The blood frenzied blood roses were among the last survivors of the battle. They constricted together in the middle around a small cluster of other friendlies. The enraged vines entrapped while the smaller snapdragons moved in for the kill. The two unit types were actually quite complementary, making Mark regret not having explored the use of the weaker flower unit types more.
But it had not been made to be. Through her conversations with Avery, Mark knew that the other plant unit contender had more options to increase her unit's power. Whereas the interface had limited them to a basic barracks addition to increase their plant units germination path. Similarly their beasts had also been quite limited, with the same barracks lair addition. After facing Daniel it was evident that the lair could provide more benefits than what they had been offered.
Finally, Leonard’s forces concluded the battle. They immediately formed back up and started marching south back to their dungeon. This battle had been little more than an appetiser, for the battle to come.
Dale had traveled leagues through the air in a rocket of brown gas, but eventually he had to land with mere fumes leftover. The goblin exterminator landed on top of one of the plateaus and continued on foot for a bit before turning into gas to move into a pocket in the midst of a crag of rocks. A good thing, because the nightmare had been streaking across the ground just after him. The nightmare had been racing across the plains after the brown contrail, but had fallen well behind. Still the dark mare had a good idea where the goblin champion had landed. Ascending the plateau was a simple thing for the nightmare; it faded from view at the base before it clawed its way out of solid rock at the top.
The beast immediately began a search. Eventually it came right over to the goblin champion's hiding spot, but it soon moved on. It evidently did not have any searching ability beyond its normal hearing or ability to smell. The later sense might have been a real problem if it was some sort of bloodhound, but the horse could not discern the specific location despite knowing the goblin was somewhere up here. The winds whipping the brown fumes all across the plateau peak and beyond, probably did not help things.
The nightmare continued the search until things were ready to kick off for the main battle. It whinnied finally before it disappeared. Dale waited a good 10 minutes before he reformed back outside his hiding spot. He then immediately began making his own way toward the battlefield. He would be a late arrival.
The upcoming battle had now had all of their full attention. The force gathered to the east of the dungeon was on the smaller side with only about 400 units in total, but already a force of 1,000 plus spiderlings were descending from the base of the plateau on their way to kick things off. The sunflower’s were too valuable to use as breeders here, so instead Mark had brought 300 wild lily breeders. They could not breed the spiders as often, but there were five times more of them to cycle through. As soon as the spiderlings died in the first wave, the second set of lilies would breed a second and so on. It would take at least an hour and a half before the first set of lilies would once again be on the hook.
It was all assuming that Leonard did not send a force to deal with them. If he was smart he would. Mark was unsure how much capabilities the other two contenders knew about, but regardless, Leonard would likely figure it out after a couple of waves. As of now, Leonard did not seem to be aware of their presence. Not that it would last much longer as the first of the spiderlings started to pour into the valley. They should be discovered fairly soon despite needing a good 20 minutes before reaching they could make it to the fortifications. The land was wide open and a black wave of spiders would not be missed for long.
As far as the spiders to be bred, Mark had sent some from both of the tier 3 varieties. The spore spiders should be quite effective against the orcs, gnolls, and steed branch units. The black funnel web spiders would also likely be able to bring anything down with just one bite. All of them were maxed out, double evolved tier 3 spiders, and there were 74 of them. Each had a power rating of 7.5, and all the spiderlings fell between about 1.7 and 2.3. The spiderlings were not overly strong, but there were more than a thousand of them.
Leonard only needed minor adjustments to account for the spider swarm. His dungeon was rather rudimentary compared to all of the other dungeons that had made it this far. The walls were a mere 6 or 7 feet tall and made of a hard baked clay, but there was 3 rings of them. Inside the walls the dungeon structures were little better. Several dozen rickety archer or mage towers stood inside each of the concentric rings, but the rest was little more than mud adobe buildings and tents. Even the forge was just little more than curtained off sections. A magic mine stood right by the dungeon entrance supplying the metal and gems required. It was all a bit nomadic, Mark decided finally.
