The cave was set into the wall, where the lake floor slowly rose to the surface. This didn't mean they were up close to the surface, as they were still deep underwater. However, it did mean that the cave entrance was relatively barren. It was a somewhat uneven area, and the large cave mouth was nicely tucked into it.
Arriving at the cave area, his monsters began to put his plan into action. The octo-lilies spread out, covering the area around the cave but still keeping enough distance to allow the fighting to happen. Considering there were thirty of them, they managed to make a rather nice wall to intercept the shard. However, it would still take them some time to intervene in the fight if they were called upon. Dan wasn't too worried about it, as he hoped that Lory would be able to make the call way before they were actually needed.
The second ring of monsters was going to be made of gators. With only twenty of the gators and their designation as assassins, Dan did not want to put them upfront. Instead, he wanted the gators to use the same strategy that they had used in the previous fight. They were going to sit back, watch the fight happen, and engage as needed to preserve the sharks' lives.
Finally, the first line of defense was going to be the sharks. With forty of them and their design to be the front liners, they were semi-spread out right in front of the cave entrance—not too close, but close enough to where they would be the first ones to engage.
The bosses themselves are in different positions. Way above the cave entrance, looking down at everything that was going on, was Lory. This way, she could try to make the best possible decision during the fight. There was also the fact that if the shard tried to escape, it would more than likely try to fly upwards and thus run right into Lory.
Jaws and Billy were the opposite of Lory. The two bosses wore underneath the cave entrance, hovering around the lake floor. They would also watch the fight as they would only engage the shard itself and none of its minions.
The position of his monsters only took a minute or so, and the shard seemed to be waiting for them to do their thing before actually making any moves. However, once everything was ready, the frog warriors came out.
There were 30 of them, and as Dan watched through Jaw's eyes, he noticed a very important detail. The frog warriors were not swimming. They simply floated out of the cave's mouth. They moved in a manner that Dan knew could only be achieved through telekinesis or flight, but considering what they were dealing with, it was most likely the first. Each warrior had a simple coral spear tipped with metal and wore the customary armor Dan had seen the warriors wear. Meaning it was mostly some coral-looking armor with bits and pieces of metal all attached together with some seaweed type plant. They all came to a stop right outside of the cave mouth and looked around.
The warriors stood still for a minute, looking at their surroundings and the forces stacked against them. More importantly, the shard looked through those eyes and saw everything that they came to fight. His monsters also kept calm during this time as they also observed what the frog warriors would do. Everyone was tense as they waited for the battle to begin.
A battle that began in a burst as all the warriors glowed pink and rushed outwards. Many headed straight at the sharks, while a few attempted to target the gators. Seeing the enemy's movement, the sharks rushed forward, going for both the ones coming directly at them while also attempting to intercept the ones targeting their fellow monsters.
The sharks all pour some of their mana into their Water Jet ability, making them rush forward at speed. Meanwhile, the rest was put towards their Water Maw ability. Much like Dan had seen during the last fight, a watery maw resembling the sharks appeared before them.
With so many abilities triggering, the dark corner of the lake glowed light blue as the elemental abilities were activated.
It wasn't long before this light blue glow was joined by a bright pink, as all the frog warriors glowed, and their speed increased to match the sharks. Then, in an explosion of blue, pink, and red, the two forces collided as chunks were torn off both sides.
Thirty sharks met 25 frog warriors head-on, and through Lorie’s senses, Dan could feel the aftermath before seeing it. Pretty much every single warrior or shark was either dead or heavily wounded. It was a result that Dan had not been expecting. There hadn’t even been time for any of the gators to intervene in the fight. The two forces simply crashed and did massive damage to each other.
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Things took an even further turn for the worse as the remaining five frog warriors began to shine in an even brighter light. The energy that had been going to the rest of the warriors was now being focused on the remaining five. This meant that the ten sharks going to intercept the warriors were torn apart even faster than their already mostly dead brethren. Thankfully, their struggles had somewhat diminished the brightness around the five frog warriors, which let Dan know they had limited energy to pull from. Or, at the very least, the shard had given them a very limited amount. However, Dan knew that the thing could definitely feed the warriors more energy if it so chose to, but Dan wasn't sure if the shard would do so.
