Peter smiled. Once again he had eliminated a demon core for good. It made sense. This guy had lost his tutorial and had not fought once in another battle. He would not have a chance to really gain epic cards, so no chance for a spare core unless he traded for it.

  Peter quickly however started scanning to see how many survivors he had… There were not many. Krista had survived. She had several arrows sticking out of her, and some severe burns, but her armor had protected her for the most part. Gnther and his mount had been in the clear. The bat demons had shot right past them in their efforts to stop Krista and the archangels. As far as mages, he had a few unconscious C tiers that had appeared in no man's land. He had a handful of beasts, other than that most of the survivors belonged to his allies. Fortunately, most of the A tiers had at least survived. That would be helpful for their final assault on Bonefiend.

  The remainder of Peter’s forces went back to his dungeon for healing, along with some of the allies. Within the next half hour both the other remaining demon cores were gone, leaving only Bonefiend. The only real surprise was that eli had managed to take out the flame whelp core. Although that was not saying much since the core had sent a large number of its units on the attack in multiple other battles, and Eli benefited from having a type advantage. Still it was welcome news. They could not take too much time to deliberate.

  Peter started it. “Okay, let's get together with whatever we have left. I doubt he would leave behind forces to make a move since he does not have only one of us left over it would not do him much good. Bonefiend will probably still have a good 50 A tiers and hundreds of B tiers. I killed 4 of his S tiers, including the 3 we knew about. Not to say he would not have another.”

  “I only have 800 left, 21 B tiers, but no surviving A tiers,” Predator responded first.

  “I have 382 including 14 A tiers and 1 S tier,” Gabriel responded next.

  “600 no elites” Gretchen responded quietly.

  “ 65… all C tiers except for 1 S tier,” Elyra responded finally.

  “Damn really?” Peter asked among a chorus of others. “Then again, what I have to contribute is not too much better. I have 332 C tier or higher, 2 S tiers, and 5 A tiers, although 200 of those C tiers are mages. Then I have 337 D tier alternate dimension archers as well… Hopefully, Eli has a little more in the tank…”

  “I got the numbers at least,” Eli said without getting into specifics.

  “Perfect, we will use the crustaceans for fodder, everyone get your forces ready,” Elyra said, closing things out.

  She clearly had no respect for the guy, but could she not at least play nice? Peter sighed. Hopefully, the guy had enough fodder to help them finish things out. The fact that they had 4 S tiers for the fight was comforting. What was also comforting was the fact that Glenda, Michael, the ritual summoning fairy and all the lesser C tier fairies, sigil masters, and mages should be good to go. As rested as possible. Guardian spirit was in a new condensed stone body, and another would be wheeled forward along with water troughs and other supplies. Depending on when the guardian spirit fell the first time, they may or may not get to use it. Regardless, Peter wanted to have it on hand. It would reveal things for sure to his allies, potentially to all the spectators as well. Peter could not worry about that. Their task was nearly over.

  They spent the next 10 minutes coordinating. Elyra’s S tier was a healer, she could join Michael in keeping their forces rejuvenated. Peter had already heard of it a phase, psychic, butterfly combination that could literally reverse time on wounds. According to Elyra, it could even revive fallen units provided she had enough mana and the unit was not overly damaged. Sounded broken, but it would take her full mana bar to revive even a weaker S tier. The body had to have only a minimal amount of damage, and it had to be done within a minute or two of death. The stipulations were so stringent she had not even successfully been able to save her other S tier. She had revived A tiers, but even then she could not do more than a couple before her mana depleted. She faced the same stipulations with them, not too much bodily damage and had to be soon after death.

  Gabriel’s S tier was a ranged tank unit, called the hedge warrior. Theoretically there was flesh being inside of there, but it looked like a metal barrel with stubs for legs. The lid would lift slightly revealing yellow gleaming eyes. Armored arms carried a steel cross, that could apparently fire energy bolts. The strength of the bolts depended on how long it charged the shot, but the thing could easily take down 1 or 2 A tiers a minute. Did not sound very fast, but Gabriel had admitted that it had a SS rank defense. Since it moved quite slowly it could withstand a storm of damage.

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  As soon as the action started on Bonefiend’s first floor, Peter saw them at work. Once again he wished he had the ‘design steal’ support card. However, other than Bonefiend's mage he would want to steal his allies' S tier designs. He could not be sure whether that would work. Probably not, he decided. That would be way too easy to set up and coordinate.

  Bonefiend had thousands of units on each of the first few floors, but he was clearly just trying to keep them expending energy and to whittle down their weaker units. His forces were undertaking suicide charges aimed at their weaker allied units, but not Eli’s D tier crustaceans. They were doing their best to bypass them and get at the useful ones.

