Araneae Lebes

Shield Generator

**Araneae Lebes** is the Boss of Stage 10.

## Appearance

*"I hate spiders. Destroy them!"*

Araneae Lebes takes the form of a walking spider-tank, with a giant Radial Cannon on the top. It has a central core filled with green nuclear liquid and four conducting coils charged by supporting mini walkers.

## Armaments

### Core

* The central control area of Araneae, where green nuclear liquid presumably acting as fuel that powers this spider walker tank is stored in. A dome shaped core equipped with weapons that is used to attack in the battle covers and protects the liquid from leaking and causing radioactive contamination.
* It attacks with a radial bullet swarm of three bullets in twelve directions (similar to a Radial Cannon), with the frequencies of discharge and damage increasing with every Difficulty.
* The core is initially invulnerable and protected by a shield, which are shattered once all of its accompanying Spider Walkers are destroyed. In addition, the core's fire rate is increased significantly.

#### Multi-directional railgun cannons

After an interval of about five bullet swarm waves unleashed by the core, green smoke is emitted from the core's sides along with a loud escalating whine. Upon this cue, twelve railgun cannons emerge around the core and each fire a shell. Depending of the Difficulty which you play in, two or three shells may be released at once.

### 4x Spider-walkers

* Each walker is equipped with a turret gun, which fires a stream of tracking gunfire at your Plane. Each stream has 22 bullets each.

## Combat Routine

As soon as the giant spider-walker tank emerges into view on your screen, its four supporting walkers slowly join in. As the dome-shaped core of Araneae would be protected at first by a force field, quickly seize this opportunity to tear down the supporting walker tanks as they power the force field while acting as secondary sources of firepower. Utilize the period of time before the Boss fires to charge up your MWS module and deal significant damage to the walkers, normally the bottom left one since it appears first. A good technique for this segment would be to use a Laser to shoot down the walkers, typically two at a time, and if you are holding down the corresponding button for a continuous discharge, the beam can safely be moved across the core to take down the other two on the other side, though the force field obviously cannot be dissipated. Once Araneae's core begins to fire weapons, keep your distance unless you have an Energy Shield. Steer clear from the line of fire of the railguns and use those long necessary pauses to charge your MWS module or power-ups.

After the four supporting walkers are cast out, the force field around the core breaks, and you can start obliterating Araneae Lebes. The core is what is always destroyed first as it can still deliver damage to your Plane, and beware of the railgun spread shot cannon which is still active as well. Once the core is shot down and its dome cover bursts out, you can open fire and tear down the rest of the spider-walker tank's structure.

## Difficulty

In higher Difficulty levels, the supporting walkers will take more time for their health to be drained off, subjecting yourself to a longer endurance time with Araneae until you can deplete its force field. The concentrated fire from the main body will be your main worries as it spews out the highly damaging blue bullets at a fast rate, especially when all four spider walkers are down. Do not be afraid to use Shields, Lasers, and/or Mega Bombs to grant yourself safety.

Overall, Araneae Lebes is a relatively easy Boss due to the lack of tracking weapons and multiple phases. Remembering its predictable firing patterns and how to dodge the gunfire is vital for the battle.

## Trivia

* Notably, Araneae Lebes is the only Boss out of all the eight known that has a name in any other language apart from English. The translation of the two words forms the term "Spider Cauldron/Pot", "Lebes" being a Greek word that means "cauldron" or "pot" and "Araneae" being the official scientific name for a spider.

* The force field surrounding Araneae's main tank can be noticed active even before the supporting walkers enter the screen, though the period is very brief.
* The supporting spider walkers appear to be still able to escape, as they run off through the sides of the screen after they are destroyed.