Baa-Ram-Ewe!

-Equus, Airship Mauled, Jaded-

“Hail friend, how are things?!” Flamberge the Fiercely Flammable and Obnoxiously Loud asked as he sat down with us.

“I’m in the metaphorical dog house for getting Luna to join in on a romp in trying to destroy the conceptual existence of Saddle Arabia.” I mewled pathetically.

“Well you do kind of deserve it after the mess you caused.” Gene Eric the Swift Reaction stated with a smirk as he leaned against the table lazily.

“Yeah, but it still sucks that they won’t cuddle me or give me attention… bet it’s even worse for them…” I didn’t know whether to smile or not about that knowledge. On the one claw the herd was suffering, on another it was heartwarming that they were suffering because they wanted to cuddle me but couldn’t give me any attention as that would be ruining the punishment.

Couldn’t even do the mom thing and play with Silvers, apparently this would teach Silvers a helpful lesson as well and I didn’t mind teaching Silvers that life is not about always getting what we want.

“I believe you mentioned there was a problem with Velvet’s pregnancy?!” Flamberge asked getting us back on topic as he was somewhat concerned about the subject as he and a certain kitsune were thinking of coming together eventually… after a few hundred years of dating and by then I’d likely be dead of old age.

Plenty of beings on this planet had absurd life spans or were still in the incarnation cycle despite the night immortality of being nearly ageless according to Celestia, gods tended to fall out of that with their immortality. I wasn’t about to find an aspect any time soon that I excelled at so hard that the universe will acknowledge it in an over the top manner… unless endless ludicrous plans count or maybe I could become a minor goddess of pettiness when it comes to Saddle Arabia.

“Yeah, we can’t do the magical potions thing too much, if you’re second or third generation coming from such potions… well… it’s against the natural order of things and it causes some truly major issues down the line. It’s a good thing mom is being careful to not teach anyone how to make those certain potions… though Zecora has basically figured it out, but don’t tell anyone about that. Velvet’s a reindeer so it’s obvious the major problem is body temperature issues that may have complications in birth as far as her personal health is concerned, almost everyone who’s researched the phenomenon are still very much confused about how Arizona did it. Otherwise the baby is perfectly fine, Velvet not so much even if she’s been toughing it out fairly well so far, but the baby will definitely be a cow or look like one and she’s going to have it.” I leaned back and thought about how my father’s spell might make little Silvers close to being a second generation, thankfully Silvers was a result of parthenogenesis which was naturally occurring and some chimera do that naturally enough that they can have any number of mates. Just so long as it doesn’t become a eugenics program it won’t be a problem and I won’t have to come down on the slightly rude and brutish society Maries comes from. “So mom is researching a potion to check for generational magical tampering, she’ll give that recipe up and spread it widely with Sage Meadowbrook’s help just in case someone figures out how to magic up babies in a highly unnatural manner. Zen bones says once or twice and society won’t collapse, but more and the birth rates will plummet like a rock and infertility will run rampant due to biological problems caused by magic itself not understanding biology… apparently it’s happened before with some pony named Majesty running an ancient civilization previously called Pony Land on the next door continent before the whole wendigo thing in the distant past. Frankly, I think Majesty is why said ponies separated into tribes.”

“Well that’s not terrifying to worry about, like at all, at least adoption is still a thing right?” Gene muttered while rubbing at the feathers on his head. “I mean if Jacky wanted more, I’d be willing… but she was barely lucky enough to carry little Gavin to term.”

“Family is many things, blood, found and more.” I commented dryly noting one of the three brothers wasn’t here. “You know what I haven’t heard today?”

“What? You mean Fortitude not…” Gene started to say, only for the obvious to happen.

“I AM FORTITUDE THE FANTASTICALLY FRAGRANT!/I AM YONA THE COURAGEOUSLY CUDDLY!” The shouts from the two yaks sent food, citizens and tables flying everywhere in the restaurant.

After getting up we had found that they were actually shouting that across from the street through the doorway.

“Ow…” I said from underneath a table as a bit of fish jerky stuffed itself into my mouth a second later, in fact I think it came from one of the many barrels of fish jerky mom had lying around. My mother Kuril made so much of the stuff that not even thieves could steal it all.

‘Deer gods’, the yaks have learned to outright turn their voices into weapons… we should all be scared.

