The battle in the mine tunnel ended before long, but the fighting outside was far from over.
It was not just the Alien Beasts inside the mine. The six Alien Beast control devices had manipulated the minds of a full six thousand Alien Beasts. In the vast forest surrounding the mine, thousands of Alien Beasts went berserk, catching the Elephant Man garrison off guard. The formation of 2,500 Elephant Men was instantly shattered.
The Elephant Man troops still had two devices in their hands. After a brief moment of stunned confusion, they too took control of two thousand Alien Beasts and sent them to block the berserk beasts.
"Quick, call for reinforcements from the base! The Alien Beasts have rioted for unknown reasons, the situation inside the mine is unclear, and the situation is extremely critical!"
The Elephant Man garrison commander shouted. Several Elephant Men mounted two-headed horse-like Alien Beasts and rode off toward the Elephant Man camp five kilometers away. Thirty thousand elite troops were stationed there specifically to prevent Alien Beast riots.
Shen Jun stood atop the mountain above the mine, able to take in everything within dozens of kilometers. The stealth of his Templar armor had been disengaged. Around him, Zeratul and the Dark Templars remained concealed, protecting Shen Jun at the center.
"Hmm... thirty thousand Elephant Men. How much Biological Essence would that be...?"
A bloodthirsty smile appeared on Shen Jun's face. Once he learned that this was the Super God Universe, what little sympathy he had for these races vanished completely.
The Trigon Civilization was ninety-nine percent likely to be Ultimate Fear's vanguard, the Void's first wave of attack. And Ultimate Fear meant the extinction of cosmic civilizations. Not to mention the Form War—Shen Jun, a God River Body, and the Beast Body Trigon Civilization were naturally opposed. Sympathy? That did not exist.
He would kill as many as he could!
The four hundred Dark Zealots lay in ambush in the forest across from them, waiting for the battle between the Alien Beasts and Elephant Men to end.
Under Shen Jun's control, six thousand giant beasts charged at the Elephant Man garrison in perfect formation. Shen Jun had never commanded a war, but he had at least heard the tale of the fire ox formation. He knew that gathering ferocious beasts together for a charge maximized their destructive power.
Thus, the Elephant Men, whose intelligence remained in a primitive age, were cursed with terrible luck. How had they ever seen such a spectacle? In just a few exchanges, more than half of them had been killed or wounded.
That said, the Elephant Men's strength truly could not be underestimated. Even against the Alien Beasts' charge, they managed to forcibly stop a row of beasts, ultimately fighting several hundred of them to the death.
They also controlled two thousand Alien Beasts. After being brutally crushed for several rounds, they learned something as well. They gathered their two thousand Alien Beasts and charged head-on against the beasts under Shen Jun's control.
The situation was basically one-sided. Although the Elephant Men would not collapse immediately, they would not be able to hold on for much longer.
"Before long, thirty thousand Elephant Man reinforcements will arrive here. They may also have more Alien Beast control devices. With our current strength..."
The Elephant Man civilization had a very small population, only around a million people. More than half of them had to serve the Trigonians as laborers, just like miners.
Their main army would not exceed five hundred thousand. It was not unreasonable for every ten thousand soldiers to receive an Alien Beast control device, considering this was the combined Elephant Man population of an entire planet.
But that did not mean Giant Elephant Star was sparsely populated. In fact, Shen Jun preferred to call it Alien Beast Planet, because Elephant Men themselves were merely one type of Alien Beast that had evolved first.
There were tens of thousands of other large and small varieties of Alien Beasts. The planet's total "beast" population had to be counted in the hundreds of millions.
Shen Jun silently compared both sides' trump cards and felt that wiping out this Elephant Man main force would not be easy. They would likely suffer losses.
Shen Jun checked his resources. A Protoss Nexus had to be placed at each mining site at the end of the six mine passages. That would require 2,400 Crystal Minerals, which could not be touched.
That left him with only a little over six thousand Crystal Minerals he could freely spend.
Without a second thought, Shen Jun warped in three Crystal Towers beneath the cover of the mountain.
The arrival of six hundred fresh Protoss troops gave Shen Jun complete confidence.
To Shen Jun's delight, three hundred of this batch were Daelaam Protoss—the new Protoss led by Hierarch Artanis in the main storyline of the StarCraft Universe. Having fought in the first war against Amon, they were undoubtedly the finest soldiers.
Of the remaining three hundred, one hundred were Nerazim Protoss and one hundred were Khalai Protoss.
But what delighted Shen Jun most was a distinctive orange-yellow figure among the Daelaam Protoss.
This Protoss did not look like a Protoss at all. Instead, he resembled a robot forged from mysterious blue-and-white alloy. He was much larger than an ordinary Protoss, with four mechanical legs and two mechanical arms.
Shen Jun knew that appearance all too well. Like Rohana now, he was a Purifier Copy of Talandar, formerly Fenix, the executor of the Khalai Protoss ground defense forces!
Unlike Rohana, who had been copied into a supercomputer system, Talandar existed as a war machine, possessing formidable combat power and extensive battlefield experience.
"I... return to the battlefield."
The classic entrance line of the immortal father emerged from Talandar's voice system as the Purifier leader declared his return.
"Commander, I am Talandar. Please issue your orders."
It was somewhat inhumane to say so, but as a fellow mechanical life-form Purifier, Rohana found it far too easy to alter his memory data. She directly elevated Shen Jun's status in Talandar's mind to the same level as Artanis.
As for why she had not replaced Artanis entirely, the reason was simple. To Talandar, Artanis was a very special existence. He would never betray his Hierarch.
But that was irrelevant. Shen Jun was still someone Talandar would serve, and that was enough.
With the six hundred fresh troops included, Shen Jun now commanded another thousand Protoss soldiers. There was no longer any suspense in facing a mere thirty thousand Elephant Man natives head-on.
For Beast Bodies, life-forms whose physiques surpassed their intelligence, five kilometers was a distance they could cross quickly. Thus, they had already reached the battlefield, bringing three thousand Alien Beasts with them.
Meanwhile, of the six thousand Alien Beasts Shen Jun had driven into a rampage, three thousand had already died. In exchange, the original 2,500 Elephant Man mine garrison and their two thousand Alien Beasts had been completely wiped out.
Suddenly, Shen Jun noticed that this army differed from the previous Elephant Man warriors. The most obvious sign was the Manta Ray floating overhead.
Hmm...
It was not strange for the Trigonians to be watching over such an important strategic resource as a Crystal Mineral Vein. Shen Jun himself had not wanted a direct conflict with the Trigonians, after all. The Protoss were still weak at this stage, and it was too early to face a behemoth like the Trigon Civilization.
Sure enough, he had still been too naive...
Shen Jun gave a self-mocking smile. Once he calmed down and thought about it, the Trigonians had already set their sights on this planet. Conflict had long since become unavoidable.
If the Protoss wanted to develop, they had to seize Mineral Veins. And seizing Mineral Veins would inevitably expose them before the Trigonians.
Therefore, there was only one choice: fight!
Before you continue