The grind of an ongoing melee was a very different type of combat than the thrilling and domineering charge of the Immortals. The mass that had propelled them through the ranks of the enemy now bore down on their back. Leeroy welcomed it. It had taken her a long time to grow accustomed to fighting with a second shell, but once she had, once her armour wearing Skill had risen to a sufficient rank, she had come to understand its power.
The jaws of the termite foe, long, curved and sharp beyond belief were designed to find the weak points of an insect carapace, the joints between body segments, and sever them brutally. For the Immortals, such weaknesses did not exist. The joints that connected their head, abdomen and thorax were heavily protected by layers of enchanted and hardened metal that defied even the potent mandibles of their enemies.
They had no powerful magic. They could not blast with fire, or ice, or blow powerful gusts of air that would scatter their enemy. Nor did they have powerful streams of acid that would melt their enemies by the dozen. Their mutations and evolutions had driven them in a different direction and it was on those strengths that they now relied.
Their enlarged heads held dense muscles that powered their long, compounded mandibles and they leveraged those with devastating bites. Their legs were specially evolved and mutated to hold their immense weight and drive bursts of speed that allowed them to initiate small charges when given a breath of space.
Though they couldn't reach full speed, these smaller charges allowed them to throw their weight around, bashing into the termites around them, shattering formations and cracking their shells, creating weak points they could exploit.
Fighting in close quarters with Leeroy and her followers was like a human trying to contain a miniature Vibrant in their hand. Painful.
They bashed and crashed, bit and scrapped, stepping over the fallen and broken bodies of their opponents as yet more emerged from the hole in the tunnel wall to take up the fight.
Even with their thick, reinforced carapaces and sophisticated armour, the best that ant ingenuity could provide, they were not invulnerable. As thousands of termites surrounded their hundreds, it was inevitable that they would begin to take damage.
The first wound Leeroy took was close to her neck and she was glad for it. She'd gone too long in this battle without her HP lowering at all. Had her armour not stopped the pointed end of that barb dead in its tracks, she may have suffered a serious wound, more's the pity.
She battled on, her reserves of energy dwindling as she expended her stamina to bite and snap her way through the melee. As the conflict raged, her sisters and her suffered more and more harm. Vastly outnumbered, there was a limit to what they could do to defend themselves as they sought to inflict as much damage on the enemy as possible.
Not that it mattered.
Those tier six members of the Immortals, inflicted as they were with the terrible curse of not properly reading their evolution options, felt the Phoenix Fire building within them. The more damage they took, the brighter it became until it raged within their bodies, a dense ball of energy just waiting to be released.
Still, they fought on. Dragging the enemy down with them kicking and screaming, buying as much time as they could for reinforcements to arrive so that this offensive could finally be repelled.
Finally, she could stand no more.
A termite lunged forward and Leeroy couldn't react in time. The vicious monster grabbed hold of her leg and threw its weight backwards, causing her to stumble. Before she could reorient herself, three more termites fell on her, biting furiously, their jaws seeking the gaps in her armour that had been torn open over the course of the battle.
Exhausted, wounded, no longer able to support her own weight, she slumped to the ground as the light began to fade from her eyes. It was in these moments that Leeroy felt most at peace, and though she knew it wouldn't last, for a brief moment, she could embrace the illusion that at last she could rest, secure in the belief that her heroic sacrifice had bought time for her siblings, that she had died a worthy death.
Only for the briefest time could she indulge in this fantasy before it was cruelly torn away. That cursed organ, deep within her carapace, pulsed ominously before the energy contained within flooded out. A torrent of bright flame erupted within her and rushed through her veins before it ignited her flesh and seared the termites around her.
Awareness came flooding back. Energy came flooding back. From the brink of her eternal rest to cursed, rejuvenated life in a matter of moments. Strength filled her limbs and Leeroy pushed herself to her feet, her mandibles clacking as she shook off the remains of those unfortunate termites who had clung too closely when they thought her defeated.
All around, the fires of her sisters had begun to ignite as her fellow tier six Immortals took the brunt of the enemy retaliation, not to protect their weaker sisters, but to bring this moment on all the sooner.