The defending force on the other hand looked far less rudimentary, but instead looked to be elite fantasy medieval warriors. There were several hundred centaur knights in full plate. A couple hundred wargs in addition to the forces returning from the earlier skirmish. However there were several thousand cavalry on horses as well. All of them wore armor of some sort whether made of steel or made of leather. In addition there was at least 2,000 infantry that would defend the rudimentary walls
Leonard had a second champion, a large orc that stood 9 feet tall and looked closer to an ogre than an orc. The champion was on the weaker side like other humanoid champions, but he still had a 22.2 power rating. He dual wielded two massive hammers that each must weigh hundreds of pounds, but since its legs and arms were thicker than Mark’s torso was wide the brute could easily swing them about. Unlike Dale or the nightmare champion, this hero was more like the red dragon or Kong. He was just a big strong brute. Likely he did not have many if any special abilities.
Nick's forces arrived into the valley a good ten minutes before the first batch of spiderlings, but the spiderlings would enter battle well before the undead. Mark watched as the orc and gnoll commanders quickly shifted to engage the force that had evidently been a surprise. However, they had plenty of time, and soon enough 800 gnolls on horseback rode out to intercept them. Leonard was evidently allowing the undead to engage his infantry before he brought his calvary in from the flanks to cut the force into more palatable chunks. By that point the first wave of spiderlings would likely be finished since the undead had another ten minutes to go.
The calvary rode straight uneerily toward the spider swarm. A long column with only 8 horses abreast. At first Mark thought that it would be good for the spiderlings since they would easily be able to come in from the flanks, but things proved to be quite different. The riders on the two sides of the column started to move their arms and hands in unison. Mark immediately knew what it was. It was a formation attack, like they had seen Daniel’s red orangutan’s use.
A moment later a red flowing barrier formed in the front and the sides of the column. It was as if they had made a red slip stream tunnel. The vanguard smashed into the spiderlings cutting right through the center of the swarm. If the spiderlings were not killed outright by the vanguard they likely were by the hundred column of riders following behind. Spiderlings that tried to attack through the red slip string were repelled with red electricity. Moments later the vanguard punched through the last of the spiderlings, so far there had not been a single loss to their side, but they had killed dozens of spiderlings.
It was at this point that the column of riders split in half, with four arcing around to both sides. Until this point the red energy was dissipated almost as soon as the column was past, but at the point the column split the energy started to remain as both sides arced around. It was like they were drawing a red heart on the battlefield. A heart that would soon contain almost every single one of the spiderlings as they followed after but inside of the closing red arcs. Mark was about to muse about the purpose of the other riders, before it soon became apparent. Once the two adjoining red circles were completed, red energy surged from the other riders through the outer riders.
The energy quickly formed a red dome over the area containing every single one of the enemies. Then the dome started collapsing as red electricity surged through its area. Mark was reminded of something he had seen at a science museum. A glass orb where with blue lightning surging and branching sporadically within. Except here the lighting was red, and here it was deadly. A half minute later when the red lightning abated, less than a hundred spiderlings remained.The calvary soon broke up from their organized formation to mop off the stranglers.
“I can’t believe it. I don’t think we killed a single one of them,” Amelia exclaimed.
“Yeah, let's just hope they expend a lot of energy and can’t do that again. If you consider that we did not actually expend any MP for our force either. So if you think about it, it's not a loss for either side.”
“Sure,” Amelia hmmmphed.
Soon enough a second group of spiderlings poured into the valley and the calvary started to reform. An additional 600 riders had already been enroute to join them. They all were headed toward the pass. Evidently, Leonard already knew about or had easily guessed about their breeding ability. This time however, the calvary formed a long line only a couple horses deep. Like Mark had guessed they had exhausted manna or whatever they had used for their formation ability. The spiderlings only slightly outnumbered their foes assuming that the riders and horses were counted as one, but the quality was night and day.
A wall of horse flesh slammed into the second wave of spiderlings. This time horses went down, riders fell from their mounts and spiders were able to survive the pass. Spore clouds soon had the horses and their riders coughing and weezing. Without the protective red formation they all succumbed to the choking spores. It made it quite a bit easier for black funnel web spiderlings to tackle the mounts or to pull off the riders, but the fight was far from in the spider's favor.
