"All units, assault formation! Charge!"
Colonel Niru barked the execution command the moment he registered the fracturing state of the first defensive ring outside the walls.
Hundreds of mechanized giants bounded across the open landscape, covering meters with every single stride and leap in a spectacular display of military force.
As a standard law of engineering, the larger a mech configuration scaled, the higher its internal power requirements became, severely diminishing its resource efficiency.
A weapon system capable of being deployed on a global scale never relied purely on its raw destructive output, requiring a balance between manufacturing costs, operational lifespan, field maintenance, and ease of control.
The fact that the Mindborn Empire could field an entire eight-hundred-strong regiment of these Type XS-52 mechs proved the absolute efficiency of the design.
"Open fire!"
Even before clearing the distance to the first ring, the twin six-axis particle cannons integrated into the mechs' arms began to roar.
Boom!
Multiple Sharkborn drones were violently hurled through the air by the concussive force of the detonations. Some lay completely motionless upon hitting the dirt, while the more durable units pushed themselves back onto their feet to maintain their vectors.
"Take cover in the trenches! Counter-attack!"
Razergill refused to let his legion serve as passive targets, immediately routing his Flyshark drones into the captured perimeters.
The Mindborn infantry units who had previously anchored the trenches had already been entirely cleared from the grid.
The very walls built to keep the invaders out had now transformed into the enemy's perfect cover.
"Die, primitives!"
Razergill fired his mace-spear blindly into the charging ranks, requiring almost zero precise targeting variables at this range. Every burst of his corrosive laser found a mark, dissolving the thick armor plating of the mechs and causing the massive machines to topple into the dust.
"Curse them!"
Inside his enclosed cockpit, Niru ground his teeth as he watched his volleys waste their energy against the dirt walls of their own trenches.
As the regiment's commander, he anchored the rear of the charge, surrounded by a dedicated personal guard cell.
"Accelerate the push! Drive them out of our trenches!"
"Right away, Colonel!"
Peering through the trench rim, Razergill evaluated the hundred-strong mech charge with absolute confidence.
An unbreachable fortress only required a solitary crack to fall, and he had already secured the opening vector.
His Flyshark drones possessed full atmospheric flight capabilities, but dropping them directly into the heavy anti-air networks of Tas City would be an absolute execution sentence. His tactical strategy relied on eating away at the defensive perimeters layer by layer.
Moving at maximum velocity, the Dreadbeast regiment rapidly bridged the kilometers separating the perimeters, sweeping past the second defensive ring.
The Flyshark Legion had initiated the campaign with twelve hundred drones, but previous combat engagements and the brutal clearing sweeps inside the trenches had trimmed their active strength.
Roughly nine hundred drones remained functional.
Compared to the Dreadbeast regiment, which had already dropped below eight hundred units, the alien swarm still maintained a clear numerical advantage.
"For the Empire!"
Clearing the intermediate boundaries, the mech pilots finally unleashed their full combat parameters.
Roars echoed across the tactical net as they charged headlong into the trenches, entering a chaotic close-quarters melee with the Sharkborn.
At the exact same cycle, the Groundshark Legion anchoring the northern sector used their superior tread velocity to violently breach the first defensive ring.
Lacking the sophisticated airborne maneuvers of the flight units, their single-minded frontal charge absorbed the absolute maximum output of the heavy defensive grid, driving their casualty metrics past fifty percent.
Less than five hundred Groundshark drones remained functional.
Under standard military parameters, a casualty rate breaching thirty percent would trigger an absolute routing script for an ordinary army.
Yet driven by their legion chief, the mindless mechanical monsters felt zero trace of hesitation, eagerly spilling into the trenches to join the slaughter.
Clang!
Along the western sector, Razergill drove his barbed mace-spear straight through the chest plating of a Dreadbeast mech.
With a harsh screech of tearing alloy, he ripped the weapon back, leaving the heavy machine to stagger backward before crashing into the dirt with a resonant thud.
Multiple mechanized wrecks lay scattered around his position, and the dark blue fluid dripping from his barbed weapon had already formed a small pool at his feet.
The visual stood as a silent record of his brutal killing script.
The moment the lines had collided, several mech pilots had single-mindedly targeted the hostile commander, drawn by his massive height that easily scaled above the standard drones.
Yet while ordinary pilots could match a generic drone, testing their specifications against an awakened warlord like Razergill was nothing short of suicide.
Every Sharkborn commander combined an independent consciousness with immense physical output and deep combat experience.