When Leeroy surveyed the field, she saw that still thousands of termites remained to fight. Her siblings were hopelessly outnumbered still, and no sign of the Colony's reserve rushing to their rescue could be seen.
Joy and hope bloomed in her.
"NOW IS OUR TIME, SISTERS!" she cried and flung herself back into the battle.
Now each wound would stick. Every dint in her HP was a step closer. Against impossible odds the Immortals flung themselves again and again, grinding down the foe, burning out their enemies using their own flesh as the tinder. Leeroy fought like a creature possessed of madness. No injury could stop her, no massed ranks could suppress her, she charged again and again, crashing through the lines, biting and clawing at everything she could reach.
Her vision began to blur. One of her antennae had been torn off. One of her legs was broken. She fought on. Surely. Surely this time.
"Let not a single termite live! Chase them down and exterminate them!"
She didn't know from where this new scent came, but the following rush of steps announced the arrival of more ants to the scene. Soon she was surrounded by fresh soldiers who threw themselves against the depleted termite force, filled with rage and vigour.
Her heart sank.
She'd been so close.
"Well done, Leeroy," Advant came and patted her on the back. "You can go and rest now."
She didn't reply except to nod wearily as she turned and dragged herself back towards the safety of the newly established ant lines. She knew it would be hopeless to continue fighting, she'd tried it before. She didn't want to be dragged back to the healers again, they hadn't let her go for days.
"Immortals, to me," she called to her sisters and slowly the now patchily armoured behemoths began to regroup, pulling themselves away from the fighting, dejected. Another opportunity lost. Another chance at eternal glory denied to them. For how long? How long could they endure?
Forever, if the Eldest had their way.
Leeroy shoved down a wave of bitterness as she reached out to comfort those around her. A few required help to move, their armour having become so twisted it needed to be removed before they could rise. They set to the task sluggishly, all of their previous enthusiasm killed by the scorned hopes.
"Leeroy," came a call, and the mighty soldier turned at the strange note she detected in the scent of her sister. "Come here."
She turned to see one of her comrades standing over another Immortal, one leg extended and placed on the other's carapace. The steel of the fallen one's armour was so twisted, so tortured, there was no possible way she could stand, she would need help. Leeroy sighed and began to drag herself over. She would assist her sister, of course she would. She may need to bite through the metal and strapping in order to free her, then she could be healed and they would return together.
Except, the ant who had called her remained strangely still. The fallen one still hadn't moved.
A strange emotion bubbled up in Leeroy at that moment. A feeling she could not identify. A hope she would not name.
Her limping stride grew longer as she forced her broken leg to move.
"What is it?" she demanded, not taking her eyes off her fallen sibling.
"I… I think she…" the ant could not go on. She trembled.
Leeroy reached out with her remaining antenna and touched it to the carapace of her fallen sister.
"She's gone," she said.
Her words rolled through the Immortals like a wave. One by one they gathered in silence until every member of their order stood in a circle around this one, still form, lying where she fell on the tunnel floor. They dipped their heads in respect.
Overcome with emotion, it was all Leeroy could do to force herself to speak.
"Her search is over. This one has found her rest. She has found her glory."
She choked.
"Does anyone know her name?" she asked.
"Cardigant," someone replied.
Leeroy nodded slowly. She turned her head to better see the eyes of her sisters. They burned. They burned so brightly she almost couldn't bear to look. She felt it too.
It was possible.
IT WAS POSSIBLE!
"RAISE HER UP MY SISTERS! RAISE HER HIGH AND WE WILL BRING HER HOME TO HER FINAL REST! HER ARMOUR SHALL BE OUR TREASURE AND WE SHALL NEVER FORGET THE FINAL CHARGE OF CARDIGANT! SHE SEEKS NO MORE!"
"REST IN GLORY, SISTER!" they thundered back at her.
The other ants watched, bewildered, as a joyful and triumphant column of Immortals made its way back through the tunnels, bearing the body of the first and only member to find what she had been looking for.
When next Leeroy and the Immortals emerged to battle, they did so with a fervour and fanaticism that none had ever seen before. Their hope had been renewed. Once again, the Immortals were reborn.