The assault on the Katydid core continued to progress with relative ease, so Peter’s full attention was on his own dungeon. His fifth floor had fallen after only 15 minutes due to the constant swarm of C tiers, a feat other core types would find difficult to replicate. The swarm continued onto his sixth floor, but they were quickly countered by Peter’s ready defenses.
Peter had more movable blinds with flame thrower turrets covering all three paths through the floor. Two blinds in the shape of a V funneled ground insects through the small gap in the middle, where the infantry waited. Several thousand B and C tier dragons fought for control of the skies, as the mages and ballista kept up a steady stream of attacks to reduce the numbers. For the first few minutes things seemed to be heavily in the defender’s favor, but that was only as they fought the insects that had been responsible for leading the attack on his fifth.
After a few minutes, the units that had been prepared for this floor started to arrive. The S tier bombardier beetle had already been dealt with, but Agatha had ensured that she could put forward hundreds of its B tier one offs. They soon kept up a steady barrage of acid balls at all of Peter’s defenses. Hundreds of B tier arachne mages had accompanied them onto the floor. The half spider half female humanoid units kept up a powerful shield that stopped magic attacks.
New incoming flying units were now formed in tight formations similar to how they were in Gabriel’s dungeon. Either Hive had sent units to support the attack on Peter’s dungeon, or Agatha was using his type cards to form her own coordinated forces. Each formation had a butterfly healer and several mages supported by a good 20 units that were suited for close combat. Most of the combat suited units would peel off quite easily, but there was always a handful that stayed with the healer and mages to defend them. Peter’s dragons started to struggle immediately despite usually being stronger. Unfortunately, Peter did not have a lot of elite support at the moment since they were all off fighting elsewhere.
Delilah and her rifle platoons had recognized the issue and started firing at the concentrated flying groups. It was not like they could penetrate the Arachne’ shields at the moment, so the flying formations were the juiciest targets available. In a sense the closely packed groups were what made it possible, but still half the shots seemingly managed to find their way through the gaps. Perhaps he needed to ask Gearhead and Greg to design a new shotgun-like weapon to make the effort easier.
It was literal rollie pollies that were brought in to serve as a line breaker. Tough gray overlapping plate rolling balls came rolling down all three paths. Peter saw one A tier’s armor even deflect a ballista bolt. Several more direct hits proved that it was not a fluke. Each of the rollie pollie’s was an A tier.
Peter had 13 bonefiend A tiers ready for such an assault. Acid balls splashed against their bone carapace as they moved forward to intercept. The acid balls were only B tier attacks, but they were enough to quickly pit and dissolve the chiton-like armor most of the fiends were covered in. Still the A tiers forced their way through the barrage intercepting the wrecking balls just in time. One skull headed fiend stabbed a lance directly into one of the large wrecking balls. The force of the insect forced the fiend back 20 feet, before the ball unrolled and quickly shifted to attack with pincer-like mandibles.
One ball was forced into a lava pit. Peter assumed it was the end of that one, but it burst out of the lava only seconds later ready to fight even as its carapace melted around it. The rollie pollies were stopped, but they were all ready to fight. Despite outnumbering them, the bonefiend A tiers were actually the ones struggling in the close combat. The insectoids were bigger and their outer armor was tough, perhaps with a defensive attribute in the S tier. It was the better support that gave the fiends a chance. One of them was killed instantly by a ballista bolt through the far softer underside, when it reared up to attack. The acid balls and magic coming from the insect side were deadly, but not instantly so against the sturdy bonefiends.
That was when hundreds of B tier flame strider spiders started pouring from the entrance. The striders were more dragon-like with long necks and tails, but they still had 8 powerful legs that churned to move their armored carapace forward. Apparently, lava pits were hardly a hindrance to them. The striders did not need the paths they waded right through the lava. Agatha had likely summoned A tier after A tier until she got something suitable to assault his later floors. Then she used her infest specialization to make a thousand copies of it at the next lower tier instead of the normal 2 tiers for one offs. All the elites remaining in his dungeon were forced to step forward. The S tier blue diamond gravitron was able to control an entire sector between two paths, but the 10 ember type card elites sent to defend the other sectors struggled to hold back the far more numerous lava traversing B tiers.