Also we shouldn’t have left an impressionable Yona alone with Fortitude for too long. At least the shield maiden look works for Yona, well enough so that I think the she could go into fashion.

-Moon Cell Realm, Midgar, near the gate to the city, Pom-

Shanty at least had The Arsenal less focused on me, still getting portals raining projectiles at me left, right and above. At least she could actually deal some damage to it and that’s because she was using physics of the water she controlled slamming into like at tidal wave… not that it helps after we just took a territory destruction to the face.

We also had incoming Brutes and there’s Lu Bu to worry about pursuing a fight with Shanty, thankfully he didn’t seem fast enough to keep up with her at an increased size to that of a small building. It wouldn’t be long before he joined the chaos.

It would be seconds before the fiery demon showed up and I was in the middle of ducking the left arm of a brute trying to slam me with a hook. I swung my paralance and took out the nearby Trooper to the right and started moving away from the brute, the guys with the guns were far more dangerous than the bulky muscle monsters and their much slower attacks. Still didn’t want to be hit by said attacks as I leapt backwards and avoided another one bringing its massive spiked clubs for arms down where I was and got them both stuck in the ground.

Instead of taking advantage of that I turned and lashed out my right hind leg in a roundhouse buck to break the neck of a Guard Hound before its tentacle could hit either me or Dolly, following that I blocked an entire portal load of bullets with the paralance as I kicked out of the way of it and another portal opening to my side that sent a plasma blast through. Dolly was sticking to my back for her safety as much as my own, as she has already deflected several bullets away from my torso.

We had to move somewhere else as we couldn’t stay out in the open where the EPs were slowly overwhelming us, in spite of the Saber Knights and Zealots best efforts to help us. The Saber Knights were proving hardy against the Troopers and Helitroopers, the Guard Hounds and Brutes were slightly more of a problem for them and the Zealots weren’t good against anything that specialized in close combat.

I watched as Shanty narrowly avoided a plasma blast and then said blast impacted near where I was as I was dodging away from it and was knocked from my hooves.

After tumbling a short distance, I quickly sat up and watched as hundreds of projectiles pour into the water around Shanty. All of them were stopped before they could even reach Shanty and got ejected downwards or back at the tank in the form of solid massive blobs of collected metal that rocketed forth like cannonballs into The Arsenal.

Shanty was even doing well against the tank, up until a blast of flames shook and staggered her by boiling some of the water from the left side of the water colossus’s face.

Quickly rolling away form a Brute trying to pound the life out of me, I’m surprised Dolly was still holding on as well as she was.

“Are you okay Dolly?” I asked as I backed away from several Troopers focusing fired on me before an exploding digital hockey puck took them out.

“Still alive, didn’t expect to be in a war zone and okay is a state of mind at this point, but I still have your back!” She meant it literally as she hadn’t let go of riding on me. Lu Bu was attacking Shanty and Shanty was attacking The Arsenal, she was getting as overwhelmed as was everyone else here.

We couldn’t last like this, at least the two Skein Flyers and the skiff were still airborne, but the heli-troopers were a major problem for them even if they were slow moving in the air. Our minimal air support was barely good enough to fend off the heli-troopers and they had to keep moving or Merak would target them and take them out of the air, the guy was obviously more dangerous in enclosed spaces where you had little room to dodge.

Our mission was successful at the very least if Canard, Sami, Snake and Peppercat of the demolitions team were here… but where was Shine? I didn’t see the slippery shadows sliding ghost gourd around, but she could at least take care of herself since of the things here did physical attacks.

Didn’t have time to worry about that as I swung twice taking down two Guard Hounds with blunt force and Dolly brought her board around to shield me from several shots a Trooper sent my way before the EP took a thrown knife to the head from Elise.

“Pom, we need to get out of here!” Canard called as the skiff swung low a fair distance away from me and he hopped onto the flying platform as it ascended and avoided some Guard Hounds.

“Excuse, I’m kind of busy at the moment and I won’t leave Shanty behind!” I’m rather invested in making sure Shanty lives longer than I currently will, on that note… I crouched down and blocked a tirade from both kinds of troopers with the paralance. “Where would we go, there are APs everywhere!”

No place to hide and I quickly leapt away as a Brute threw an overhand right arm slam at me that tore a hole into the ground.