  Eli had indeed supplied plenty of fodder, 1,200 C tiers and over 4,000 D tiers; he definitely had enough numbers to keep enemies distracted, if the enemy was not smart enough to realize that was all they were. The enemy units would go right around the D tier crustaceans to go for more valuable units. He was killing the crustaceans too, just prioritizing the rest. Still Peter found it hard to imagine that Bonefiend could come out on top, homefield advantage or not.

  The attrition was far higher than what Frozen gate had been capable of, but they had easily preserved their elites. The floors fell steadily as did their numbers. The surprise did not occur till their forces were committed on the eighth floor, but it was not Bonefiend that made the move. It was their own ally. All at once the guys thousands of C and D tier crustaceans moved forward to support the assault despite supposedly being under Glenda, Krista’s, and Gabriel’s generals leadership. Normally only a portion was used every floor.

  “Whoa…What the hell, Eli,” Gabriel said in surprise. At the same time came frustrated and surprised cries from his allies. Peter saw immediately what they were from. It was happening to him as well. Hundreds upon hundreds of crustaceans were pouring into his dungeon. All C tier, but there were a lot of them.

  “You son of a bitch. What are you doing!” Elyra cried.

  “Oh you guys like that…” Eli snickered. “I figured we should do a complete wipe. Well maybe not completely provided we finish off Bonefiend in time. Still my guys move pretty fast, and most of your guys' defenses are pretty lacking.”

  “And what are you going to do if you kill us before our forces defeat bonefiend,” Gabriel said calmer than the other allies.

  “Well in that case, I’m sure I could probably finish things off myself. Bonefiend might be strong, but could he withstand 10,000 C tiers, Oooo and quite a few A tiers I kept back. I mean honestly, you guys know I did not fight for the last 7 years right…? Anyways, once I’ve dealt with you all, I would feel comfortable sending them forward as well.

  “You’ve been holding back this full time…?” Elyra asked, clearly she was a step away from exploding with anger.

  “Yeah, I believe I said as much already,” Eli said smugly.

  “Why are you betraying us,” Gretchen protested.

  “Betrayal…Ha… I did not want to battle this year in the first place. You guys forced me into it. I had plans. I would have a full decade's worth of resources to fight off the intermediate cores, now I have to make other plans. Can you really blame me… You guys forced my hand.”

  “And how do you expect to survive next year or the year after. Most of us have extra cores. You can’t expect to be any of us in a straight up battle,” Gabriel alleged.

  “Ummmm… well probably true, but that is what Double taps are for. Sure that should help get most of ya. I had to trade for them. As far as next year and on, well I made a deal with Agatha, fire ant, and hive. Crustaceans are kind of like insects after all. Scurry around along the bottom of the sea. Anyways, I will join them. With 9 rookie cores, I doubt the few of you who survive this will be in any state to challenge us. They already agreed to join me in battle against any who try…hehhehe.” Eli could not keep from laughing.

  Elyra raged, and she was not the only one.

  Peter finished the message, handing to a grim Khan to attach to an iron glider fly. It was simple, ‘Eli is moving against the other allied cores finish the Bonefiend attack as soon as possible.’

  “Eli…” Peter said clearly over the others. The others quit swearing at the guy, momentarily. “I will survive your little surprise attack. I mean it's actually pretty pathetic you expected this much to be enough. I’m sure you have watched my battles. Doesn’t matter, what does matter is the fact that I will squash every spider or bug I have to, to get to you. You just signed your death warrant.”

  “Hhehehe… You are so full of yourself. I have indeed watched your battles. You may be one of the strongest rookies. It's a wonder how you have won year after year, but you can’t overcome pure numbers. Which even one of the bugs would likely have on you. It’s kind of their thing. Dealing with all 8 of them along with me… impossible. I’m tired of talking to you turds. My forces in Bonefiend’s dungeon will fight and march forward until they die. My last gift to you guys. Who knows, perhaps you guys can finish them off in time.”

  With that, Eli had turned off his ability to receive messages from them off. Elyra screamed after him, Predator started having a panic attack. The guy did not have a spare core, or if he did probably not enough to survive a double tap. Peter just looked at Khan.

  “I got the message out. I will prepare our forces, personally," the old rainger said with a grim tone.

  “Numbers?” Peter asked, looking at his aid.

  “It seems the guy did expect a bit more from us. He sent about 3,000 units including 8 A tiers.”

  Peter nodded. It was indeed slightly higher than reported by the others.