Five minutes later the the calvary once again reformed, now at half strength. The once again started riding again for the pass. With another round of spiderlings, Mark was confident the tier 3’s would be victorious along with another wave of spiderlings against what remained, but then he noticed it. A corridor of grass turning to black in a straight line toward the pass. The black stallion with a fiery mane was headed in that direction. Leonard knew how much of a threat the continuous waves of spiders were, and he was sending in a champion to help deal with it.
Mark did what he could to prepare the defense of the pass. The tier 3 spiders moved to the lip. Hundreds of lilies prepared to heal with their blessed aura and targeted healing spells, even as another group used proliferate on the tier 3 spiders. Another batch would be ready before the enemies made it. Across the prairie the battle between the undead and Leonard’s forces started in earnest.
Out of their depth with the nightmare the spiderlings were sent towards the lines of calvary. The nightmare ignored them and streaked toward the true threats. Choke spores filled the pass, but the nightmare did not seem to notice. Flame gouts streaked out, each claiming a spider’s life, causing them to shrivel up hugging themselves with their legs as they burnt. A black funnel web spider made it through, slicing with its front legs even as it tried to sink its fangs. The front legs left steaming furloughs along the side of the nightmare, but that was it. The nightmare shifted and kicked the spider with both of its back legs. Sections of the spider just departed its body as green blood exploded out away from the stallion.
The nightmare soon began erecting walls of flame that lasted 5 seconds before they dissipated, but spiders were coming right over the flames as soon as they dissipated. Their tier 3 bodies were at least strong enough to last for a short while near the heat source, at least with the healing support of hundreds of blessed auras from the lilies. The stallion whirred around shooting flames and kicking or nipping any that got to close. Finally a black funnel web spider made it through and it sank its fangs into the right hindquarter of the nightmare. For its trouble it got kicked to oblivion, instantly killed.
A geyser of steam shot out from the successful bite location. “Ahhhh I got it now,” Mark could not help but remark aloud. “The nightmare is not really a creature of flesh and blood. Steam comes out from where it is wounded.” Mark now remembered that Dale had caused a few such wounds throughout their struggle. Mark had thought the nightmare impervious with all of the actual hits being burnt to steam, but the steam was basically the vitality of the beast. The beast would have a finite amount. It brought a spark of hope, to what had seemed a lost cause. Dale had seemingly been totally outclassed, unable to hurt the other champion. Thankfully that had not been the case.
The nightmare dissolved into the air, before breaking through the ground from a nearby location. The tier 3 spiders were a threat when they could surround the champion and work in an approach. Something the beast was now aware of. As soon as the nightmare became surrounded it would change locations and attack at the flanks of the tier 3’s. In this way the champion could safely decrease their numbers.
The spiderlings on the other hand outnumbered calvary they were clashing with just outside of the pass. Within a minute the fighting had devolved into an open but highly mobile melee. It was like a spotlight of carnage gliding away from the pass further into the valley leaving plenty of dead in its wake. The calvary were perhaps trying to disengage or keep from being surrounded, but they were having difficulty breaking off from the spiderlings that were only slightly slower than the horses. That and they were engulfed in a cloud of dust and spores. The fight was not quite one sided, but it was clear that the calvary was in trouble.
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Five minutes later, the spiderlings had completely broken the calvary’s ranks and started making their way toward the dungeon proper. The surviving calvary members quickly started to reform together, and soon were galloping in pursuit. However, both forces had been reduced enough where they would hardly make a difference. Similarly Dale was making his way there, riding a lone tier 3 spore spider that Mark had pulled for the purpose, but he would be extremely late to the party. Likely the nightmare would finish things up in the past and return well before Dale ever made it.
The nightmare was continuing its hit and run tactics with near complete success. Only one more spider had been able to slash down its black hide with its front sickle like leg, causing a gout of steam to erupt. Soon the stallion would be finished up with things.