While the combine firepower of Sami, Krosserdog and Crazy dealt with them, I started to retreat on hoof as more and more the Brutes were coming and not just the three that were already encroaching on me quickly.

Shanty was losing water mass to Lu Bu hitting her magical fire and flaming fists, she was trying to keep in the fight with The Arsenal all while trying to fend him off. It wasn’t going too well and neither were my attempts to keep away from the Brutes as there were nine of them now and I couldn’t actually attack them.

“Fly overhead, I’ll grab on!” I could jump high enough, Canard apparently understood why I was asking for that and I was kind of surrounded at the moment and I was busy smashing a Guard Hound with an overhead swing of the paralance.

Coiling the wool around my hind legs as I fought back several Guard Hounds and avoided the swinging arms of the Brutes, I moved behind a pair of Zealots that lunged forward and stabbed down the Troopers they had an advantage against their shields easily soaking the gunfire when there’s not more than one concentrated on them.

“Keep holding on Dolly!” The skiff flew overhead and looked to be about to lower down, instead I crouched down and launched myself up with my wool springing me up to the bottom of the skiff which I grabbed with my right hoof and clung fast as I held the paralance in my left while blocking fire coming from below. “Go-go-go, we need to help Shanty, also is Shine up there?”

“No, Snake says she went to do something important before taking to the shadows, she should be fine!” Canard called out to me as I continued to block shots from the Troopers as I hung below the skiff as it took off and avoided a group of Brutes jumping and swinging at me. They were too heavy and they weren’t nearly anywhere even remotely close to reaching me as they could barely jump five feet off the ground and we were like thirty or so feet up. “I’m more worried about where Jeanne is!”

Shine was at least the safest among us about being able to get out of Midgar alive at the moment, but I doubt she was going for an escape. If we needed someone to get out alive then it would be her and possibly with someone else if she uses her Trick-Or-Treat move one person.

As for Jeanne, she didn’t seem to be getting attacked anywhere down there. So hopefully she retreated to the AP controlled territory to regroup.

-Shanty-

I be lashing out the massive right leg of water and it be transforming into a blade. The cutting arc be damaging The Arsenal somewhat again, but I think it still be having too much fight in it as I quickly dodged back and ducked down around a flaming punch that flew over my head from behind to start blasting Lu Bu with a mass of water from the left shoulder, as I backed away from him and moved to the side to avoid a big blast of hot energy as it flew by.

The water I was spraying at him didn’t be putting his fire out, it was just turning into steam before it could even be making contact with his flames. Also it had been a while since I last needed air and I could still be feeling myself breathing despite being entirely encased in water.

An eruption of flames be shrinking down the giant water goat I be making as water be bursting off of the goat shaped mass of water in the form of steam. Lu Bu then be trying to reach into the water to be trying to grab me, I be pushing him back with the left hoof and backed away before a blast of energy from the right cannon from The Arsenal be striking me and burning away more of the protective water that be surrounding me.

I hopped and turned the goat shaped mass into a spherical blob of water and bounced over the Arsenal. Lu Bu be getting a face full of projectiles, but it be doing nothing to him as he be bouncing them off of it, he did attack The Arsenal with a punch that be damaging it somewhat.

It be a wonder the machine was still holding up so well, but we not be really getting many chances to do some really heavy damage. In fact, I think I was being the only one that could, given Pom be hanging on the underside of the skiff and they were dealing with a lot of heli-troopers. I reformed the water goat and be lashing out with my right hind leg to swat a number of heli-troopers out of the air and then be slamming it down on a Brute.

“Shanty we need to retreat!” I could be hearing that through the water, didn’t be wanting to, but… I moved backwards rapidly to avoid the blasts of lightning The Arsenal be sending my way and I had to be avoiding Lu Bu’s massive flaming fist as it be digging into the water towards my face and creating lots of steam blinding me to what The Arsenal was doing.

I still managed to be fumbling my way out of being grabbed by him.

-Junkyard, Jeanne-

“I really don’t like fire…” I whined as I turned towards the Elite Trooper that appeared after tearing apart enough regular troopers and guard hounds. It had much more armor than a regular trooper and its weapon fired multiple projectiles at once in a wide blast with ever shot, my left arm was hit by several of such explosions of projectiles but my Iron Defense scales held up to the impacts as I pressed ever forward… alone… with a badly battered arm.