The only good thing about the massacre was that Lory was getting things into motion. Dan sensed how the gators started going invisible, with others already having shot forward to try to hit the remaining frog warriors. Heck, even the octo-lilies were moving forward to be closer and engage in the fight.
As the frog warriors took a second to recover from the rush of power, they were struck by fiver gators who, like missiles, smashed into the warriors and their shields. The gators hadn't even gone one for a proper chomps. Instead, they had enhanced their strength and speed on top of making their scales metal and then slammed into the warriors. Not only did this lower the brightness of their shields, showing that they had indeed taken some decent damage, but it also threw them off their game for a few more seconds.
Once again, as they attempted to recover, the gators that had gone invisible came out of invisibility and shot forward. Their self-sacrificing brethren had bought them time, and they used their chomp abilities along with activating Stalker as they were going to try and rip off limbs. There were ten invisible gators and five of each targeted one warrior. The two frog warriors, not expecting such an attack, were each grabbed by one of their limbs as the gators chomped down, broke through their kinetic shields, and tore off their limbs.
Annoyingly, by the time the gators had struck, the other three frog warriors had recovered and, with the death of their allies, had gained yet another boost of power as the energy from those particular frogs was drained and given to them. As such, the ten gators were quickly pierced through and blasted apart as the frog warriors slammed into them spears first.
Dan didn't like the strategy at all. All of his monsters were sacrificing themselves just to take out these empowered frog warriors. However, he couldn't complain too much as the strategy was working. So he kept watching as the last five gators rushed forward, picking one single target. Three rushed in like the original self-sacrificing missile gators, while the other two went invisible.
Unsurprisingly, already having seen the tactic once, the three reaming frog warriors were ready, and as the three separate gators approached, they held out their hands, and blasts of force met the gators, blasting them apart. There were only two good things from that strategy. One, their blast had cost them more mana than simply tanking the attack. A conclusion Dan drew from seeing their glow diminish. The second good thing was that the blood and gore from those three Gators blocked the total sight of the incoming attack from the last two remaining gators.
Both gators hit the same frog warrior in staggered hits. They, of course, slammed into their warrior's shield, but the damage was considerable as the warrior's magic glow dimmed even more. At that time, the lilies finally joined the fight, along with two sharks that had survived the initial charge. One shark did much like his gator pals and simply slammed into the warrior, killing itself. However, that was enough to finally break the warrior's shield, and the second shark came, taking one big bite and ripping the warrior apart.
As the water bloodied even further with even more death, Dan was glad to see that the last two remaining warriors were not empowered even further. The only problem was that they were still reasonably healthy, and the last remaining monsters outside his bosses were the lily pads. A problem further enhanced as their vines were not very fast. So when the 30 or so lily pads reached forward to grasp the two remaining warriors, the two warriors could easily slip or tear through the tentacles.
Sadly for the warriors, there were 30 lily pads, and each had eight tentacles, for a whopping total of 240 combined tentacles. So, as each lily got closer and closer, it just became a forest of tentacles that the warriors had to cut their way through or dodge. This was made even harder when each lily activated their strength enhancement or made it so the water near them was turbulent as they used their Control Water ability.
The fight between the lilies and the two frog warriors ultimately came down to numbers versus quality. It was a fight that the octo-lilies won since they completely outnumbered the two warriors. There were simply too many attacks and not enough space to dodge as they moved around, cutting their way through. This didn't mean that the lilies didn't take casualties, as by the end of the fight, at least half of them died, and the rest were heavily injured. The fact was that the warriors had been powerful in their own right, and even embedded in a forest of vines, they were able to get lucky or deal enough damage to make casualties. However, the critical part was that all the enemy minions were defeated, which meant it was time for the big bad itself.