Mark and Amelia soon shifted their complete attention to the other battlefield. The undead had partially claimed the outer wall. Despite thousands of calvary wreaking havoc in their ranks well away from the dungeon proper. Seemingly Nick did not care about the losses. Thousands of undead continued to attack the fortifications, while the rest got cut off and began fighting the mounted units. Mark quickly caught sight of and watched for a moment one of Nick’s unique titled units. Numerous was near the front of the battlefield inside of where the calvary were attacking. He was spawning undead from the ground every moment or two. His spawn quickly rushed forward to join the fray. By itself it was a limitless trickle of foot soldiers to whittle down Leonard’s infantry.
The only other obvious undead leader was the giant skeletal dragon that was sifting through the calvary. The giant dragon only had its physical ability, no flames, no necromancy, nor magic, but the skeletal dragon was a great match for calvary. A rock that could stand against and hardly be affected by the flow of calvary hitting against it at every turn. The dragon kept its batlike wings closed together against its back. Mark had not seen the big dragon fly yet, but based on the skin connecting the framework of bones for its wings he assumed it could.
But the dragon was the lone bastian among the undead, the rest that faced a cavalry charge were only causing minimal losses to the riders or mounts, and the true elite centaurs knights had as of yet not made a move. Then again, it looked like Nick had also not sent in most of his elites. Tombstone carrying grave rippers, ghasts, and specters waited on the sidelines by the hundreds.
The undead were assaulting the middle earthen wall by the time the spiderlings arrived. In fact multiple necromancer spells had already taken root inside raising undead within the middle layer. The spiderlings would not accomplish much, but they would pull some of the attention. In addition a hundred bat goblins and weevils took off from a nearby plateau. Their flight was slow, as heavy laden as they were. The spiderlings were not halted by the wall, they immediately mounted it and began assaulting the units within. There were plenty of defenders, but only a trifle compared to the numbers confronting the undead. Plenty of the spiderlings were still fighting when the air division delivered their payloads.
Hundreds of ordinance dropped and duplicated as they plummeted toward various clumps of defenders within the inner and central layer. Vases of flammable liquid shattered against archer towers lighting them up immediately. Once the payloads were delivered they were free to whiz about and fire arrows or magic. The numbers were not significant, but the air division took a lot of focus off the attackers assaulting the walls from the ground.
The base would be in danger of being overrun in another 5 minutes. Something that became a foregone conclusion when the orc champion along with a band of orc elites left to join up with the elite centaur knights. They were already moving toward Nick’s undead elites. The nightmare was already racing back, presumptively with the same target. The skeletal dragon was moving to fight the champions, as was Dale. The dungeon entrance would fall, but it would not matter if Nick could not get enough elite undead inside to take all of the floors and deal with the dungeon guardian.
The regular calvary had been whittled down to less than half their original number and would be stuck fighting with the rest of the undead army that still numbered in the thousands. The true fight would happen off to the north of the main battle and would consist of four heros and hundreds of undead elites and centaurs.
The nightmare actually made it to the field of battle first. It raced forward toward the giant skeletal dragon that moved into its path. Mark could not think of a way for the stallion to really hurt the opponent that was 20 times its size, but then the nightmare began to grow. Red fire started to become visible black hide cracked open. The cracks became bigger and bigger as the horse grew to first double its original size and then to three times its size.
The nightmare stopped growing when the horse was about two stories tall. By this point its hide only had small islands of black amidst the sea of flame. The skeletal dragon on all four legs was about the same size, but like the red dragon its bulk was a good five times its height. The dragon was still several times bigger than the approaching nightmare. The dragon was only bone except for the bat-like wings. Mark had no idea how a unit could even hurt the dragon except to hit it with bone crushing force, and if anything was capable of doing so on this battlefield, it was the now giant nightmare.
The nightmare was covering ten times the amount of ground with each stride as it had been before the two met. The horse landed hard near the dragon, its hooves digging furrows into the ground arresting some of its momentum, before it delivered a powerful front kick. The dragon caught one hoof with its forearm, but took the second directly to its collar bone. The forearm held, but the collar bone snapped. Causing the skeletal dragon’s frame to buckle slightly, but the skeletal dragon delivered its own bite to the neck of the flaming stallion.
