It was naturally Theseus who was able to shake himself to sensibility before it was too late. He looked left and right to see that the others were similarly as crippled as he was, and soon the sound of crackling electricity appeared louder and louder.
Theseus obviously knew that something had gone horribly wrong at this point. As such, he could only clap his hands and create a wave of water that carried all five of them away from the base and into the air so they could have a vantage point.
However, what Theseus eventually saw terrified him. Thousands of the same robotic machines they had destroyed earlier were rushing over from all directions, their nozzles and weapons pointed towards them in the sky.
Upon seeing this, the Ancient Hero no longer thought about waiting for the others to overcome their daze and shouted towards them.
"WAKE UP AND FIGHT!"
That was all he could say before he was forced to shoot them all in different directions to avoid a volley of blasts that would certainly vaporize them. As had been put forth before, Divine Energy was a superior form of energy that could harm indestructible metals like the 'Holy' group of minerals.
However, just the same, the opposite was true. The beams of energy powered by Source Energy which was also a superior form of energy could harm these Demigods as if they were just mortals with high stats, instead of divine beings that should be invincible to anything.
Hercules had proven this to be true, so Theseus didn't want to risk anything. However, splitting the group up to fight their own battles was basically leaving their survival up to fate.
Seeing the robots that had quickly surrounded him on all sides, Theseus could only smile bitterly and hope that the others would survive.
..........
Pyrrha landed on a bit of cracked metal, which woke up her thanks to the pain. She coughed a bit of blood and shakily rose to her feet, then looked around. She was shocked to notice that she was quickly surrounded by various machines that were all humanoid in shape.
She had inevitably lucked out in not receiving the attention of the artillery-type machines, but that was mostly because Miranda's subroutine judged Pyrrha to be a low threat due to her limited kills and seemingly placid nature.
The subroutine had observed their limited interactions during the few moments before Medea had attacked and had created a profile for each fighter, even moreso when they fought and it could get a handle on their powers.
As was expected of an AI, it efficiently split up its military forces to deal with each of them based on this very profile, how 'dangerous' each of them were comparatively.
Pyrrha didn't know this, but she was relieved to not have such heavy attention on her. It wasn't that she was timid or weak, but because she didn't really like to fight.
The reason why no one on the team really paid attention to her nor tried to find conflict with her was not only because of her nature, but because of her history.
After all, Pyrrha was one of the few Demigods in existence who was once actually a full god!
She still had her divine church and her connections, as well as a wealth of Divine Energy that would even make Hercules tremble. However, her Divine Fire had been greatly weakened due to a choice she had made years ago.
Pyrrha was the daughter of the Titan Epimetheus and the first woman Pandora. Her father was the only brother to the legendary Prometheus, which was where she got her fire element abilities from, and her mother was the one woman every mortal knew, notorious for opening that one box that shouldn't have been opened.
Her birth was a bit of an issue since she was half-titan, but the Gods mostly ignored it as both Prometheus and Epimetheus were seen as mortal-lovers, not to mention Epimetheus was seen as a fool.
Pandora was a creation of the Gods, their first attempt at creating mortal life through their own hands. It was just unfortunate that their own creation, due to intense innocence bordering on ignorance, opened the one thing that plunged most of Elysium into chaos.
Pyrrha as their first daughter had inherited her mother's innocence and gentleness, as well as her father's general silliness and laziness. She didn't engage in fights or conflicts with everyone, she was generally pleasant to be around and she wouldn't cause much trouble anyway.
That was why someone who was able to use the fire element would be like this, as most fire element users were hot-headed and emotional. Pyrrha was unique and one-of-a-kind in this regard.
Incidentally, she had also inherited her father and uncle's love for mortal-kind, which was - just like Prometheus and Epimetheus - her downfall. During a particularly intense battle between Poseidon and Aegir, two supreme deities of the sea, an entire section of Elysium had been drowned in waves.
Many mortals lost their lives, and Pyrrha could not stand to see this. As such, she burned her Divine Fire to spread life and power to those who survived, in order to repopulate and return into splendor.
Of course, as a fire element Goddess, she could not bring people back to life. That was the best she could do at the time, and the price she paid was heavy. With the weakening of her Divine Fire, she naturally fell in power to a level similar to a newborn Demigod.
Her previous power and greatness had long been lost and any enemy of hers could have taken sweet vengeance upon her… if she even had any enemies. Rather than that, many gods took pity on her and still treated her as one of their own, because Pyrrha really just wasn't a pain in the ass.
She also still had her church activities and they were constantly providing her Faith Energy, not to mention the great store of Divine Energy she had from years of being a Goddess and not using it to engage in meaningless fights.
This was why she was able to rise so fast and reach a high rank among Demigods. This was the history of Pyrrha, and she was a notable entity. Of course, Pyrrha also reached where she was because she had the support of her husband Deucalion, who also sacrificed Divine Fire to infuse into the mortals but fell short of falling out of Godhood.
Surrounded by these robots, Pyrrha understood that she would likely die if she held back, and she unleashed the primordial flames within her. Unlike Theseus who used water and Medea who used wind Pyrrha's fire was of a different tier.
Not only was it the fire belonging to an actual goddess, but it was part of the original fire that Prometheus had taken from the top of Mount Olympus, something which could even burn gods, much less metal.
Her flaming red hair which was entirely made of fire lashed out as if they were whips of flames, lancing through any robot nearby and turning it into scrap. Her eyes spewed streams of fire that cut through any robot she gazed at like lasers.
Her hands continually flung out huge fireballs that exploded powerfully, covering the area in dust and ash. However, the red eyes of the robots could be seen through this dust as they switched to infrared to scan the area.
They all locked onto Pyrrha who couldn't be any more noticeable in their eyes due to her excessive heat. Pyrrha was naturally chilled by the sight of hundreds of glowing red eyes coming alive around her, and she began to panic.
Goddess she may be, she wasn't a fighter and didn't have much experience in this regard. In fact, the subroutine AI had even lowered her danger rating because of this fact.
It was an unmistakable fact that the Demigoddess was extremely clumsy in the way she fought, spreading her fire out all over as if she was scared to let the 'monsters' come close.
Compared to Hercules, Theseus, Achilles, and Medea who were fighting more efficiently and powerfully on their own battlefields, Pyrrha was, unfortunately, a joke.
Incidentally, this played to her advantage as the subroutine reallocated bots from Pyrrha battlefield to that of the others who posed a bigger threat and needed to be contained immediately.
In the calculations of the subroutine, only 10% of the amount initially allocated would be enough to delay Pyrrha long enough for it to slaughter the other four and then deal with her.
As such, the remaining bots around her began to give her distance and focused on stalling her by firing shots and then retreating, 'kiting' Pyrrha as it were.
Pyrrha, who was flustered and worried, was all too happy to see this as she focused on defense and looked to the other battlefield, hoping that the others would be fine.
After all, she didn't want to run away and leave them, as that would be too cruel.