A second later a shadow popped up and rose up past the Elite and it fell over with a slash mark ripping up its entire spinal column.

“There you are! Are you okay Jeanne?” Didn’t have time to answer Shine as I immediately lunged towards the nearby PLANT and ran it through. We needed to keep our foothold, so I targeted it and ran the plant through with the spear.

“I guess everyone saw me running from the fight huh?” I stated lowly as the territory blast pushed away the EPs and a PLANT to start producing APs appeared, Guardian Lancers. We had some time to talk before more EPs came, they were less here than elsewhere… I’m sure I knew where most of the EPs currently were. “I’m still fit for fighting, it’s just that… it must not be great for morale to see someone who’s supposed to be one of the leaders retreating without telling anyone.”

“Depends on the situation really, we are kind of getting overwhelmed here and here you are still fighting even if you won’t go anywhere near fire. Just survive for an hour Jeanne and I’m sure help will be here to back us up and things will get better.” At least Shine had a chipper personality when it feels like we couldn’t hold for too much longer, The Arsenal was terrifyingly tough and Lu Bu was a nightmare. “Let’s call this a tactical withdrawal and start building up AP support while the others have the focus of the bigger problems.”

I looked at the lance wielding APs and sighed, Shine gave me a gesture to take charge of the APs and I shivered at her trust.

“Let’s move out!” I ordered and the Lancers joined up on me and Shine. I would not go into the flames, but I could still go near them. I tightened my grip on the banner spear, it would be hard to find any other PLANTs as the enemy is keeping them out of our reach and we’re barely holding on territory as it is. “We’re not done yet, I know you are at your best when charging forth or guarding an area, but help me find the enemy PLANTs and lead me to them! Also let’s avoid me being near fire… I can’t exactly brain that well when flames are around me.”

The Guardian Lancers started moving out with Shine taking up a position at my side and smiling.

“You’re father and mother will be holding that farm, it’ll still be there waiting for you when you get back.” Shine said sweetly and I didn’t know how much of that I believed, but I didn’t want this to be a one way trip.

“I’m terrified of fire.” I stated quietly.

“And you think I’m not?” Shine said with a cheerful lilt and light laugh as she sent me a gentle smile. “Everyone’s got something to be afraid of. It is how we deal with that fear that makes the difference in how it will be eventually seen, here you are by yourself and you’re still trying to make the situation better by at least doing something in spite of everything going on. You have yet to stop fighting and you haven’t completely given up. Even if I hadn’t shown up you would have taken that PLANT and sent help our way regardless. Now come on, let’s sow chaos in the enemy ranks together!”

Shine was a good friend and an even better hero than I was currently being, it wasn’t bitter jealousy that made me think this… but sadness that I couldn’t live up to the banner I carried so spiritedly and that I couldn’t put my full back into it when fear was getting the better of me.

For some reason I remember being burned on a stake and the nightmares haunted me, as much as incidentally burning down the barn back in Valora once when I was still a little Jangmo-o. I’m surprised to even be a Hakamo-o, how was I ever going to evolve to become a Kommo-o if I let fear get to me?

-Near the front gate, up in the air on the skiff, Canard-

Jeanne and Shine were likely together, also Jeanne was a tough lady. She could take care of herself and likely had her own ideas on how to deal with things, we’re still in a bit of a pickle here personally.

Guard Hounds and Brutes were less trouble when they couldn’t reach you, Troopers and Heli-troopers however were continuing to fire on us. At least the small trickle of Saber Knights was dealing with the Guard Hounds and slowing down the brutes, as for the Rider Zealots they were impressively deadly against troopers who had no melee option for dealing with them and their guns were all but useless against the zealots shields as they charged forth with their energy blades erupted from their gauntlets.

I sent a digital puck out and watched as it took down one of the Heli-troopers.

“How much time until the artillery in the walls blow Sami?” The skiff shook as some of the hundreds of bullets tore through the shields of the Zealot pilot and damage one of the better engines on this thing keeping us airborne.

“Three minutes until the overloads cause all the artillery to fail. I don’t know if they have a repair system, but it’s going to take quite a bit of time for them to recover from the damage hundreds of artillery cannons all going up at once will do!” Sami popped her head up from cover and started firing round after round from her rifle into the heli-troopers.

The flying troopers were currently our biggest issue and Krosserdog was the one doing the most damage to them.

