The Demon Eyes on the outskirts of the warzone had been destroyed. Only a few remained functional above the workshops, and compared to before, their reconnaissance range was limited to just 200 kilometers around the workshops.
But within this limited view, the red dots on the tactical sand table had blurred into a glaring sea of blood.
Allen stood before the sand table, his gaze locked onto the enemy’s trajectory.
The enemy had no intention of splitting its forces. All the modified Magical Beasts were advancing in a fan formation, heading straight for the volcanic cluster located between the two workshops.
"Looks like he doesn’t intend to split his forces," Allen said, his voice cold and hard.
On the light screen, Victor’s tone was grave. "He’s not splitting up? Then which of us is he planning to hit first?"
"Neither. He wants to take out our energy hub first."
Allen pulled up the coordinates of the volcanic Magic Furnace. "He holds an absolute advantage in troop numbers, yet he’s still choosing the safest tactic."
"If he destroyed the workshops, we’d only lose our ability to produce more units. But if he destroys our Magic Furnace, our Golem Legion will be nothing but scrap iron in less than ten days. He’s not leaving us even the slightest chance of a comeback."
Cautious and flawless.
The enemy commander himself had yet to appear, content to simply steamroll them with his massive army.
This kind of overwhelming, straightforward strategy was suffocating.
Fifty kilometers away, the main forces of both armies had yet to clash, but all manner of long-range attacks had already erupted.
Fifteen giant Snail Monsters leading the enemy vanguard halted, the scarlet main eyes on their backs beginning to charge simultaneously.
The Grim Reaper’s roll call had begun.
On the front lines, a "Peacekeeper" main battle Golem that had just activated its AT Field was instantly obliterated. A beam of light pierced through its Force Field and chest armor, turning it into a brilliant fireball.
Then a second, and a third.
Allen’s brow furrowed.
"Defensive positions! Freedom Gundam squadron, spread out! Evasive maneuvers, no pattern!"
The Freedom Gundams leveraged their superior mobility, their frames leaving afterimages in mid-air as they scraped past the edges of the light beams by the narrowest of margins.
In Victor’s sector, however, several Heavy Armored Golems raised their giant Tower Shields and managed to withstand the assault.
The beams slammed into the shields, bursting in a blinding flash of light. The surfaces of the Tower Shields glowed red-hot as the tremendous impact pushed the Golems back dozens of meters, their treads carving deep trenches in the ground.
"Counterattack." Allen showed no emotion at the loss of his Golems, issuing the order to fire without hesitation.
Behind the main defensive line, sixty "Purgatory" launch platforms roared to life, their piercing whistles tearing through the air.
Thousands of Red Lotus Magic Missiles rocketed into the air, arced at their zenith, and slammed down upon the distant sea of Magical Beasts.
The fiery explosions merged into a single mass, painting the horizon a blinding white.
However, as the wind blew the smoke away, Allen’s expression grew grim.
The enemy formation had, without him noticing, become extremely spread out. Under the Black Wizard’s micromanagement, the modified Magical Beasts were maintaining a safe distance from one another.
The overwhelming barrage of firepower had only managed to kill a few hundred Magical Beasts.
In the sky, the battle was even more ferocious.
The Storm Falcons and Victor’s squadron of Flying Golems dove to drop their payloads, unleashing a torrent of bombs without any regard for the cost.
But several hundred of the enemy’s flying modified Magical Beasts met them head-on. They were incredibly fast, spat acid from their mouths, and locked into a deadly struggle with the Storm Falcons.
Beams of light and streams of acid crisscrossed through the clouds. Every so often, a Storm Falcon’s anti-gravity flight Rune Array would be corroded by acid, sending it spiraling down into the Beast Tide below to burst into a ball of fire.
"We are losing air superiority," Jarvis reported, processing tens of thousands of data streams simultaneously to provide real-time casualty updates.
On the ground, the Magical Beast army had crossed the scorched earth and crashed into the first defensive line.
Swarms of Alloy-Claw Lizards leaped over the temporary fortifications, swinging metallic blades at the front-rank Golems. From the rear, Crystal Shell Giant Scorpions, bearing cannons on their backs, provided precise long-range fire support.
The disparity was despair-inducing.
One after another, the defending Golems were tackled and dismantled. Alarms blared across the entire front. The joint defensive line began to show signs of collapsing the very instant it made contact with the enemy.
"It’s no use, we can’t hold them!" Victor yelled frantically over the comms channel. "My first battalion was wiped out in ten minutes! Allen, how much longer until you reach Level 2?"
"Four days," Allen replied, his tone still steady as he stared at the mounting casualty figures.
"Four days? We won’t even last four hours!" Victor slammed his fist on the control console.
He stared intently at the tide of monsters flooding in beyond the light screen, the muscles in his face twitching.
Then, he clenched his jaw, a look of grim resolve flashing in his eyes.
"To hell with it! Deploying now!"
RUMBLE—!
The subterranean metal gates slowly opened. Accompanied by heavy footfalls that made the very earth seem to groan, a true monster was unleashed from its cage.
It stood fifty meters tall, its body a dark crimson, and it carried no fancy long-range weaponry.
