The tactics of the Church even seemed to surprise Angaria so much that they had to scramble to respond.
This sight gave the Bishop so much happiness that her lips twisted into a sneer, and as he watched her, Jonah felt like cursing.
Different Bishops used different methods to denote tactics, and so, when she had uttered just that single alphabet, he hadn't been able to understand what she meant.
Now, as someone who had perused the records of the Church obsessively to find out everything that he could, he knew exactly what she was doing.
'TFT' stood for…'Taunt, Fortify, Teleport'.
It was a tactic devised to fight continents where their power level was such that they would have been able to survive even on the Mainland. The objective was for a force to infiltrate the land of the continent and set up a teleportation formation to facilitate the free movement of troops in and out of the war.
No one could have expected that this would be the tactic used here, as, from the beginning, the intention had always been to devastate Angaria in one fell swoop. The fort created by the soldiers kept growing stronger and stronger, and with a satisfied smile, the Bishop raised her hand again and made a third image appear on the last part of the wall that was still bare.
It showed the view on the outside of the fort where the Heroes of the Order hadn't moved yet.
The image they were watching till now showed the inside, where Jonah saw that half the soldiers had stopped helping those pouring their Energy into the 60 feet(18 m) wide fort and had assembled to begin laying down a large formation.
When Angaria did recover, the step they took could be commended, but alas, they were just a beat too late.
The circular fort was such that it could defend those inside even at the cost of the lives of all the Peak Heroes. As all four humanoid figures shot forth all of their attacks at it, a loud sound reached their ears but except for the entire thing shaking as if it was being swept up by a storm, there was no other change.
He did see the faces of the Heroes who were in charge of manning the defense tighten, as if they had not expected that they would have to deal with this sort of power. Still, they had done so with only their Energy reserves being expended, and at the moment, it looked it would be impossible for them to be breached.
Angaria seemed to understand that whatever they were doing, they had to be stopped. This was a wise observation, as it was never good to allow an enemy to do what they wished.
As if they had already practiced it before, the four humanoids started to clump together into a group.
"Oh, look… the monkeys seem to have learned a few tricks."
Without responding to her mocking tone, Jonah continued to witness the transformation of the four into a single figure that also had two hands and two legs, but was hazy, as if it couldn't properly hold its form together.
Still, its sheer size was enough to make warning bells ring in the head of anyone who might be going up against it.
It towered over the fort that had risen to be a 100 feet(30 m) tall, so much so that when it neared it, its highest point only came up to near its waist. That meant that the entire being with easily at least 250 feet(76 m) tall, and with time, it even began to get better and better at unifying the power of all 200 Peak Heroes who had been deployed.
Jonah waited to see what kind of tactic it would use. Had the Heroes trained enough to be able to combine their Mageroots to form catastrophic attacks? Or perhaps, could they use the continent-wide formation to somehow bring the Energy reserves of all of Angaria to bear?
That was clearly what had happened before, when the continent had empowered all four figures that had comprised of the Heroes.
The Bishop was still sneering, but he noticed that she had slightly bent forward on her chair. And so, together, they waited to see what Angaria would do.
When the giant figure got so close to the fort that it could simply stretch its hands forward and catch it, it made its move, and it was so simple that Jonah wondered why he hadn't thought of it.
With a sound akin to that of an earthquake, it bent its legs…and jumped.
The image of such a gigantic monstrosity bearing down on the relatively small fort of the Church made it seem as if they were only capable of being crushed.
Truly, as it flew through the air, Jonah saw that even the faces of the soldiers grew serious as they braced themselves and poured all their power into the Artefact that had created the fort.
Choosing to attack with all its strength by joining its hands together to form a mace, the giant struck a blow that made a shockwave travel across the surface of the Endless Sea.
A storm of dust rose from the earth after it landed, so for a few moments, neither of them could see the result.
Alas, when the dust cleared…the white fort still stood tall, while the giant figure was on the ground.
As it got up and began to pound on the fort with the combined strength of so many Heroes, the Bishop even started to laugh.
Jonah could only stare between the attack on the outside and the status of the soldiers on the inside. The incredibly complex teleportation formation that they were building was at least half done, and so, he began to wonder whether this was how the war would end.
He could bet that his disciple must have been shocked after seeing how the Church was still defending instead of attacking, but how could he know that they were building their power so they could kill everyone on the other side in one move?
Each attack by the giant possessed tremendous power, but the soldiers of the Church were armed with multiple figurines of the Saint that continued to be depleted as they poured more and more Energy into the Artefact.
The power of each attack truly was something to behold, but like a turtle, the soldiers managed to keep defending themselves. Sometimes, as the blows rang across the Sea, a few parts of the Artefact did fail and expose what they were doing within, but every time this happened, those who were on standby would quickly act to patch the hole.
Finally, after raining down 20 successive blows, the Heroes of the Order seemed to grow agitated as the giant's hands rose again and came down with a strength they hadn't used before. They were clearly exerting themselves, and because the soldiers had gotten used to a certain baseline of power to deal with, they weren't prepared for this sudden outburst.
This time, an entire tenth of the Artefact failed, and for the briefest of moments, everyone could peer inside and see what the Church was up to.
This, too, was patched quickly, but Angaria seemed to have gotten a glimpse of their intention, as the giant began to back off.
The Bishop and Jonah both sensed at the same time that a trump card was going to be deployed to try and stop them.
The giant soon melted away, leaving the shore of Angaria empty. This lull in the battle made the soldiers tense up, but as their training was infused in their very bones, they quickly moved to use this time to check on everything and make sure that they were prepared for whatever might come next.
A few seconds later, the first thing that changed was that the continent-wide formation in the sky began to light up again. This time, it did so with a red glow that reminded Jonah of what he had seen before embarking on their journey here, but this thought instantly fled his mind when an attack mightier than any he had seen in his life struck down from the center of the continent.
It came so quickly that he couldn't follow it with his eyes, but the Bishop seemed to have found out something as she stood up with so much force that the chair she had been sitting on flew back and banged against the wall.
Jonah followed her gaze to the part of the wall that was showing the interior of the fort, and that was when he saw the reason behind her reaction. Whatever the attack had been… It had managed to cleave right through the defense of the Artefact and strike at its very center.
10 Heroes lay singed and twitching on the floor, and beside them, a part of the teleportation formation had been destroyed.
As if there was no intention to give them a moment of respite, the glow in the sky intensified again, and this time, the Bishop dropped all pretenses and shouted at the Heroes still standing on the shore.
"The core! These bastards somehow figure out how to weaponize the core! Defend as if your life depends on it, dammit! Each attack will be stronger than the last! Analysis team, why the f*ck did you not detect that attack? I'll have you all flayed when we return! Soldiers, even if you all have to die, finish the task! Initiate Lifeforce Burn, now! Move, dammit!"