“We do not want to crash near those Brutes when the skiff finally goes down!” Called out Peppercat as she fired a short ranged ball of lightning into a Heli-trooper trying to either land on us or attack the skiff with the whirling blades directly.

“We just got another territory…” Dormarch announced and looked off in the direction we entered the lower city from. Surge projector blasts were flying from his tentacles at every heli-trooper that so much as got within range of him. “I’m feeling Guardian Lancers, looks like Shine and Jeanne are trying to build up support and take out some PLANTs. Unfortunately for us Merak seems to have been keeping all the PLANTs away from us to prevent territory captures like that from happening… but he can’t deal with us and Jeanne’s small contingent from going after the PLANTs. We need to keep him busy and off balance!”

“Easier said than done Dormarch. We’re getting hammered from all sides here and Peppercat’s right, this skiff is not going to stay airborne for much longer!” A hole opened up in the zealots shield and Pom quickly physically plugged it with the paranormal lance. “Also Shanty’s water colossus is rapidly losing mass quickly, she can’t keep up with both of them for much longer. At least she’s getting faster the less water there is.”

“Nice to know that isn’t just me that noticed that something was up with a lack of PLANTs to assault in the area.” I turned to the zealot. “Fly us lower, the artillery along the walls is about to go up and I don’t want to be high enough to be caught in the blasts.”

We sorely needed that support like yesterday.

A widening blast of green swirling glowing wind, likely from Dolly, dropped every Heli-trooper out of the air around us.

Not too long after that I heard something hit one of the rear engines… my eyes widened we were losing altitude and both the rear engines had caught fire.

“This is Canard we’re going down, please get here soon after wall cannons go down. We’re almost out of time in here!” I called out into the headset I was wearing as the skiff started tilting forward and we were closing in on Ifrit and The Arsenal. I turned to the Zealot. “Aim the Skiff at The Arsenal, we’re going to jump for it, everyone is to get clear and get into the city and find a place to holdout, carry anyone that is injured or gets injured with you! We’re not leaving anyone behind and we need to start making this foothold stick!”

-Far side of the plains of Midgar, Castle Alexander, Ocellus (Music: Protect the Espers FF3/6)-

We were still getting hammered, but we were prepared to move forward and from the last signal sent out by Canard, it wasn’t going too well in there…

That’s when the first artillery piece along the wall went up in a giant conflagration and soon they all started exploding along the wall. The wall was minimally damaged, but we silently watched as all the cannons went up in massive explosions along the wall in a vibrant display that was too obvious to miss.

“That’s the signal!” I called out. “Commence plan Save Them! Is the Divine Judgement ready to fire?”

“As it’ll ever be, but we’re walking the rest of the way to the city once we use it… can’t wait to see this thing actually fly!” Answered Cid. “We’ll be walking the rest of the way and we’ll be down to two cannons working after the drain… but we’ll still give them heck.”

“Are the care package team ready to go?” I asked.

“Head Gazimon here, the zealots and the rest of us are ready to go, Welch has been pulling double time to get this done!” The Gazimon reported.

“Torneko, castle defenses?” I asked.

“We’re ready to take on the heat and keep on burning if anything gets inside!” Torneko responded jovially. “Our Minotaurs are ready to keep on trucking and some of them even like being engineers for Cid.”

“Welch production line on the Skein Flyers and Magitek Armors?” I asked.

“I’m having Rider Zealots help with building them and they keep trying to make something similar to the Skein Flyers.” Reported Welch.

“Let them make whatever it is they want as long as they keep supplying enough vehicles for the assault we’re about to launch, they are called Riders for a reason and I’m sure they have a few ideas of their own for what they want to pilot.” That’s all that I had to worry about, now I just had to command us into position.

-Castle Alexander-

The castle lifted into the air at the large mechanical paws and started levitating forward towards the city walls, the sudden lack of heavy artillery fire made it easy for the castle to ignore the fire from the many smaller vehicles and mechanical EPs the city had been absolutely throwing at them near constantly.

Just because the enemy lacked artillery, didn’t mean that Castle Alexander lost any of its own as hundreds of rockets fired arced from the castle’s courtyard on the back of the giant mechanical hovering dog. Without artillery support the EPs were being blown back in droves.

