The five Battalions encircled the ruined city, setting up within direct line of sight to two other Battalions so that the overlapping fields of fire could prevent mass Klem movement out of the region, at least above ground.
If the Klem wanted to move below ground, it would alert the seismic sensors, and the Regiment would have to decide what to do about them, but for the moment, the voracious insects were trapped within the ruins, pinned down by artillery fire from the Super Heavy Mecha, and hunted by Cleansing Light maintaining a flying vigil overhead.
Max couldn't keep that up forever, though. He was alone in the cockpit, so he would have to land and sleep eventually, the one great disadvantage of a single Pilot setup.
The Battalions had already set up a three-shift rotation on the front lines, with one group on duty, one on standby, and one resting at all times, so they could instantly mobilize two-thirds of their forces if a large attack began.
The shifts had just changed when Max decided to land Cleansing Light behind the First Battalion and see what the Klem would do when the Titan Class Mecha was no longer clearly visible overhead. He had considered setting an autopilot, with a damage warning to let him know if something attacked him while he hovered overhead, but drawing the defenders out directly seemed like a more efficient use of their resources.
He could still stay awake for hours, and he was hoping that they would take the bait and attack soon after he landed, attempting to overrun the Regiment when they were apparently at their weakest.
The Klem were reliant on their leadership castes, so the disappearance of the Command Mecha should signal to them that it was an opportune moment to attack.
Max flew out of sight of the city, then returned low along the horizon and crouched behind a hill, fifteen kilometers behind the First Battalion, to wait.
Twenty minutes passed, then thirty, before the first reports of the Klem gathering in large numbers, despite the continued artillery shelling, started to come in from every Battalion at once.
[Prepare for a mass charge. Target the Behemoths first. At the first sign of trouble, hit the emergency signal, and Cleansing Light will take to the air to reinforce you. I don't want any casualties during this early part of the investigation if we can avoid them.] Max ordered.
The danger was that he would reveal himself too early and the Klem wouldn't send out their strongest forces, dragging out the siege for longer than it had to be. They weren't here to cleanse the region. At least that wasn't their primary goal. They just wanted to know what the Klem host was up to so that they could begin the plans for the next phase.
Without any detectable signal, the entire mass of the Klem force rose up and charged the five Mecha Battalions at the same time, preventing them from reinforcing each other. As far as tactics, it was simple but brutally effective. Send the first line of warriors with shields to block some of the attacks as the lines rushed forward, and then get the Shredders into close combat.
If any of the five-meter-tall warriors survived, they could deal with the Light Mecha, but the Klem didn't count on it, preferring to let the much more lethal Shredders do the dirty work of clearing large groups of enemies with their rapid attacks and multiple limbs.
That wasn't all that the Klem had prepared today, though. The Shredders also included similarly sized Tyrants, which were grown with ranged energy burst weapons instead of the extra central limbs, firing balls of flaming or corrosive liquids at the Mecha lines, exponentially increasing the threat that the swarm presented to the Mecha of the Terminus Regiment.
The Heavy Mecha responded the moment that the Klem ranged troops revealed themselves, trading Ion fire for Chemical bursts and rapidly thinning the ranks of the giant beings among the Klem.
The true horrors for the Klem attackers began when they got close to the makeshift bulwarks, and the Fusion Flamers lit up their front ranks, turning them to ash and setting off any of the Klem that were equipped with ranged weapons and too close to the Mecha lines.
[Status Report] Max ordered.
It only took a few seconds for the Mecha Company Commanders to update their status on the computer, showing the lines holding strong and no Klem making it to their Mecha now that they were facing the full fury of a Heavy Mecha Regiment.
Then the Drone Fighters began their work, hitting the Klem with strafing runs and dropping bombs into their ranks, creating far larger explosions than the artillery of the Thunder Guns.
The Klem tried to send up a wave of Gargoyles to counter the Drone Fighters, but the agile planes were ready for them, meeting the small winged Klem with a scorching wave of Laser blasts, clearing their airspace again, and letting the strafing runs continue.
Being attacked from multiple directions at the same time was confusing the Klem, and they didn't seem to understand what they were supposed to be defending against, which brought the attack to a halt. It was a fatal mistake for their Commander, or whatever hive mind was in control of the Klem attacks of this nature.
Too much wasn't known about the way that the Klem communicated and interacted with each other to be certain which was correct, but Max was leaning toward a simple form of shared consciousness, with smarter and more developed Klem serving as Commanders.
It made the most sense from what he had seen of their tactics. Removing a few Commanders or separating a small group from the main force didn't affect their planning or ability to coordinate, but killing all of the largest Klem threw them into disarray.
With a little luck, the facility that they had built under these ruins would shed some light on how the species operated on a daily basis. It wasn't really essential knowledge. Knowing how they fought was enough for most commanders, but Max thought that if he knew more about them, he might be able to use the knowledge for other purposes.
Terminus always had some sort of experiment going on, and if he could find a way to link functions the way that the Klem appeared to link minds, he could make his [Unified Force] System Function even more deadly.