The nightmare ripped free. This time there were dozens of geysers shooting out steam from where the teeth had ripped into it. Mark watched as the nightmare visibly reduced by at least 20% over the course of seconds. The nightmare whirled around delivering an even more powerful hind kick that sent the skeletal dragon backwards with multiple crushed ribs. Several streaks of white energy erupted towards the giant horse, but the horse faded from existence. The grave rippers debuffs sailed hundreds of feet past before sizzling out.
A second later the horse, now back to normal size, burst from the earth near the undead elites. The skeletal dragon recovered but had to turn its attention to the ogre sized orc running as fast as a horse right for it. The orc champion with his hammers was not a threat that could be ignored. The elite centaurs had decided to arc around to keep well clear as they rode for the undead elite. Dale was still a couple leagues out so the skeletal dragon would have to make do for now..
The skeletal dragon proved to be far too slow to deal with the humanoid that was barely the size of one of its legs. The orc could deliver multiple powerful blows before it danced back from a retaliatory swipe. The orc was quick, but was also evidently using some skills. Perhaps having seen that Dale was on his way toward the battle, Leonard had apparently directed the nightmare to break off its attack on the undead elite and instead to deal with the dragon champion. If things worked out they could face both enemy champions with a 2 versus one advantage.
Seeing the plight, Mark ordered for Dale to intervene. It would cost energy stores, but Dale was capable of getting to the fight far quicker. Mark did not care about Nick’s skeletal dragon, but if it went down Dale could not possibly beat the other two champions by itself, when he had already proven incapable of even beating the nightmare in a one on one. Power ratings alone the match up might have looked quite fair, or even slightly tilted in their favor. Dale was the weakest by a narrow margin, and the skeletal dragon was the strongest by a double the same margin. But based on what they had seen to this point things did not seem to be leaning their way. The skeletal dragon was powerful, but too slow compared to its foes. The broken collar bone had magically snapped back into place, but Mark had not seen anything else to make the dragon more than a big walking brute. Had Nick not sprung for some of the additional champion upgrades?
Dale became a streak of brown fumes propelled toward the battle. He turned back into a solid figure delivering a powerful kick sending the orc champion to the earth. The skeletal dragon ignored the nightmare as it focused on the downed figure. This time its powerful paw strike connected with the orc that had been getting back to his feet. The orc hero was batted away landing hundreds of feet away in a heap, but he was up in moments and running right back toward the battle. Dale was already forming his sphere of fumigation. Since the other allied champion was a skeletal creature without a respiratory system he did not have to worry about affecting the dragon. The nightmare might seem fairly immune, being some sort of elemental illusionary flame creature, but the orc champion was another story.
The nightmare covered half the skeletal dragon’s body with flames. Which were apparently so hot they caused cracks to spread across the bones. Dale instantly closed the distance to help shooting concentrated toxic acid as he approached, but the nightmare nimbly dodged the first before fading allowing the second to pass right through. The orc champion attempted to rejoin, but had to block a powerful blow from the bone tail of the dragon. The champion crossed his hammers catching the tail in the middle, before throwing the tail aside and continuing on. The dragon concentrated on the orc, while the other two continued their earlier game of tag from the prior battle.
The centaur knights were now fully engaged with the undead elite. The centaurs had protection enchantments to keep the spectral units at bay, and also had something that made them immune to the banshee screams. The undead elite would lose in a one on one fight. It was lucky for them that they outnumbered the centaurs 3 to 1. Already dozens of centaurs were realizing their strength was fading as debuffs sapped their strength. Many already had chain tethers into the ground as the undead fought while retreating. So far none of the centaurs had succumbed to the chains pulling them towards an open coffin. A skill that would have them become a mummy wrapped in chains that would fight their fellow centaurs.
Mark wondered what a mummy centaur would like, but so far the centaurs with four firmly planted hooves were able to prevent themselves from being pulled in. Others had even broken free. Those caught however were easy marks for the tier 3 grave rippers who could tear right through steel with their claw like fingers. The skill did not seemingly work against the already dead. Although already necromancers had raised a handful of undead centaurs to fight on their behalf. Regardless it was definitely clear that the elite undead would win their battle, and they would do so with plenty of strength to still challenge the dungeon.