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To compound the problem dung beetle type units started physically launching curled up B tier spiders. The spider unfurled their legs and started to decelerate thanks to silken parachutes. Those that were not shot out of the air, landed with bone jarring force. They immediately began to cause chaos. The ballista bolts stopped near completely. Peter only had one group of elites that could solve all his problems, but it would mean robbing his alternate dimension. Glenda had immediately come to the same decision. A dark elf aid disappeared to pass the order.
Over the course of the next few minutes spectral armor and mirror soldier troops started blinking into existence all over near the back of the sixth floor. The other C tiers left in the alternate realm immediately began to struggle as they faced overwhelming numbers without elite support. Still Peter would rather things become more difficult there then in the physical realm
The move kept the physical realm from being overrun, but it was still a life and death struggle now on both sides of the dimensional boundary. Peter could only watch, frustratedly. If he had not sent off all his elites elsewhere, his own defenses would not be struggling nearly as much. Peter sighed, as he finished the message. He had no choice. He only had a few elites that he could bring back.
It took a few minutes to get the fiend and mirror soldier back, summoned right to the sixth floor teleportation ruin. The collapsing star fiend immediately set to work. Acid balls immediately began to rain down on its position. Acid was not one of the fiend’s many resistances. Luckily the fiend was nimble enough to dodge between them. The near immune flame resistance allowed it to traverse the lava same as the hundreds of striders, which soon became the SS tier’s favorite target. Acid balls continued to rain down despite the presence of friendlies. Insect cores cared little about friendly fire, what did they care if they killed their own units as long as they could take down the enemies as well.
Strider after strider were hit, but the tactic worked. First the collapsing star fiend took a glancing blow from an acid ball. The fiend hardly paid its smoking shoulder a second thought. However, a minute later a ball hit the fiend directly on the snout. Even the fiend could not suffer a facial wound and remain unphased. It clawed frantically, before eventually choosing to dive into the lava. A moment later it emerged with clear damage. Half its face was ruined, including one of its eyes. Still the fiend was a tough son of a bitch. It immediately began fighting again as acid balls continued to rain all around its position.
The collapsing star fiend was not the only favored target. Both the other S tiers were also heavily targeted. The blue diamond gravitron was constantly hit as it worked to keep hundreds of striders from pushing onto the platform. The unit’s metal was steaming and melting as the acid ate away at it, although the progress was slow the S tier would be in trouble if it had to keep enduring direct hits. The original mirror soldier was fending off the other side of the platform on the same side as the collapsing star fiend. However, the mirror soldier was able to successfully dodge even as it fought, at least for now.
By all indications, they should be withdrawing or something at this point. All three paths were being strained. The final platform was besieged from nearly every side as well as within. The air battle and alternate dimension were clearly struggling, but Glenda made no such call. It was likely she did not feel she could. They would take excessive casualties if they tried. They could only fight to weather through the attack.
Things seemed grave, but the insect army was also losing elites at an accelerated rate. The parachuting spiders were not weak by any means, but they were easy prey to the alternate dimension B tiers working to cull their number. Each was a B tier, but they were being used as little more than a distraction here. Their blood became fuel for the sanguine fairies to continue to protect the platform from the acid barrage. All across the line the fairies were able to protect the main forces, it was only the units acting independently that could be targeted effectively. The rest of the near constant acid barrage landed harmlessly against a dirty green blood barrier.
After 5 minutes the strider numbers began to dwindle as they were steadily killed by Peter’s elites as well as through enemy friendly fire. Once the focus was shifted back to only the 3 paths things would get far easier. The collapsing star fiend and gravitron were clearly on the verge of death. The gravitron was barely even able to fight. Its form now looked like a melted ball of metal standing on two legs. One of the arms had completely melted into its side. The other was half way there. The collapsing star fiend had bone showing in half a dozen places. Its movements were clearly hampered by dissolved muscle. A half dozen striders attacked from all sides as it struggled back to dry land, even as acid balls splashed down all around the area.
Luckily, there was a way to save the SS tier. It was time that Elyra returned the favor. He had sent her the ether tearing dragon, his most deadly weapon. Then he had sent Gnther’s force for support
The ruins flashed as a dozen units appeared. Three phase A tiers immediately disappeared as they moved to come to the aid of his alternate realm defenders. The rest served as an honor guard for the S tier psychic healing butterfly. Moments later flesh started to reform and muscles and sinews to knit as the damage was reversed. Peter would have just loved to see Agatha’s expression, when the SS tier only moments from death was restored to near full health.
