Peter would say that he definitely did not like Eli, but he would not say that he absolutely loathed the guy. He had always understood the other core’s motivations although he considered them foolish. They had forced him into battle. It was not out of the realm for him to feel resentful for it, or for him to even join up with the insect faction. Although if he had willingly joined them, Predator would still be alive. The insect faction would then have stood no chance against the six of them. Now however, Peter could not help but to curse constantly at the guy.
Of course the guy would have been the one to come up with a counter for Peter’s ether tearing dragons, when the insects had not. Just like in the prior battle or earlier in this battle the ether tearing dragons immediately cut into the high tier crustaceans, which fell just as easily as any other unit to the incorporeal units. Even with only two thirds of their original energy, the ether tearing dragons could quickly turn the situation around by killing several hundred elites, and initially this was exactly how things proceeded.
Several dozen A tiers and even more B tiers fell in quick succession as they popped in and out of the alternate dimension, but then an A tier crustacean with a mushroom cap back along with hundreds of its own C tier one offs sent out a chorus of radar like pulses of white energy. The energy passed seemingly harmlessly across every other unit on the field, but when it hit the ether tearing dragons… ‘Poof’. The SS tier dragon lasted a moment longer, it shrieked as it was ripped apart.
All at once Peter lost a good 70% of his ether tearing dragon force including the SS tier. It had hit every unit that had been in the physical realm at the time immediately dissolving them like vapor. The remaining B tier dragons continued to blink into existence to hunt elites, but more pulses followed. The dragons attempted to avoid them, but the pulses surged forward at impossibly fast, easily emitting and reaching them before the dragons could go in and retreat out of the physical realm. Each wave caught a few more. By the time the last B tier dragon had drained itself to the limit and retreated as previously ordered, there were only than 8 left.
The crustacean forces soon continued forward, the dragons having stalled their progress. Eli had still lost quite a few elites, but Peter could only assume the core felt it was just the cost of doing business. Taking out an SS tier would likely net him a condition as well as help the battle tilt in his side's favor. Even with what he had just lost and still had committed in this attack it was clear that the crustacean had not committed more than what he would have considered acceptable to lose. The bottom feeder core would provide just enough help to keep them from reversing the situation, but would then choose to conserve his forces as much as possible.
What followed was an extremely bloody confrontation as Elites from the allied dungeons were transported in to help Elyra hold on. Peter ended up sending every single one of the B tier mining apes, and they died, to the unit. Most of the other elite reinforcements also fell. Twenty minutes later, Elyra’s defense was once again stable. They had killed all the crustacean units, other than the mage units that had retreated. Eli had likely planned to be able to pull them out of the battle entirely, but now they would be trapped inside due to the rescue force. Hopefully, they could take out that radar unit and all its one offs since Peter still had 98 ether tearing dragons with the assault force.
They were all currently at the beginning of the cricket dungeon recouping their energy. Not to mention all the other incorporeal units they had in the allied forces. That radar wave attack was a perfect counter. It was things like that, that had prevented Peter from going crazy and summoning even more of them. Peter of course used another resurrect for the SS tier leaving him with 5 left. It was a unit worth saving, despite the glaring vulnerabilities to certain counters.
The slog continued on all fronts. Progress in Cricket’s dungeon was even slower than Peter had thought. It took nearly an hour for them to completely clear the first floor, although that was not quite accurate because at the same time his vanguard was already pushing forward into the fourth floor. Similar exterminations were being conducted on both the second and third floors simultaneously. Still it would take more than twice as long to take out Cricket than Katydid had. The losses would also be far higher. Already Peter was doing the mental math to figure out how they would be able to finish things off at this rate. Cricket's dungeon would be far from the last to have the tunnel layout. In fact it was the katydid core who had been unusual for not having done so.
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The slog continued for several more hours. The insect cores had as expected trapped their rescue force inside of Elyra’s dungeon as soon as they could take control of the entrance. The only highlight was that Peter had been able to spare the collapsing star fiend over through the transfer ruins that mages traveling along with them had made. The SS tier had proceeded calmly along with the rescue force until the crustacean mages tried to break through. A good 45 minutes of rest was plenty to refresh the fiend who gleefully waded through several thousand lesser crustacean enemies to take out the mages as instructed. There was no way Peter would allow them to be pulled out.
Over the next hour the fiend led the joining effort as many of the rescue forces and other heavy hitters fought the forces trying to eat into them from behind. At about the 8th hour mark from the start of the battle the rescue force broke through onto Elyra’s seventh floor sandwiching the last few thousand insects preventing them from joining Elyra’s defenders. At this point the rescue force was pretty haggard itself, but the relief would allow Elyra’s units to rest. Not a good thing for the other side since it meant the effort they had put in to keep the allied forces exhausted would be undone on that front. Already it was clear that the insects did not have the resources to continue the way they had. D tiers were now being mixed in to keep up the numbers for the endless waves.
An insect force was sent in to sandwich their assault force in the cricket dungeon, but it was little more than a nuisance at this point. Peter could not believe it. They had really exhausted most of their heavy hitters already. If they were able to send even a small force of high tier units at any one of the allied defenses it might succeed. If not the first time it would most definitely work the second or third, yet it seemed like Eli was the only one that still possessed such a force.
The crustacean core had not made another move. He probably was waiting for the allies to exhaust even more resources through continued battle. It was unbelievable. Even if their side won, surely the insect cores would be pissed off at him for holding back when not doing so might ensure a far quicker victory. It would serve them right. The crustacean was nothing but true to his character. He was not a true ally to anyone but himself.
It was not until half passed the 11th hour of battle when the assault force finally succeeded.
[The cricket core has been eliminated from the battle. Opportunity will be made available at the end of battle for any enemy core to use double tap, provided that the cricket core has any core’s remaining after core burn through protocol.]
They had knocked out the second insect core, although apparently cricket had snagged a spare core through either trade or support card packs. The core had not even battled since its tutorial that it had also lost.
The assault force moved onto the springtail core next. The springtail’s dungeon was still based on the common insect tunnel strategy, but was quite a bit different than crickets’. It had pools of water complete with underwater adjoining tunnels that led to aquifers. The main tunnel would also periodically dead end into small chambers. Each time there were three or four more large tunnels leading in different directions. The springtail had gone with a more maze-like feel, and the aquifers allowed its water based units to move across the map, which made it difficult for the assault force to follow.
Still it was not like the springtail had any elites to make it a real challenge. Navigating the floors only took 4 hours. The assault force suffered steady losses, but faced no real trouble. The losses would have concerned Peter if not for the other fronts. The insect cores had simply run out of gas. The attacks had been broken off completely. They had finally come to the realization that a half C and D tier force would not be enough to do the job. Now it seemed like they would rather continue the fight on their own turf inside their own dungeons, where they felt like they had more of an advantage.
Them breaking off had been a pleasant surprise. All of the allies simply let their defenders rest since the assault force could keep the battle going all by itself. They would have felt good about how things were developing, if their forces were not so depleted. Perhaps the insects had assumed they had more than they had, or they were just in that dire straits themselves.