Leonard’s fate really hung on the outcome of the battle between the four heros. However the orc champion was having a difficult time against the far bigger skeletal dragon while inside Dale’s fumigation sphere, and the nightmare was running out of steam… literally. The nightmare and Dale were now about on an even footing. Mark assumed it was due to the nightmare losing steam. The champion had basically run from one fight to another and had not recovered to full strength. Dale on the other hand had more than an hour to make a near full recovery of his energy.
The first major wound was on the skeletal dragon, who had its back femur entirely shattered. The bottom half of the leg fell away, and for the first time the wings unfurled to allow the dragon to steady itself. The orc champion pressed his attack raining hammer blows against the dragon's hip bone which cracked and started to fracture under the onslaught. At near the same time the nightmare had worked itself in to deliver a powerful back kick to the dragon’s neck. Vertebrae splintered, but the neck held.
However, pushing the dragon near the edge had given Dale his opening. A powerful black acid dart stabbed into the nightmare’s side. It was his first real hit other than a far weaker large area acid attack. The nightmare winked from existence, but the stallion's right side was steaming profusely with no sign of stopping when it clawed its way out of the earth hundreds of feet away. The side of the nightmare looked like it was cratering in at the point of impact. It was obviously a serious wound, perhaps worse than the dragon bite from earlier. The nightmare did not diminish in size, but in some way it seemed less tangible.
Still the fight continued on. The nightmare, perhaps on its last leg, was fighting more fiercely than ever, and Dale would soon be running on fumes… also literally. The next break in the battle was also against them. Seeing that Dale had lost awareness of him, the orc champion actually threw one of his hammers. The hammer spun end over end cutting threw the air like a buzzsaw. Dale became aware of the danger a split second before the impact. Too late apparently, Mark and Amelia could only witness the aftermath. Dale’s right arm spun away even as his body was sent in the opposite direction. Blood poured from both the stump and down his chin from the panting goblin’s mouth. His side had also been caved in on the right side.
Perhaps realizing that his time in the fight was nearing its end Dale began a frantic attack once again on the nightmare. The nightmare continued to escape so Dale turned toward the orc champion. The orc easily dodge acid dart after acid dart, before Dale was incinerated from behind by the nightmare. Leonard had no chance to celebrate the victory because the skeletal dragon brough his front paw down at near the same point in time slamming and pinning the orc champion to the earth. The dragon ended the orc mere seconds after Dale’s flaming husk fell to the dirt.
The skeletal dragon had won despite having to hobble on 3 legs. The nightmare was just too weakened to pose a credible threat. It could not become big again, and did not have the energy for large and powerful flame attacks. Once the dragon turned and quickly caught up to the centaurs, the battle was over. Leonard still had 1,000 units of calvary, and pockets of infantry fighting furiously to hold different slivers of their base, but they were fighting a losing battle.
The nightmare was hit by multiple debuffs at some point while it still frantically attacked the dragon’s flank. They slowed the stallion enough where the dragon managed to stomp down on the other champion. Mark would say the nightmare was dead, but there was no body. However the horse failed to return as the undead forces with their air support mopped up the defenders.
In the end Nick was left with just over 2,000 units, but since plenty of necromancers had survived his force would swell by a good thousand plus units soon enough. Like their own witch doctor reanimate, these risen would last for the rest of the day. Even considering that there was another champion at the bottom of the dungeon, Nick should have more than enough to finish the job.
Mark and Amelia’s attention soon turned to the other battlefronts that would soon explode, even as the undead started entering the dungeon entrance. Still Mark was not too absorbed to have not kept some units behind to continue to monitor. He did not miss the skeletal dragon taken to the sky, headed to the west, back to his own dungeon. He did not miss that the dragon carried Numerous and a handful of others.
Nick was confident that they would not be needed to take out Leonard so was bringing them back home. He was obviously aware of their southern army at this point. There was a good 8 or 9 days of travel by foot between the 2 dungeons, but the dragon would likely be there in a matter of hours. The battle would be well underway by that point in time, but if the dragon made it in time it would even the odds. It was possible there would be another four way champion fight in a matter of hours.
