Iena is gone, and Nguyen and Gohka can’t break through our defenses alone.
If he’s still got the other ancient dragon chiefs on hand somewhere, that would be another story, but I really don’t see why he would be holding out at this point…
The moment when Iena and the other water dragons attacked the Upper Stratum would’ve been the best time to attack. With that window of opportunity closed, all that accomplished was losing a major player like Iena for no good reason.
So the theory that the rest of the chiefs abandoned ship makes the most sense. Why would they do that, though?
Well, I can kinda see Nia bailing.
She’s always been a shut-in anyway.
But Hyuvan and Reise? That makes less sense.
Hyuvan has a strong sense of duty and always carries out orders faithfully, despite his ridiculous demeanor.
And Reise is so loyal that he let himself be sealed away all by himself to protect the Sword of the Demon Lord.
It’s a little hard to believe that he would leave Gülie’s faction.
If he did, I’m guessing something really serious must’ve gone down on their end.
The scary part is, I have no idea what that could be.
Does this mean something is happening elsewhere that’s so important it could have a huge effect on our side, too?
Something that would cause loyal dragons like Hyuvan and Reise to secede?
…Okay, if that’s true, it can’t be anything good.
And it’ll be tough to figure anything out from way down here, where I’m not getting any information from the outside world.
That doesn’t mean I can just up and leave now, though.
It wouldn’t be wise to change our course of action based on nothing but a vague suspicion.
We’ve got to stick to our guns.
Focus all of our efforts on defending the Great Elroe Labyrinth to the bitter end.
Whatever might have happened to throw a wrench in the other side’s plans may just work out in our favor, anyway.
I’ve got to concentrate on commanding my own army.
Still, at this point, we’ve just about clinched it.
Things were already going well for our side, and now the puppet taratects have arrived.
That’s four puppet taratects along with the queen.
Not to mention nine arch taratects and plenty of smaller spider monsters, too.
On the other hand, Nguyen and Gohka’s side only has two ancient fire dragons and one ancient lightning dragon left.
The others have all been defeated already.
They were a match for us in terms of legendary-class monsters, but otherwise our defenses were just too strong.
Now that the puppet taratects have arrived, Nguyen and Gohka have zero chance of turning things around, when they couldn’t even handle the queen and her underlings alone.
Nguyen must realize that.
Not sure about that meathead Gohka, though.
Their best option here would be to retreat…but will they?
Nguyen howls.
Even though I can’t hear it as I watch through my Panoptic Vision, I can feel the forceful drive behind it.
He burns up the threads around him with fiery breath and fights back against the puppet taratects as they descend on him.
So he’s not gonna run.
I guess that proves that their side has their backs against the wall.
If the other ancient dragon chiefs were still on standby, that would mean Dustin is doling out his forces in piecemeal attacks, sending them in one by one only to get destroyed.
There’s no way he would do something so stupid.
It makes more sense to assume that Nguyen isn’t retreating because he knows there’d be no coming back if he did.
At this point, I have to assume that the other ancient dragon chiefs really did defect.
Their only remaining option was for Nguyen and Gohka to break through the queen’s defenses in the pit.
But we’re not nice enough to just sit back and let them do that.
The puppet taratects assault Nguyen from all sides, moving in perfect sync.
A fiery breath attack shoots from Nguyen’s mouth toward one of them—Ael.
She produces poisonous liquid to cancel it out.
Since he’s stronger and has the attribute advantage over her, Nguyen’s attack wins out, and Ael gets blown back by the fiery breath.
But the other three attack Nguyen in the meantime.
Their six sword-wielding arms slash away at Nguyen’s tough scales.
That’s three of them with six arms each, for a total of eighteen attacks at once.
Since Nguyen’s stats are higher, a single attack doesn’t leave a very deep cut—but it’s not shallow enough to ignore, either.
Eighteen of them at once is enough to deal some major damage to his HP.
In evident pain, Nguyen produces fire from his entire body in a last-ditch effort to drive them away, which only proves their attack did enough damage to make him cautious.
Ael, Sael, Riel, and Fiel.
These four puppet taratects are my elite force.
The puppet taratect species is exclusive to individuals handpicked by me. It can’t be reached through the normal taratect evolution tree.
But their numbers have been greatly reduced, and now only these four remain.
The rest of the puppet taratects fell in battle.
(Let’s not talk about the fact that it was White who took out most of them.)
These four elites who survived all that are the best of the best.
It helps that they were already particularly strong compared to the others, which is why I kept them out of that fight as my bodyguards.
That’s why they survived getting slaughtered by White.
And they’ve continued to survive even throughout this final battle.
Sure, they haven’t grown as quickly as reincarnations like Sophia and Wrath—even Merazophis has grown faster.
But they’ve definitely become more powerful by surviving so many fights.
I don’t just mean in obvious ways like higher stats and more skills, either.
Their techniques and teamwork have grown, too, in ways that numbers alone can’t convey.
These four are the puppet taratects who have survived it all.
And they’ve spent more time together than any of the others did, too.
No one can top their teamwork.
They cover for each other and fight in harmony without ever using Telepathy or anything of the sort, like their hearts are beating as one.
Riel and Fiel use their threads to catch Ael and bring her back right away.
Ael looks a little scorched on the surface, but the puppet taratects’ real bodies are the tiny spiders hidden inside their doll-like exteriors.
Damaging the outside won’t kill them as long as the spider at the core is safe.
With Ael and the other two brought together, Sael is left alone on the opposite side.
Nguyen notices this right away and goes after her.
But the other three puppet taratects leap at his back.
Nguyen senses them coming and flips around to fend them off.
Then Sael promptly takes that opening to attack.
Her sword slices up Nguyen’s wing.