Something seemed odd as there was no Magitek Armor or Skein Flyers were being fielded as the castle continued taking a pounding from all sides as it headed towards the center of the battlefield of the plains.

The castle was moving at speeds that it previously hadn’t been able to move before, its turrets were putting up a meager offensive. As it neared the center of the plains still a fair distance away from Midgar the sword in the castles back rose up and started glowing.

“Divine Judgement!” Ocellus’s voice called at as the castle’s paws slammed into the ground and millions of beams of light started tearing across the plains and ripping through the enemy’s battle lines in short order tearing apart every EP in sight and gaining a huge amount of territory in the process as every enemy PLANT in the region was torn to shreds by the massive territory spike that buffeted the walls of Midgar.

Unfortunately the Divine Judgement couldn’t really pierce the walls and only a four beams managed to arc through an opening and into the city proper.

Out of three of four beams that made it through and there was only one to directly hit to a real problem target. The other three beams went wide and only destroyed two Brutes in the ensuing explosions.

The Arsenal was struck by the one lone beam in the back end of its right cannon and then had the skiff crashed into it not ten seconds later dealing a lot of damage to the tough death spewing tank.

“You think you’ve taken the field well let me show you what I’ve had cooked up for you!” Merak transmitted to Castle Alexander.

Hundreds of robotic scorpions started digging their way out of the ground around Castle Alexander while it was prone on its belly, along with hundreds of other mechanical tank EPs in a variety from spiders to normal treaded tanks. Hundreds of EPs unearthed themselves all around the castle and they were focused on moving towards it.

“Anthill, Anthill!” Ocellus called out loud from the castle.

The mechanical scorpions didn’t get too far before they were being struck by a lot of beams firing horizontally and from the direction Castle Alexander just came in. In fact a variety of energy attacks rained down on the sudden ambush swarm.

“Mirage Collective here, did somebody call for an exterminator?” Mirage Mew stated as thousands of Mirage Pokémon, the digital cousins of flesh and blood Pokémon, started surging forth onto the battlefield their souls alight and ready for battle.

Quite a number of Rider Zealots in the castle shivered at what Mirage Mew said.

“Harmony Programs on task, FRIENDSHIP!” Shouted Pinkpie.exe a second later as hundreds of candy cannonballs and horns started tearing into the enemy lines, followed by raptors, bulls and flying lizards charging across the battlefield.

“What?!” Merak seemed surprised they had seen that coming.

“Did you really think we’d miss you stuffing machines into the ground under the cover of your artillery fire?” Ocellus stated flatly from where she sat in the control room of Castle Alexander. “Thank goodness for Caerbannogs scouted the battlefield by digging through the ground or else we wouldn’t have known about that! I’m pretty good with knowing where to put stealth experts to work… since I am one.”

Castle Alexander stood up tall and started to slowly stomp forward as Mirage Pokémon and Harmony Program started to help with the decimated battlefield.

“Now that that’s finished… care package team launch now while we have an opening!” Suddenly hundreds of Skein Flyers hauling other Skein Flyers and some supplies started flying across the battlefield unimpeded along with Magitek Armors using large tilt rotor fans to get airborne.

The flying variant of the Magitek Armors fired missiles down at the various EPs on the ground while on their way towards the city. There was no anti-air to really stop the Rider Zealots from getting into the city at the moment.

“Care package team away, we’ll get to them in time Ocellus, you’ll see!” The Head Gazimon called out as they rode among the many Zealots flying for the city.

“Damn it, Moby is still dealing with the Slayer Dragon in the upper tiers… Moon Cell Watchers and Gunships start deploying right now!” Merak was not a happy camper at his sneak attack being foiled, he decided to focus his efforts on killing at least one of the few beings currently fighting inside Midgar.

“Everyone get ready for deploying ground forces…” Ocellus stated as the meager ground forces they could put out weren’t afraid of getting into a pitched fight. None were more eager than a tiny little yellow mite that could fit in the cup of someone’s hoof who was going to continue being a big hero on any battlefield. “Are you ready Dazzle, Frizzle?”

Castle Alexander, stopped, crouched down and offloaded a bunch of people onto the battlefield, they were soon surrounded by APs that teleported directly out of Castle Alexander.

Saber Knights, readied their swords. Guardian Lancers held up their spears. Caerbannogs were carrying bandoleers of grenades and rope darts on their hips. Rider Zealots were piloting regular Magitek Armor and any remaining Skein Flyers that weren’t part of the care package fleet that took off to attack Midgar by air.

