"Your Excellency Commander-in-Chief, gentlemen, the time is ripe for our army to launch an offensive, and on behalf of all the officers and men of the Imperial Air Force, I hereby make a solemn promise: From this moment on, the sky on both sides of the Turbidity River will be under the absolute control of the Imperial Air Force, and you generals can do whatever they want on the ground battlefield without interference from the enemy Air Force!"

General Baker's confident promise was in fact a prediction that the Imperial Air Force would ensure air supremacy on the Western Front. It is obvious that this will bring great convenience to the ground forces.

General Engel also believed that the opportunity on the battlefield was fleeting, and the Eastern Expeditionary Corps must seize the time period when its air force was superior to launch an offensive and advance the battle line to the east bank of the Turbidity River.

According to the battle plan drawn up by Commander Engel himself, the Imperial Expeditionary Corps would launch a river-crossing offensive in the early morning of May 2 – which happened to be the day before the Battle of the Golden Horn – and the entire operation could be broken down into three steps.

Before the ground forces crossed the river, the First and Second Fleets of the Imperial Air Force under General Alphonse Baker set sail and were heavily armed along the east bank of the Turbid River, bombing all targets that looked suspicious. If the Far East Air Force airship appeared within the defensive range, Commander Engel authorized General Baker to take the initiative to meet it, and at the same time stressed that he should not fall for the enemy's tricks:

"Your most important task is to drive the rebel air force out of the defensive circle, and you must not be obsessed with pursuing enemy ships, because first, they may encounter ambushes, and second, they will cause loopholes in the air defense line, and the rebel airships may take advantage of the weakness to drop bombs and bomb our troops crossing the river, causing unnecessary casualties to our officers and men."

When the Imperial Air Force firmly controlled the air supremacy on both sides of the Turbid River, the operation of crossing the river was advanced to the second step: the Imperial Artillery Divisions stationed on the positions on the west bank, under the cover of the air force airships, spread out a line along the river, and carried out carpet bombardment of the field area outside the Jiangdong position and up to 10 miles in depth, to ensure that the firepower fully covered every piece of land, to destroy all buildings, woods, and even caves that might harbor guerrillas in the Far East, and to completely eliminate possible harassment in the process of crossing the river.

At the same time, this kind of carpet bombing was also an extremely deterrent means of active defense, which made the Far East garrison troops on the opposite bank realize the determination of the Imperial Expeditionary Corps to cross the river. On the premise of losing the air power, even if the garrison troops on the Far East and West Front, from the commander to the ordinary officers and men, had the courage to sacrifice without fear, they could not approach within 10 miles of the river bank under the double bombardment of airships and artillery, let alone prevent the Imperial Expeditionary Corps from calmly crossing the river under the cover of air force and ground artillery.

General Engel was very thoughtful, and even thought that it was possible for the Far Easterners to bypass their own firepower coverage and make a fuss from the upper reaches of the Turbidity River. For example, a large number of bombs similar to the "drifting mines" commonly used in naval warfare were released upstream, drifting down the turbulent river, colliding with the pontoon bridge erected by the imperial troops to cross the river, and even the officers and soldiers and equipment on the bridge, causing explosions, damaging the pontoon bridge, causing casualties, and thus achieving the goal of obstructing the imperial troops from crossing the river.

The vast basin of the Turbidity River and the complex terrain in the upper reaches of the river made it impossible for the Imperial Air Force to extend its patrol radius to all the areas upstream where drifting mines could be dropped. General Engel did not want to leave any opportunity for the Far Easterners, so he simply gave up the traditional way of crossing the river by erecting pontoon bridges, and urgently transferred four large magic guide transport airships with a load capacity of up to 1,000 tons from the holy city of Yashan, and loaded the officers, soldiers, equipment, and heavy weapons including four magic guide train guns "Old Charlie" onto the airships in batches, and flew over the Turbidity River from the air to the east bank position!

Palatina's 1st Correctional Brigade and Bazel's 1st Breaking Brigade, once again serving as the vanguard, will be the first to cross the Turbid River on the morning of 3 May by transport airship. After arriving on the east bank, the first mission of these two vanguard units was to take over the fortifications on the east bank, which the Far Eastern frontier guards had painstakingly built up over five years and then abandoned without hesitation, and to make full use of the enemy's legacy to quickly establish a solid defensive position and provide an absolutely safe foothold for the personnel and equipment that would cross the river in the future.

According to General Engel's estimates, it would take at least two to three days to transport the main forces and equipment across the river.

On the 2nd of May, the gloomy weather seemed to be some kind of bad omen. The 1st and 2nd fleets of airships of the Imperial Air Force set sail from the Olevy Fortress at dawn and arrived over the Turbid River thirty minutes later.

At the end of the eastern wilderness, the dawn of the junction of heaven and earth is revealed, and a crescent moon still hangs high in the sky, occasionally casting a soft moonlight through the shadows of the clouds, sparkling on the surface of the rushing river. The commander of the Imperial Air Force, Admiral Baker, personally took charge of the First Fleet's flagship, the Brilliant Fleet, and entered the air defense zone pre-designated by Commander-in-Chief Engel under the escort of four wingships. Ten minutes later, the Second Fleet of the Air Force, led by Vice Admiral Holmzberg, Deputy Commander-in-Chief and Chief of Staff of the Imperial Air Force, also entered its corresponding defense zone.

General Baker issued an order from his flagship, which was quickly conveyed to the commanders of each ship, and the ten magic airships opened their hatches one after another, and each released the escort force. A total of 10 carrier-based aviation battalions, totaling more than 3,000 imperial knights on vultures, spread out over the east bank of the Turbid River, forming a floating sky net, first throwing flares to dispel the night that had not completely faded, and providing a wider field of vision for the artillery on the positions on the west bank.

Five minutes later, the silence over the river bank was broken by the rumbling of cannons. The Imperial Artillery Division's total of 3,000 magic crystal cannons roared at the same time, blasting heavy shells filled with blazing glue out of the barrels, drawing beautiful parabolas in the air, crossing the rushing river, and falling towards the wasteland on the opposite bank.

Flames and smoke rose from the ground, and scorching waves of air roared against the ground. The trees on the wasteland managed to survive the long winter, and just after growing some young buds and green leaves under the soothing of the spring wind and rain, they were wiped out under the cover of artillery fire. Flames spread in the fields ten miles deep along the river, turning all the plants and trees into scorched earth, and billowing smoke rose into the sky.

The east coast has become a scorching hell, and the west coast is not peaceful. The positions along the river, which General Karl had painstakingly managed for many years, were extremely busy, and the four large transport airships, which were so large that it was uncontrollably gaspty, were all painted in gold and glittered under the cover of artillery fire. Four large transport airships with a capacity of 1,000 tons all had their hatches open on both sides of the hull, and a total of more than 6,000 heavily armed Imperial knights lined up on the gangway and stationed themselves in an orderly and unhurried manner.

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