Chapter 1000 1000 Glorious Battle
Max took a moment to restock his materials storage with parts from the destroyed interceptors, effectively reloading for the next leg of the battle and began to assess the battlefield.
Things were not going well for the defenders.
Many regions had been pushed back, the majority of the Darkling and Arisen forces had been pulled into another layer to fight, and there were very few reinforcements left on the line while the enemy just kept appearing, wave after wave.
From the looks of it, when the Darklings asked for every species to come and help, they didn't mean a delegation from every species. They meant everyone. Every single combat-capable being was going to be needed to keep up the battle at this rate.
There was no telling how many more waves of reinforcements the enemy could bring, but there was no point during the battle when they had not outnumbered the defenders by at least two to one.
[Commander. The planet's surface has been scoured of the Klem, and the Demonic beings assisting them have retreated.] The Android Army's Commander informed him, bringing the first good news Max had heard in a while.
[Return to orbit. The Destroyers will have deployment data for you.] Max ordered.
There was another group of attackers coming for the Koleska unit under Commander Yuri, and there was a massive Myceloid force engaged with the Anomaly Fleet, but they at least looked like they had things under control.
A thousand Titan Class Mecha was more firepower than the entire fleet of some of the species present, and the human ships were far more heavily armed than most.
An Orbital Lance streaked out from the lead ship of the Anomaly Defence Fleet, tearing apart a Myceloid Colony Ship and clearing a path through the horde. The sight assured Max that they would be fine for a few minutes.
With all their Orbital Lances, including the ones on the Mecha, which he had swapped out on his own, they would be able to keep clearing out waves of enemies with relative ease.
Nico joined Max as he waited for the Androids so that they could form a unified push into the enemy lines with their full force and hopefully begin to stabilize their portion of the front lines.
The Mass Drivers had crushed the last wave of enemies that came to them, and they had a moment of relatively clear skies, but minute by minute, it became clear that they were about the only ones who did have things under control.
[Zone One Flank has collapsed. The Noggara are in full retreat, along with their support fleet.] The Koleska Fleet General informed everyone.
[Zone Two and Three are faltering under the influx of new attackers.] He added.
That was over a light year away, on the far side of the battlefield, and dozens of species and a truly massive scale battle separated them from the human fleet.
[Prepare for Incoming.] Nico suddenly announced a split second before Max's sensors detected the disruption in space that indicated an incoming portal from the unknown layers.
[The Android Army is staged. What are your orders, Commander?] The team leader asked.
[Form up at our location, with the Destroyers on the far side, away from that disruption.] Max ordered just as the first enemies began to appear.
Hundreds, then thousands of corrupted Cathedral Ships emerged from the profane portal with its strange energy signature, and they were firing before they even fully coalesced in reality.
The Mecha scattered and began to fire back, allowing Max and Nico to target the largest of the enemy's Capital Ships, hoping to destroy their command structure, but the news from the line was not good.
The Cathedral Ships were everywhere, and large portions of the line had been boarded by the Demonic Beings, who were ransacking their ships.
Looking into the other layer, even the Darklings and Arisen were being forced back until finally, a regroup message was sent with the Darkling security patterns. All forces were to fall back and attempt to defend as many of the worlds in the region as they could.
The enemy force was too large to take face on. They were going to have to find another way to deal with it.
It wasn't going to be that easy to disengage, and Max moved quickly to make sure his own force would be able to get away.
[Commander Yuri, Fleet Commander in charge of the Anomaly Fleet, please move to join the Innu. Valkia, fall back to your ships. I will defend the position with the Android Army while you retreat to the Anomaly area and make plans for a counterattack.] Max ordered.
The Androids moved to a defensive net formation, letting the others move behind them, and Max reluctantly switched the Mass Driver Rounds in his Thunder Guns to Nuclear bombs. The space here was so unstable from the battle that a single Antimatter bomb was likely to tear it apart and throw half of the battle line into another layer.
The Thunder Guns barked, shaking the chassis of his Mecha and three of the Cathedral ships' shields flared, absorbing the impact and explosion, then another barrage from Nico before the Androids unleashed their full firepower against the damaged ships.
But three in a matter of seconds was nothing compared to what was appearing, and Max considered how to make his attacks more effective.
The shielding that the Cathedral Ships were using here was nothing like the last time he had faced them, and he didn't know the capability, but he decided to have the Android-piloted Destroyers try their Orbital Lances. Each ship had three of them, with one mounted on the front and one on each side.
That seemed to be the answer.
The larger ships were destroyed in a beam of blinding light, while the Mass Drivers and energy weapons of the Mecha dealt with the smaller vessels.
The Titan Class Mecha of the Anomaly Fleet joined them seconds later while their ships retreated to guard the others.
[We are with you, Commander. We have the firepower to run a fighting retreat, no matter what they throw at us.] The leader of the Mecha force informed him in a grim tone.
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