In its hand, it dragged a fifteen-meter-long giant warhammer that carved a terrifying trench in the ground behind it.
A Level 4 Golem, the "Tieyan Judicator."
It strode forward with heavy steps, heading for the very front of the defensive line. Each footfall left a massive crater in the ground.
Countless modified Magical Beasts shrieked as they lunged at it.
The alloy claws hacked against its dark metallic armor and shattered instantly.
Corrosive acid splashed against it without producing so much as a wisp of white smoke. The high-energy beams from the Snail Monsters struck its chest, leaving only faint white marks.
The Tieyan Judicator performed no fancy maneuvers; it simply swung its giant warhammer in a wide, horizontal sweep.
A dozen Crystal Shell Giant Scorpions were instantly crushed into pulp, their metallic remains and flesh sent flying by the immense kinetic force.
It was like a wedge driven into the heart of the battlefield, remaining utterly motionless no matter how the tide of Magical Beasts crashed against it.
The core materials, built to the specifications of a Level 4 Golem, displayed a despair-inducing resistance to both physical and magical attacks.
It was like an immovable pillar, planted firmly in the most vulnerable gap in the defensive line. Every modified Magical Beast that tried to get past it was smashed into scrap metal and gore by that colossal hammer.
The most ferocious wave of the assault was cut short. Incredibly, the Golem had single-handedly halted the collapse of the defensive line.
The surviving guard Golems seized the opportunity to regroup, using the Tieyan Judicator’s massive frame as cover to re-establish their firing lines.
The Black Wizard, hiding in the shadows, seemed to have been stunned by the new arrival as well, and the situation miraculously stabilized.
Victor let out a long breath, raising a hand to wipe the cold sweat from his forehead.
"Did you see that, Allen? This is the true power of the Tieyan Clan." He managed a weak smile, trying to regain some of his lost composure.
Allen’s true body was racing against time with his cultivation. The sub-processes of his mind handling the battle didn’t respond. Instead, their attention shifted past the immediate battlefield, focusing on the Mechanical Tyrannosaurus Beast that had remained motionless in the distance.
’No anti-air or long-range capabilities. In the end, it’s just a glorified super-soldier.’
Allen knew perfectly well. ’It’s only a matter of time before they figure out its weaknesses.’
The battle raged in a tense stalemate until the next morning.
The high-intensity combat rapidly depleted the forces on both sides.
A small mountain of Magical Beast corpses had piled up at the feet of the Tieyan Judicator.
In the distance, the thirty-meter-tall Mechanical Tyrannosaurus Beast finally stirred.
Its heart, a patchwork of gears and flesh, began to contract and expand at an unprecedented rate.
THUMP!
THUMP!
The dull thudding of its heart drowned out the roar of the battlefield’s artillery, echoing clearly in everyone’s ears.
Jarvis’s voice suddenly became shrill. "Warning! Target exhibiting abnormal Magic Power fluctuations! Readings are breaking 6,000... 6,500... 7,000!"
7,000.
That was Morning Star Level destructive power!
The Mechanical Tyrannosaurus Beast opened its massive maw, which was lined with metallic fangs.
Its target was the Tieyan Judicator standing at the forefront.
After observing for the better part of a day, the Black Wizard controlling it had seen through the Quasi-Fourth Level Golem’s weaknesses—its defense was extremely high, but it had no long-range attacks and lacked maneuverability.
A massive black fireball began to form in the Tyrannosaurus Beast’s mouth.
The very air seemed to warp from the intense heat.
A pillar of pitch-black fire erupted forth, crossing several kilometers to strike the Tieyan Judicator squarely in the chest.
The Breath of the End.
The moment the black flames made contact with the armor, they erupted over the outer shell. Strangely, they didn’t seem to generate much heat; instead, they began to seep through the armor like a phantom.
As if they had a life of their own, the flames seeped directly into the Golem’s internal structure, emitting a corrosive SIZZLE. Wherever the fire passed, the Golem’s internal Rune circuits were incinerated, and the energy output from its Magic Furnace began to fluctuate wildly.
The Tieyan Judicator’s movements jerked to a stop.
The next second, thick black smoke began to pour from the seams in its armor.
The black fire had somehow bypassed the physical defenses and was incinerating the core components directly!
The Tieyan Judicator’s eyes flickered twice and then went dark for good.
Its colossal frame stood motionless, like a lifeless statue.
The battlefield fell into a momentary, deathly silence.
After unleashing that attack, the beat of the Mechanical Tyrannosaurus Beast’s heart slowed considerably, and its Magic Power readings dropped rapidly. Clearly, an attack of that magnitude placed an enormous strain on the creature itself.
But the goal of the one controlling it had been achieved.
This "Quasi-Fourth Level" Golem, capable only of melee combat and lacking any long-range countermeasures, had been completely neutralized.
The pillar of the joint defensive line had been broken.
"No... Impossible..."
On the light screen, Victor stared blankly at the inert Tieyan Judicator, his pupils trembling violently.
His final trump card had been rendered useless in such a dramatic fashion, and he hadn’t even laid eyes on the enemy commander.
Death felt imminent.
"It’s over..." Victor screamed into the comms channel. "Allen! The line is going to break! Do you have anything else?! Use it, now!"