"Princess, an army of 100 hyenas of our Clan has been gathered. We are ready for your orders!" a very muscular, black hyena shouted. It currently stood in front of the blood-red hyena, and it absolutely towered over her. Yet, it didn't dare to be disrespectful. Behind the black hyena, 100 other hyenas could be seen. All of them had lowered their heads to show respect.
"Very well," the princess said. She was only 30-meters-tall, but she felt gigantic to all the present beasts. She was a Lord, something they couldn't fight. "Then, we will proceed with the attack as planned."
"Yes, princess," the black general said. Then, he turned to the army. "The Earth Movers will create a pathway on sea level. You will then fight the sea beasts and kill them however you want. This is a war, not a duel. So, you will do everything in your power to kill as many enemies as possible."
"The corpses will be shared among the participants in the fight while a third of the corpses will go to the leaders of our great Tribe! Make the Tribe proud and kill as many enemies as possible!" the black general shouted.
"For the great Tribe!" the hyenas answered in unison.
The black general looked back at the princess.
"Begin," she said.
"Begin!" the black general shouted.
The hyenas charged forward in unison. They had been over ten kilometers away from the water so that their enemies wouldn't be prepared for their invasion. The brown hyenas ran in the middle of the pack while the others ran alongside them.
Hyenas were versatile beasts and had different affinities. Except for water, wind, and lightning, every other element could be awakened by them. Of course, there were also hyenas that didn't have any affinity towards an element. Instead, these hyenas just had slightly more powerful bodies that allowed them to be faster and stronger. A slightly more powerful body made them equally as dangerous as the ones with elemental affinities.
As soon as they came close to the sea, they saw a lot of sea beasts go forward. Yet, some sea beasts also retreated. These were probably informants that would relay the information to the leaders. Yet, that would take some time. After all, the headquarter of a territory was nearly always in the middle. This gave the invaders an advantage.
CRRRR!
A vast area of land rose from the sea as the Earth Makers created a powerful and wide pathway. The hyenas didn't care about the minor flooding. Their own mountains would stop the water. The pathway was created with incredible speed, and a lot of the sea beasts couldn't retreat in time. Seeing the fleeing sea beasts close to them, the hunting instinct in some of the hyenas awoke.
Some of the hyenas quickly jumped at the closest prey in the water. Right now was the best opportunity to kill sea beasts. After all, the enemy was still confused. They would only need to become more careful later in the war.
One hyena jumped at a small and slow squid. With one attack, the hyena would kill this squid.
CLAMP!
A massive shear came out of the water behind the squid, grabbing the whole hyena. The hyena grew panicked. Crabs were slow, but their shears were powerful. Usually, it wouldn't be hard for a hyena to dodge these shears. Yet, the hyena was above water, in the air, and couldn't dodge.
Beasts didn't have Spirits. This meant that they couldn't perceive their surroundings in detail. They could only feel living presences in their surroundings. Yet, when the water was full of beasts, they couldn't discern which present had what body or shape.
The hyena thought it was about to die, but surprisingly, it only felt its body being thrown into the distance. It landed in the sea after a couple of seconds and looked around. Some sea beasts were present, but not that many. On top of that, they didn't attack.
"You, me, fight!" a barracuda transmitted from its front.
The hyena was surprised. Was this a duel?
"Duel?" it asked back.
"Yes. You win, you live," the barracuda said.
"Fight!" the hyena answered. Not all hyenas were smart. Most of them were only a little bit smarter than fish. That's why the hyena accepted its situation that quickly. It only had to win this fight!
What the hyena didn't know was that similar things were happening to its tribesmen. The seemingly retreating beasts had only been bait. After they jumped into the water, the hyenas would quickly get separated by different means. Then, they would be forced into a duel with a sea beast.
Hyenas were powerful fighters on land. They could be considered to be above average with their teeth, speed, and claws on land. Yet, in the water, they were weaker. Of course, fighting in water only reduced their Battle-Strength by a little bit. They were still quite powerful.
The princess was watching this from the land. She didn't take part in this invasion yet. After all, her mother had said that the Tribe needed some practice. Only when about half of her tribesmen died would she get involved and finish this invasion.