Ocellus had noted that something was distracting Moby Dick, so their air forces would actually have a chance to get through.

“I think can get dragon type Growlmon going… that should be enough for us to take the plains right?” Dazzle responded as she and Frizzle exited the front gates with everyone that could fight while the Commandramon continued to hold the walls of the castle.

“Then let’s show them we didn’t come this far to be stopped now!” Ocellus called out brazenly. “We’re here to save worlds, let’s act like it, CHARGE!”

The APs moved out doing their various duties.

Saber Knights at the front with their shields, dealing with the smaller EP forces with their blades.

Lancer Guardians pierced forward with their lances. They speared through armor without fear.

Caerbannogs started disappearing into cardboard boxes, the ground or into tall repeatedly blasted digital grass. They would be scouting and setting up traps for the enemy. They toppled machines unexpectedly and caused havoc across the battlefield if they weren’t caught in time.

Zealots piloted their vehicles and protected the elite or VIP ground forces that were Dazzle or Quetal’s group, who weren’t as easily replaceable APs, from projectile fire as they provided a heavy offensive of their own. Their shields proved to be a problem for the many projectile oriented mechanical EPs on the field of battle.

Behind all of them stood the castle that continued to walk forward from the halfway point on the battlefield towards the front gate of Midgar in a full on assault without pausing.

“We’re coming, hold out for a little while longer!” Ocellus stated as the Mirage Collective Pokémon and Harmony Programs sent from Mare Melum joined up and started pushing forth.

-Currently retreating into the city of Midgar, Pom-

The Arsenal just took a lot of damage from the skiff crashing into it, yet it was still going. Lu Bu… was entirely unaffected by that Divine Judgement beam…. why am I not even surprised by that?

Krosserdog quickly helped me up and he then turned and started to fire on the incoming Brutes, his shots were less than effective and there were at least twenty of them to deal with now. Their numbers were slowly getting worse and they were obviously an elite type of EP given how tough they were.

Where was a rampaging Fou when I needed him?

“Come on Pom, we all made it off the skiff, now let’s move and start really sticking it to Merak!” Elise called out gleefully, she was really getting into this now.

I looked to see a giant water version of Shanty Buck Lu Bu in the face and at best it barely stunned him, no injury… we still couldn’t fight something like that.

“Stop thinking and start acting!” Dolly stated, patted me on the back gently with a paw.

“We’re going to need a lot of help if we’re to deal with Lu Bu and The Arsenal is still quite functional!” I pointed out that The Arsenal was already back upright and despite the damage… all its weapons looked like they still worked perfectly. “We don’t have the kind of firepower to deal with them and it’s not like a Magitek Armor is magically going to drop out of the…”

A Magitek Armor slammed into the pavement in front of me and it was entirely undamaged from where it was cracking the ground, it opened up and revealed that it had no pilot in it. I also didn’t like how the words ‘Metal Hound 002’ were stenciled on it in bold white letters on the armor painted to look like it had a wolfs fur pattern.

“Sky…” I said dumbly, also I noted there were large pack at the back of the armor that seemed to be for flight. Oh no, I’ve had enough trouble with driving a vehicle like this one on the ground, now I’m going to be piloting one that can fly?!

“Cheese House!” I looked up and my eyes widened, there were four Flying Magitek Armors and several Skein Flyers that started laying into the Brute EPs and started pushing them back with missiles. The four Zealot’s piloting flying Magitek Armor came in and landed, one of them turned to me and said with a hint of humor. “What lamb crawls?”

He gestured to the Magitek Armor innocently sitting there and waiting for a magical pilot…

“What, do you need a written invitation Pom?” Dolly stated with a grin, she was quite eager to get her paws on it and I was quite reluctant to get into something she didn’t know how to fly.

“Oh my goodness… Goddess Jiutian preserve me.” I dragged my left hoof down my face and turned to Elise and she shrugged at me, as did Cruel and Crazy.

Sighing audibly as it couldn’t wait, I went forward and hopped into the pilot’s seat and waited for Dolly to latch onto my head.

Here I go again, sealed in a screaming metal death trap fighting things well beyond my measure… I hate my life... bet this armor was going to be destroyed by the fight too.