Arturo counted maybe 20-25 Gold-rank signatures underground. Possibly more, sensing through earth and stone was imprecise.
It could an that Orion anticipated the Silver army was expendable while he maintained a core of true power in reserve.
Either possibility was unsettling for different reasons.
If Orion considered the surface army expendable... What did that say about his strategic calculations? About how much power he actually had access to? About what he was planning next?
Questions without imdiate answers. But questions that would need answering soon.
For now, Arturo needed to concentrate on neutralizing the imdiate threat of hundreds of tars in the imdiate range and the thousands still organizing for more coordinated responses.
The enemy army, despite having lost so hundreds in Selphira's first attack, was still very large in absolute numbers.
More than 4000 Silver-rank combatants remain mobile and mostly capable of healing and rescuing the frozen ones. Gold-rank leaders still directing them. Enough mass to be dangerous if properly organized.
And they began implenting even more defensive tactics that were effective specifically when you had many people available to coordinate, approaches leveraging volu over individual quality.
It was an iteration of elental power, each tar contributing their mana to the construction of the collective.
Smart tactics. Exactly what you should do when outnumbered but not outmassed. The walls ford a rough channeling structure, not complete fortification but enough to direct attacking forces into kill zones where fire volu could concentrate without risk of hitting allies by mistake.
Classic defensive design. Any academy would have approved.
And that fire volu began manifesting as dozens of tars with fire affinity coordinated attacks amplifying each other.
One tar launched modest-sized fireball, maybe basketball-sized, strong but not overwhelming.
But when it passed through space where three other fire tars were channeling fla energy, the ball grew exponentially.
By the ti it reached its intended target, a projectile that had started as a minor threat had transford into an inferno that could lt steel and vaporize water instantly.
And they could launch maybe 10-15 of these per minute. Creating continuous barrage that would overwhelm even golden rank defensive techniques through sheer sustained output.
Again, decent smart tactics. Using numbers advantage appropriately. Creating threats that individually superior opponents would still have to respect.
These were tactics functioning precisely because the enemy had massive numbers permitting coordination at scale that a small group couldn't replicate.
If Selphira and Arturo had tried facing that with a conventional approach of simply charging directly toward the enemy formation's center, they'd have been overwheld by the pure volu of elental attacks converging from multiple directions.
Even Gold 3 couldn't tank 10 amplified fire attacks simultaneously. Even Selphira's defense had limits when focused fire exceeded those limits through accumulation.
Even if she had finished Ren's 1000 days extra cultivation.
But Selphira and Arturo's group was small in numbers, and that smallness was also advantageous when applied appropriately rather than a disadvantage needing compensation.
Arturo gave signals that all tars under his command recognized imdiately.
All fingers raised. Sharp downward motion. Disperse.
The group divided into small cells of 5 tars each.
35 tars beca 7 cells. Each cell capable of operating independently but maintaining tactical communication with other cells through signals established previously.
And cell 8: Selphira Arturo (leadership, maximum individual power) Cells 1-7: Five-person units (mixed specialties for tactical flexibility)
It was a configuration maximizing mobility and minimizing risk that area attacks would eliminate multiple tars simultaneously.
Spread formation ant a single gigantic fireball might hit 5 people maximum instead of 37. ant the enemy had to divide their attention across 8 different threats instead of focusing on a single target. ant if one cell got pinned down, six others could respond.
Selphira and Arturo had ford their own cell together, two tars each worth more than hundred ordinary Silvers and not needing additional backup to operate effectively against most threats they'd face… Missing only wood elent in their roster.
Nobody argued with 4 centuries of experience. Nobody questioned Gold 3's tactical judgnt. You just followed and tried to keep up.
The cells began moving with speed contrasting dramatically with the enemy army's attacks.
Each identifying targets of opportunity. Each executing coordinated attacks leveraging speed and power over raw numbers.
Cell 1 flanked left, targeting earth-elent tars maintaining wall structures. Take out builders, walls collapse.
Cell 2 went right, engaging fire amplification chains. Disrupt one node, the entire chain becos less effective.
Cell 3 pushed the center, drawing attention and forcing the enemy to commit to defense.
Cells 4-7 circled wide, preparing to hit enemy flanks and rear once front engagent pulled defenders forward.
Classic small-unit tactics.
And Selphira and Arturo moved as a strike unit, identifying high-value targets and eliminating them before the enemy could react.
The oldest Gold leader attempting to assemble his forces? Selphira's ice spike.
Fire amplification node building particularly dangerous attack? Arturo's Qilin scattered the formation.
Earth wall blocking ideal approach path? Combined technique. Wall fractured and fell in under 5 seconds.
Efficiency. No wasted movent or mana.
And then it beca painfully clear why massive area tactics the army was employing were poorly conceived against mobile high-rank opponents.
The enormous attacks they'd designed to overwhelm other armies' defenses now had greater probability of hitting their own soldiers than striking elite groups moving much faster than engorged elental projectiles could travel.
Gold-rank tar with beast fusion… simply faster than the attack. Dodge wasn't difficult, just move perpendicular to the trajectory.
But the Silver-rank ally maintaining defensive wall position couldn't move. Perfect target for the attack that missed the intended victim.
BOOM
Fireball struck a friendly wall position. 9 earth tars caught in the blast.
"Watch your fire!" soone scread.
Too late. Another amplified attack hit a friendly formation behind them. 5 Silver tars went down.
"CEASE FIRE ON ZONE 3!"
It was a tactical nightmare. The exact problem that happened when you designed tactics for different types of warfare and then tried applying them inappropriately.
Area attacks worked best against armies. Worked against formations. Worked against targets that couldn't or wouldn't move too fast.
They didn't work against small, mobile, individually superior units that could dodge and let your attacks hit your own people instead.
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