On the ground, Dyges’ eyes went slightly dimmer as the transmission was cut off. He wasn’t worried about the ascendant in the air. He was worried about the fate of the keystone.
At this point it was obvious it was a losing battle. Judging from the number of ships in space, even if every zealot and slayer on the ground was not a foot soldier but rather a Highlord, the battle would be lost. Two thousand Ma’lash couldn’t defeat twenty leviathans.
A terran army would’ve fallen apart already. Even if they didn’t jump on a transport and make a run for it, the defenses the men put up would be weak. But this was not the case with the Tal’darim.
Every single combatant on the planet was present. Crimson bane blades were activated by zealots who couldn’t wait to bath in the blood of their foe. Slayers tapped the ground with their metal limbs. Havocs made intimidating noises as their AI, just like their creators, desired battle. Photon cannons scanned the surrounding.
Sensing the zealotry of his forces, Dyges shook away any sense of doubt. Even if he couldn’t keep the keystone away from Kerrigan’s hand, he would make sure zerg corpses cover the surface of the planet before that.
The ascendant got to setting up the defenses.
In space, Kerrigan licked her lips in slight boredom.
She was bored.
Being the most powerful figure, at least in the material world, in the sector, Kerrigan could get anything she wanted. If she wanted a planet destroyed, every single living being on that piece of rock would be gone before she could mention that again.
At this point, there was very little thing she could do to make herself entertained. She could no longer enjoy food. She could no longer have sex. Just look at what she did a few minutes ago: She was willing to throw away hundreds of expensive mutalisks just so she could enjoy the view of a Tal’darim ascendant dying slowly and painfully. Hell at the end of the Brood War she was even willing to let some of the potential enemies go just to make her life more interesting.
But now Kerrigan found another opportunity to make herself satisfied.
“How many Tal’darim are on the planet?” Kerrigan was in no rush to attack. The artifact was hers and would always be hers. The only difference was when.
Immediately, hundreds of overseers moved out of the leviathans and toward Monlyth. Their pneumatized carapace allowed them to move extremely quickly. Within half a minute, they got to the surface of the planet and spread out. The eyes that covered their entire body looked down on the Tal’darim fortification below, scanning everything there was to see.
“Overseers! Destroy them!” In the outmost defense, a supplicant slayer saw the mutated overlords. He ordered in a deep dark voice. His presence as a supplicant gave him slightly more authority than other slayers. Immediately, half the slayers present blinked and appeared beneath the overseers. Their phase disruptors opened fire, and overseers growled as they were shot down one by one.
Kerrigan didn’t raise a single eyebrow as every overseer on the ground was slaughtered. Instead, she merely remained still as one of the queens spoke up.
“My queen, there are 2281 Tal’darim units on the planet. Should we attack?”
Kerrigan smiled slightly. “I am fair.” She flicked her long nails. “Send 2281 units down and bring me the artifact.”
“Yes, my queen.” What Kerrigan did was against the zerg code of efficiency, but Kerrigan’s dominance over the zerg was more powerful than the zerg subconscious to stay efficient. Every queen present was created by Kerrigan to replace the cerebrates that refused to serve Kerrigan, and they knew better than to question their creator.
Hundreds of overlords, much larger than normal overlords, moved out of the leviathans and descended upon the planet below. The Tal’darim forces were focused around the pillar that held the artifact. The rest of the planet was pretty much defenseless. 2281 zerg units unloaded outside the Tal’darim defenses in complete safety.
With a sharp screech, these units consisted of zerglings, roaches, and hydralisks. They charged toward the Tal’darim defensive formation.
The zerg made no attempt to cover their tracks, and the Tal’darim saw them a distance away. A zealot immediately went to report.
“Ascendant, we have spotted zerg forces outside our defenses!”
“How many?” Dyges asked without turning.
“2281.” The zealot said with a sense of anger.
Immediately an area of empty space beside the zealot exploded. The zealot knew it was a result of the anger of the ascendant. He also knew why he was so pissed.
There were 2281 Tal’darim on the planet. The zerg outnumbered them a thousand to one at the very least, but instead of fighting them with their full power and gifting them an honorable death, the zerg decided to send out a small group of units. The zerg were known for their numbers. By sending out these limited forces, the zerg commander was telling the Tal’darim they weren’t worth her full might.
Dyges knew it was the Queen of Blades herself in the leviathan above. Her psionic power was like a burning sun to him, but her power didn’t mean she could mock a warrior’s honor.
“Kill them all!” Maybe he couldn’t win this fight, but he woteachught the Queen of Blades a lesson. The Tal’darim were not to be toyed with.
In the front, the Tal’darim forces growled in utter excitement. Zealots led the charge as their bodies were temporarily turned into a blur of energy. The next time they appeared they were smashing into the zerglings in the front.
Red psionic blades cut through zerg carapace. The bane blades of zealots could only go through half the enhanced carapace before being stuck, but the elite warriors didn’t let that stop them as they kept on slashing and kicking and hitting and doing everything they could to inflict damage.
A Tal’darim zealot slashed down his weapon and severed one of the claws of a zergling. The zergling hissed in pain, but the pain only made it faster and stronger. Without even flinching, the other claw of the zergling cut down toward the zealot’s armor covered body. A layer of red shield appeared and blinked, holding back the claw, and the zealot used the chance to stab his blade into the zergling’s stomach and penetrated its body.
