Mothlina could only sigh at his response. Before he had come to attack them, their two parties had not had any interaction, and from what they had learned, Darius only came to be a few years ago.
He lacked the fear and hatred that the natives of Faust harbored towards them, so she believed him when he claimed, it wasn't exactly his choice to treat them in such a hostile manner.
Alas, this also cemented that there was no hope of reconciliation. Darius was under strict orders to eradicate them, so all they could do is resist or die.
Worst of all, killing him was out of the question, not only because they lacked the capability without Beelzebub, but also because they did not know what kind of repercussion they would suffer for it.
Mothlina slowly hovered back, her cute eyes darkening slightly. "A pity that we have met under these circumstances. Please, do not blame us for trying to protect ourselves, Lord Darius."
Mothlina flapped her wings, releasing a huge amount of purplish dust that covered both Queenie and Ladyba. Darius Analyzed it and saw that it was a special spore produced by Mothlina that greatly increased the magical defense of those targeted by it.
It seemed like Darius' earlier notion had been right, the Grandmaster bugs had to be connected to the same bugcloud. As such, the experiences of those who died before had been passed onto the survivors, letting them know how to better defend themselves.
Against foes of objectively equal or lesser power, this was broken to the point of senselessness. It was unfair and unbelievable, allowing the Insects to adapt to anything faster than any other race.
However, against those with many means like Darius, it merely served to make his task slightly more annoying.
Mothlina released a batch of yellow-colored spores, which Darius identified to increase physical defense greatly.
As for Ladyba, she was a Soul Bug, so her attacks were of the mental type. An intangible wave spread from here as she flapped her wings rhythmically, entrancing all onlookers.
Darius, Xela, and Gunner couldn't help but feel like they wanted to lay down their weapons and sleep. This kind of ability was potent on those with weak souls because it would almost always work.
Even Grandmaster mages would fall prey to this, as Ladyba likely had higher Intellect stats than a human Grandmaster. However, putting aside Darius' high Intellect, he and his two Branded Servants had skills that negated soul-related attacks.
Darius and Gunner possessed a skill called Spirit Barrier which they had both leveled to the max.
[Spirit Barrier - Level 100 Skill (Max)
Grade: Basic
Cost: None
Description: This is a unique skill lineage belonging to the Witches of Fallon, a group of women cursed with the Mystic Arts and its benefits as well as detriments. As masters of manipulation of all things soul-related, they developed this skill that protects their own souls from interference by others. Currently, this skill disperses 100% of all incoming spirit and soul damage/negative effects.]
As for Xela, she had her own skill granted to her by her Divine Concepts called Pure Soul.
[Pure Soul - Level 50 Skill
Grade: Basic
Cost: None
Description: After connecting your existence to the Divine Light as its receptacle, your soul has evolved. You are naturally resistant to all curses, soul attacks, and soul interference by 50%.]
With these skills, Ladyba's efforts were practically fruitless. Xela had high enough Int that after the 50% reduction, she could ignore the soul attack while Darius and Gunner only felt it for a second before it faded away, regardless of their Int.
Ladyba did not seem to notice this as she kept up her efforts, hoping to resolve things peacefully if possible. However, Queenie was not so kind. Despite being arguably the cutest of the three, she was also the strongest among these Grandmaster bugs and the most violent.
She charged forward so quickly that only those with an Agility of 100 points and above would be able to follow. Her target was Darius, who grinned widely as he countered her charge with the tip of his new lance, the Dragon Ancestor's Lance.
[Dragon Ancestor's Lance of Destruction - Unique Weapon (Lv. 10)
Durability: 550,000/550,000
Quality: Perfect
Damage: 8,000-12,000
Description: A one of its kind spear that has never existed in the history of Faust. It is made from the broken shaft of the Dragonlance, Holy Gold, and a little bit of Mithril, God's Steel and Soul Essence. During its creating, it was mixed with Lunar Dew and the heart blood of the Ancestor Dragon, granting it Supreme might and a sentient spirit that can grow the weapon's power endlessly as long as it is wielded by someone worthy.]
When Queenie's stinger collided with the lance, the two produced a sharp clang sound that shook the entire cavern. Darius was pushed back quite a bit while Queenie remained steady.
After all, he only had a 100 points of Strength while Queenie had 228 points of Strength. With double his output, it was only natural that Darius would not be able to overcome the Giant Bee.
Both sides took damage from that clash, especially the Killer Bug since Darius' lance was so powerful that its damage was next to nonsensical. At its current level, it dealt a gross damage of 1,008,000 damage.
Similar to the magical damage calculation, physical damage was straightforward = [Str x DMG x Crit (if any) x skill modifier (if any)] ÷ [End x Def x skill modifier (if any)].
So for Darius, it was 100 Strength x 8,000 DMG (minimum) x 20% (Basic Lancer Arts level 4) x 5% (Weapons Mastery level 1), hence the huge number.
However, unlike magical attacks where the opponent usually did not have a suitable defense, and so suffered the full amount of damage, physical attacks were usually balanced became even if one did not have any Defense or skill modifiers, one would definitely have Endurance.
This was why Darius didn't invest crazily into Strength and physical-related modifiers compared to magical ones. In fact, the reason was even clearer when one took in what happened next.
Queenie had 250 points of Endurance and the buff from Mothlina granted her a whopping 500 points of Defense. This totaled 125,000 points of calculable defense, and when divided against Darius' slightly over a million damage, what came out was…
8 points of damage! (8.064 to be exact)
Yup, that was it, the magnificent 1 million damage that looked like it could even kill Gods and Devils amounted to just this. So, the benefit of magical attacks over physical should be even clearer.
Even if Queenie did not receive the buff from Mothlina and just relied on her 250 points of Endurance, it still would have only done slightly above 4,000 points of damage, which was a great decrease from the awesome 1 million.
However, all was not lost in terms of physical conflicts. As the battle with Lord Darm had taught Darius, it wasn't the sheer awesome power of one strike that won the battle with the Supreme System, but the accumulation and frequency of attacks.
Sure, 8 points of damage sounded lame, but with the 150 points of Agility Darius had, he could easily strike out more than 500 times a second if he overclocked himself and went maximum output.
8 damage 500 times was 4,000 damage a second. With Queenie's HP above 56k, 14 seconds of concentrated attacks would lead to her death.
The issue here came in the form of stamina. It usually had little bearing in battles because most of them were resolved in mere seconds, and both parties usually didn't go to the maximum output.
However, if one were to do so, their stamina would drain away like a toilet being flushed down. Without this, Stamina would be a useless stat for the Supreme System to augment and emphasize.
Darius smiled and retreated slightly as Queenie came back for another attack. Queenie's speed was just slightly higher than his, so it looked like the stinger would penetrate Darius' cranium, which was where Queenie targeted.
However, the Killer bug's attack was brought to a stop as a huge bronze-colored fist grabbed its stinger with ease, preventing it from moving even an inch forward.
Queenie struggled in Gunner's grip, not able to free herself no matter what she did, while Gunner brought the Queen Bee close to his face and stared her down.
Queenie froze as she gazed into those intense green eyes, remembering the feeling that Heracron, Gluttworm, and Rancido passed over bout the horror of Gunner and how they died brutally under his attacks.
Realizing she was about to suffer the same fate, Queenie was filled with fear and terror. She struggled even more brutally as her two allies screamed and tried to save her.
But when Gunner had you in his grasp, nothing on Faust could save you from whatever fate the large lad chosen for you. He simply gripped the top end of Queenie's body and pulled against the end that was in his other hand, her stinger.
This led to the Queen bug being forcefully ripped in half from the middle by Gunner's obscene strength.
