battleships were as fragile as cardboard before those fins.
With a swing of its tail, chunks of dense, solid ice hammers formed from seawater condensed along it. With each flick, it could even smash through the hull of a destroyer in a single strike.
Inside the nape of the Sea-Diving Titan, watching so many Middle Easterners die before her eyes, Airi felt a trace of cruelty.
But war was like this.
Suppressing her discomfort, Airi continued attacking the Middle Eastern navy.