The zergling was lifted into mid air, but the zealot didn’t stop there. With a bloodthirsty grin, the zealot turned off his weapon and reached forward through the zergling’s wound with his bare arm. With a sudden pull, the zealot’s hand left the zergling’s body. The only difference was the hand wasn’t empty. A sector of intestine was in the zealot’s grip.
The pain enough to cripple a terran marine rushed into the zergling’s tiny mind. The beast wasn’t, well, crippled, but a second slash across the head ended its life.
The zealot dropped the piece of purple blood stained intestine and smiled.
The next second a spine hit him in the face. The zealot level plasma shield was penetrated instantly, and the grooved spine found its way through the zealot’s head. The red light in the zealot’s eyes went dim as the warrior collapsed on the ground. With a final groan, his eyes closed completely and his body disintegrated, leaving just his armor and his weapon on the ground.
The legacy of the zealot was quickly covered as more zealots and more zerglings charged into the fray. In just seconds the once shiny armor was turned into a pile of muddy waste.
The melee units were covered by support units. Tal’darim slayers, modified stalkers with ranged attack, blinked into the field. Countless particle disruptor shots were fired at the zerg horde.
They were quickly retaliated by their counterpart from the zerg. Hundreds of elite hydralisks, hunter killers, launched grooved spines toward the red flank, earning a sea of clear red shields from their targets. Most of the time they couldn’t kill the units, but they could do enough damage so melee units could finish the job.
Dozens of smaller mechanical units appeared in the battlefield. They were havocs, modified sentries. They blinked almost simultaneously as their AI analyzed the situation and decided what was the best course of action. When the computation was complete, they carried out that order.
Two dozen red force fields appeared in the zerg forces. They couldn’t do real damage, but their contribution to the battle was still significant. The zerg horde was separated into countless smaller sections. Zerglings were put into different piles. Some of the zerglings were stuck in the back while others were trapped with the zealots and were massacred. The hydralisks tried to reinforce their melee brothers, but their spines were blocked as well by the force fields.
When the force fields faded away, the ground was already covered by zergling blood, and the hydralisks found themselves facing a crowd of angry zealots with little zergling between them. In a fair fight, a zealot could kill an elite zergling. Only when it was one zealot against two or three elite zerglings that the table might be turned.
The zerg took heavy losses, but they weren’t completely defenseless either. As the force fields were gone, a group of larger zerg units marched into the front. A hundred of them, they were much larger than hydralisks. Meters of armor meant their chance of survival was much larger than that of the fragile hydralisks and zerglings.
They were roaches, the tanks of the zerg. They weren’t as strong and durable as the ultralisks, but they were in more plentiful numbers.
They were obviously a difficult foe, but to the Tal’darim that only meant more glory. A zealot charged at the roaches. As his form solidified, his red blade was already on top of it’s target.
The zealot smirked as he felt his blade cutting into something, but his smirk immediately turned into a frown when he realized he couldn’t push the blade in further. He tried to enhance the psionic input of the weapon, but once again the weapon was stuck after making a few more inches of progress.
The roach opened its mouth, and a pile of highly corrosive saliva flew toward the zealot. The zealot was too close to the roach to move away, and his plasma shield was immediately activated. The acid hissed against the shield and was quickly evaporated, but so did the energy of the shield.
The warrior could feel his protection failing. He knew what would follow if his shield was gone. His armor was more decorative than durable, and he wasn't foolish enough to think it could stop the acid. Once the shield died, he would be defenseless. Even if the shield held, barely, there was no way he could survive in a battle as messy as this one with a half depleted shield.
Still, the desperate fate only brought up the strength in his heart. Instead of backing off, he redirected more energy into his bane blade and, with a sudden kneel, ducked under the stomach of the roach, He had never fought with roaches before, but it was common sense that the stomach of a beast was usually the softest part. The zealot couldn't cut through the armor in the head, but how about the stomach?
The roach realized what his opponent was doing. Taking a step back, it raised its sharp claws and stabbed down on the zealot. Roaches were ranged units, but every zerg could do melee. The sound of something piercing the wind made a whoosh sound in the air as the claws came down.
The zealot's eyes shined determination. Instead of dodging, he put his right wrist next to the roaches' purple stomach.
A blink of red cut through the stomach carapace and punched a hole through the salivary gland that held the acid in the roach.
The zealot only had time to put on a satisfied grin before acid poured out of the wound and smashed into his shield. The shield hissed and did its best, but there was a stream of the corrosive liquid washing over it. Finally, the shield popped, and the zealot screamed in pain as his face was melted.
The scream died when the injured roach continued to slash down with its claws and cut the zealot into a puff of red smoke.
Finishing off the zealot, the wound on the roaches' stomach was already mending. The layer of carapace wasn't the only thing that kept the roaches alive. Their rapid regeneration helped as well.
The victorious roach advanced forward, looking for its next enemy.
With the roaches as the tip of the spear, the zerg swarm started to punch a hole through the Tal’darim defenses. The protoss resisted, but they fell one by one. After losing a couple hundred warriors, the rest were pushed over the first line of defense. The photon cannons were destroyed and most of the defenders were dead. The survivors retreated to the second line of defense and were backed up by fresh photon cannons, the established defenders, and fresh reinforcements. With all these advantages, they barely managed to hold their ground.
As the Tal’darim were giving their lives for their god, their commander was still next to the artifact, thinking.
Suddenly, he looked up into space. There were twenty leviathans of the swarm in the sky, but he wasn’t looking at them. Instead, he was looking at another ship that just exited warp space.
It was a terran ship.
It was a certain outdated Behemoth class battlecruiser.
