Outside the perimeter, the demon tide was still assaulting the defensive line like mad.
The stench of rotten blood, scorched carapaces, and superheated metal mingled, seeping through the thin air into the sensor housings.
The automatic turrets spat fire without pause, their barrels as red as if they had just been pulled from a furnace.
But in the core of the position, the launch sequence did not falter.
"First batch of interceptor missiles, launch!"
Boom!
Twelve surface-to-air missiles rose in succession, their exhaust carving straight lines of fire over the gray wasteland.
"Drone swarm, gain altitude and move to the secondary interception coordinates."
In midair, large numbers of drones climbed simultaneously, lights flashing beneath their fuselages like a flock of iron birds flying silently to their deaths.
Their mission was simple.
If the missiles failed to intercept the plasma clusters, they would use their bodies to form one final layer of attrition above the position.
Put bluntly, they were taking the hit with their steel bodies.
The first batch of surface-to-air missiles quickly approached their targets.
The plasma clusters were extremely fast, but their trajectories were stable, they could not change direction, and they were so large that missing them would have been difficult.
"Entering proximity detonation range!"
"Detonate!"
The plasma had no solid body, so they could only use remotely triggered proximity detonations.
High above, the first missile exploded in front of a plasma cluster.
Preformed fragments, metal dust, and a cloud of coolant spread instantaneously, slamming into the outer layer of blue plasma.
Then the second, third, and fourth missiles exploded in succession.
Red light, silver flecks, and blue flames tangled together like a burst of fireworks forcibly shattered high in the sky.
But these were not fireworks for anyone to admire.
Every falling fleck of blue light