"The enemy is prepared for our invasion!" the black general shouted. "Stay in formation and don't jump into the water. They need to come to us!"
The hyenas followed the general's command and stayed in their positions. Sea beasts rarely used Earth Movers, in their case Water Makers, in a fight. That was because sea beasts with an earth affinity were rare.
This was not the case for land beasts. Many land beasts had earth affinities, which allowed them to use the Earth Movers more freely. Yet, the Earth Movers were still essential in a war. If they all died, the army would need to fight the enemy in a disadvantageous territory.
"Idiots," Shira said five-kilometers-away from the fighting. As soon as the five spies from the Hyena Tribe had been apprehended, she had been informed. Ever since then, she had waited here.
How did the River Tribe notice the spies?
When an enemy thought that the River Tribe was full of sea beasts and saw such a big mountain range, they would immediately assume that there were tunnels underwater that lead through the mountain range.
That case was, of course, also true for the River Tribe. Yet, what the enemy didn't know was that it was forbidden to use these tunnels. Like this, the spies would search for the tunnel and swim through them, right into an ambush.
After that, the five snakes had been put before a choice. Win a one-on-one fight and join the Tribe or die. After hearing that the snakes only had to win one fight, they grew ecstatic! Other Tribes required many fights to join them, but here, they only needed to win once!
They quickly accepted the proposal, and their enemies were determined very quickly. In actuality, the enemies had already been prepared beforehand. After all, at some point, a spy would come through the tunnel. The less time passed, the more effective Shira's plan would be.
The chosen enemies were the mid-rank Spirit Beasts that were considered the weakest in their category by Shira. Losing them wouldn't be an issue in exchange for some smart snakes. Additionally, if all five snakes died, they wouldn't be able to feed the enemy false information.
Yet, two of the five snakes died. Their enemies had been the weakest of their category, but the snakes also didn't have much fighting experience. They hadn't had many fights in their Tribe.
After the three snakes survived, they had been put before another choice. One of them had to feed the enemy false information. Yet, in exchange, they would be allowed to fight another weak beast.
Finding weak beasts wasn't so easy since the snakes had no idea how the other tribesmen fought. Yet, if Shira were the one searching for them, it would be no issue to find a weak opponent.
One of the snakes had stepped forward and had bargained. Instead of fighting a weak opponent, it was ready to report the false information for something else. Shira listened to the snake's offer. In return for delivering false information, it wanted its smaller siblings to survive.
Shira thought about it for a little bit and got an idea. After speaking to Gravis for a bit, she said that the Tribe accepted the snake's proposal. Like this, the false information had been fed to the Hyena Tribe.
"Use the sea cucumbers," Shira transmitted to the army.
Meanwhile, the army was progressing quickly. They had already covered over a third of the territory. As soon as they reached the mountain range, they would be able to use it to their advantage.
SPLASH!
Suddenly, several fish appeared close to their pathway. Yet, these fish were not alone. Every fish had a gigantic sea cucumber riding in their opened mouths. The sea cucumbers were quite big with a length of about fifty meters, but the fish were all over 200-meters-long. Directly after they appeared, the sea cucumbers shot a white and sticky substance at one hyena each.
Before their allies could save the captured hyenas, the fish bit down on the sea cucumbers, but not hard enough to injure them. Then, they shot away, pulling the hyenas into the water. Everything had happened too quickly for anyone to react.
As soon as the hyenas fell into the water, every single one of them burst into flames that burned away the sticky substances. Surprisingly, the sea cucumbers had all only targeted the hyenas with a fire affinity.
Of course, this was Shira's doing. Land beasts with fire affinities were incredibly dangerous to sea beasts while fighting on land. The main reason was that these hyenas could attack from a long range.
Yet, in the water, they were weakened even more than normal hyenas. The water in the middle world wasn't as simple as the water in a lower world. The water had more Energy, and, therefore, was also more resistant to fire. Only Unity Beasts or stronger could ignore the water.
After pulling them in, other beasts started dueling the hyenas. Of course, part of the corpses would go to the sea cucumbers.
Meanwhile, only 70% of the hyenas remained on the pathway.
"This will be troublesome," the black general said.