Their supreme leader, Silas Trifang, hadn't promised to anchor the final vanguard out of pure arrogance.
Witnessing several more of his men reduced to scrap, Colonel Niru finally closed the distance, his personal mech easily outscaling the standard units in his regiment.
His heavy machine stood nearly five meters tall, forged from a specialized alloy composite.
"Form up on my coordinates!" Niru commanded, flagging a few elite guards to focus their trajectories onto the hostile chief.
The ordinary pilots were being systematically butchered like wild fauna before this monster, confirming he was the absolute nerve node directing the alien force.
"Looking for deactivation, insect!"
Razergill spat, his attention snapping to the heavy guards closing within a few hundred meters.
He planted his boots, gripping his mace-spear with both servos to target the massive lead mech. Attempting to encircle a warlord was an absolute display of foolish audacity.
Zing!
A beam of dark red corrosive laser streaked toward Niru's chest core.
Razergill anticipated the usual melting scrap, yet the lead mech merely shuddered under the impact before continuing its charge completely unbothered.
The triumphant grin on the warlord's face armor instantly froze, replaced by an intense surge of frustration.
Before Razergill could pivot his weapon to strip away the guard units trailing behind the commander, Niru's dual particle cannons fired.
Boom!
The heavy outputs bucked violently as they discharged a saturation volley right into the warlord's coordinates.
The elite guards added their own firepower, the short distance ensuring the payloads detonated the exact millisecond they cleared the barrels.
"Cease fire!"
Niru commanded over the tactical loop, bringing his heavy machine to a halt as his optical display filters worked to resolve the expanding cloud of ash and smoke.
As the air cleared under his gaze, a battered silhouette materialized within the crater.
The concussive blasts had left Razergill covered in soot and debris, yet his primary structural integrity remained entirely intact.
"Impossible!"
Niru muttered, his subroutines failing to process the lack of structural damage.
The hostile commander had clearly deployed a high-tier energy shield similar to the prototype defense matrices integrated into the empire's absolute top-grade units.
Since ranged ordnance failed to breach the target, he would rely on raw mass to flatten the monster.
Spurring his boosters, Niru drove his machine straight into close quarters, though his personal guard cell was rapidly intercepted by a swarm of protective Sharkborn drones.
"Die, alien filth!"
Roaring through his speakers, Niru swung both massive mechanical arms in a wide, crushing arc toward the chief.
The Type XS-52 carried zero integrated melee blades, but its reinforced limbs served as devastating blunt hammers backed by heavy hydraulic systems capable of delivering multiple tons of kinetic force.
Yet the heavy limbs that had easily smashed concrete fortifications during military exercises were abruptly halted by the crude, barbed frame of the warlord's mace-spear.
Clang!
Inside the cockpit, Niru felt a wave of dread; the physical strength packed into the alien commander completely defied his calculations.
During the opening phases of the invasion, Silas Trifang had kept his conscious chiefs off the field, ensuring the Mindborn military remained entirely uncalibrated to their individual capabilities.
"You miserable crawling insects, I will tear your sparks out!"
Razergill roared, the previous bombardment completely igniting his fury.
He leveraged his mace-spear to pin the mech's arms, snapping his massive jaw plates down toward the cockpit canopy.
Thud!
Niru executed a desperate reverse thrust, the heavy frame stepping backward just in time to clear the lethal teeth.
Before his systems could even stabilize, the warlord surged forward once more, swinging his heavy weapon in an unbroken chain of strikes.
Clink!
A few surviving pilots tried to break formation to assist their commander, but the surrounding Sharkborn drones checked their vectors instantly, keeping the duel strictly isolated.
After a few more brutal exchanges, Niru recognized his systems were operating at a severe deficit.
Scanning the surrounding telemetry, he noted that the overall exchange rate between his regiment and the alien legion had flattened out to a horrific one-to-one ratio.
The Dreadbeast Mech Regiment was on the absolute verge of being systematically exterminated today.
"I will not permit it. I will never allow it..."
A cold certainty locked into Niru's thoughts.
As the barbed mace-spear came down once more, he dropped his defensive guard entirely, opening his cockpit armor to receive the blow.
With a sickening tear of metal, the sharp barbs bit deep into the chassis.
"Huh?"
Razergill's massive head tilted slightly, his primitive facial features showing a brief flash of confusion at the absolute lack of resistance.
Before the warlord could wrench his weapon free, Niru slammed both mechanical arms forward, locking the monster into an iron, unbreakable embrace.
The core reactor integrated into the mech's spine flared with a blinding, violent radiance.
Boom!
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