What the Herald did not understand was that Jack's advantages transcended environmental constraints.
What the Herald did not realize was that Jack had calculated this exact sequence and was already prepared to execute a counterassault that would render the subterranean deployment completely irrelevant.
The panic cascade had forced the Herald into a reactive posture, compelling him to abandon his carefully constructed tactical framework and to reach for hidden assets he had been reserving for exactly this kind of catastrophic scenario.
But reaching for those assets had been a mistake. It had been the move that a creature without deeper reserves made when facing an opponent who had already calculated five moves ahead.
The Herald's disclosure of its subterranean units, communicated through their activation, signaled the depletion of its primary advantages and the deployment of its secondary reserves.
