Resource distribution amongst the young in the Colony is far more generous than one might expect from ants. Of course, grubs are given high priority for food, ensuring they grow into their full potential in the proper time. Hatchlings always form a core before evolving to tier two, and they always do so with maxed mutations.
Naturally, this requires a tremendous amount of Biomass. That phrasing doesn't really do justice to the reality…. The Colony requires an OCEAN of Biomass on a daily basis, not just to fuel the growth of the young, but to feed the millions and millions of grown ants. Vast tracts of Dungeon are routinely swept clean by them, with an efficiency that none can rival, but even that isn't enough. Other solutions, such as the aphid herd, are required to extract additional Biomass in unconventional ways in order to make up the shortfall.
Cores, of course, are the true limiting factor. The Colony would love to have each and every ant evolve with flawless cores, fully reinforced and with a special core absorbed on top, but it simply isn't possible.
There is only one type of ant who is given this luxury as a matter of course: the Queens.
- Excerpt from "Evolutions of the Ant" by Granin Lazus
"An impressive win-streak, to say the least!" Poppant praised the hatchlings, and they nodded seriously. "A completely undefeated run! I know how hard you all worked for this. The other Tenders are wondering just how long your streak will be."
"Endless," Solant said simply.
She didn't intend to fail, ever. Anything less than perfection would be a blemish on the Colony as a whole, and that wasn't to be tolerated. She'd expressed this view to her teachers several times, and they had warned her it was dangerous to hold unrealistic expectations, that a belief in an unobtainable victory was as deadly as an undefeatable enemy.
What they had said was wise, yet Solant knew, deep down, that if there was a chance to win, she would find it. The longer the training course went on, the more her ideas were put to the test, and the more they were proven correct. The Soldier trainers told her to be more direct, less reliant on trickery and deception, the General trainers said her strategies were too elaborate, with too many points of failure, the Scout trainers said that she couldn't always rely on perfect information, the Mage trainers said that as they and their opponents grew stronger, the battlefield would become too difficult to predict, the Carver trainers said she couldn't be smart enough to foresee every outcome, the Shaper trainers said her allies weren't pets and couldn't always execute her intentions flawlessly, and the Healers told her that victory without sacrifice was the ideal, but often unattainable.
Even still, she would win.
The more her confidence grew, the more her broodmates believed in her. An unshakable unit with complete trust in each other, a group with complete and total knowledge of the capabilities and intentions of every other member.
"Our victory is determined by our training and preparation," Solant said to Poppant, "every advantage we use was honed there."
Poppant looked down on the little superior hatchling, her antennae waggling cheerfully.
"Nobody knows how hard and efficiently you train more than I do," she said, "I've been with you the whole journey, after all!"
Of course, there was a little more to it. It was unusual for a single hatchling to have such wildly divergent ideas, and to command such respect from their peers. By this time, the administration of the Antcademy heavily suspected they had a Champion on their claws. The first that they knew of to come through their classes and not found by the Eldest.
"But now it's time for your next evolution, and as a reward for your exemplary record in Tunnel Ball and every other training exercise, you've been granted special evolutions once again!"
Some of the ants winced, but Poppant hastened to reassure them.
"Fear not! I've brought the tea and sugar," she said, as she clacked her mandibles happily and bustled from one ant to the next.
It was painful, extremely so, but Solant endured the process as best she could before she engaged the menu and chose to evolve.
[Congratulations on reaching the maximum level for your current species. Evolution will allow you to change your form and increase your stats as a monster.
Warning: evolving will make securing XP and Biomass difficult as fewer rewards are given for preying on creatures less evolved than yourself.
Your evolution options are as follows:
- Superior Soldier (Special)
- Superior Scout (Special)
- Superior General (Special)
- Superior Ant Mage (Special)
- Superior Core Shaper (Special)
- Superior Carver (Special)
- Superior Brood Tender (Special)
- Superior Juvenile Queen (Special)
- Superior Healer Ant (Special)
- Juvenile Great General (Special)
- Juvenile War Brain (Special)
- Battle Leader (Special)
- War Planner (Special)
Some interesting special evolution options had appeared and Solant looked at each with interest. Despite how well the Eldest designed the Superior evolutions for each caste, she knew it would be a waste to throw away the precious opportunity to select a special evolution. Each of her choices related to leadership in some way, and she wondered what had caused the System to lean that way.
Perhaps her relatively high ranked leadership or tactics Skills? Or the Eagle Eye mutation which allowed her to envision the battlefield as it would be seen from above? Or the Tactical Awareness mutation she'd added to her brain?
Whatever the reason, she examined each carefully.
The Juvenile War Brain was easy to eliminate. Despite the hefty bonuses it gave to Cunning, it required her to become semi-immobile, basically transforming her into a symbiotic entity that would be grafted onto another general that she would possess. It didn't gel with her picture of herself, nor the Colony as a whole.
War Planner was suited to directing the course of an entire war, away from the battlefield itself. It helped to organise logistics, plan movements that played out over days and weeks. Important, necessary even, but that wasn't for Solant. She wanted to feel the heat of battle on her carapace.
The Battle Leader was an interesting evolution, giving solid bonuses and auras that would allow Solant to become a potent presence on the front line, enhancing her allies and directing the fight from up close.
It was good, but not exactly what she wanted.
Instead, her gaze fell on the Great General evolution. Only a juvenile, which meant there was potential growth in the future.
[The Juvenile Great General is a leader who has displayed tactical brilliance and a grasp for grand strategy. Lead your troops in a brilliant dance, bewilder and confuse the foe, achieve victory.]
Now this, spoke to her.
-x-X-x-
Rip and tear. Rip and tear. Rip and tear.
Holy moly, I'm getting sick of all this ripping and tearing!
The stupid demons are endless! I'd go so far as to say that the demons start coming and they don't stop coming! It's not even that there's just an endless sea of demons swirling around us, it's the percentage of those that are overwhelmed by the big daddy demon and come wading through their kind to get at us. And maybe that's only one percent of every demon we see, but that still adds up to INFINITY demons.
Even I'm getting tired, and I'm basically immune to fatigue, for now at least. The further we plunge into the third stratum, the further from the Colony we get and the more tenuous my link through the Vestibule becomes and the more nervous I get.
I've been kind of hoping that I'd connect to the ants below me, in the fourth, since I know our territory is roughly vertical as it descends, but I've got nothing yet. We've known for a long time that the third was deeper than we thought, but this is getting ridiculous.
So far, we've descended four times, and everytime we get down a layer, the mana gets thicker and the environment more unwelcoming.
[Just how deep does this place go?] I complain to Al. [If it gets any hotter, my cooling enchanted rings are going to melt off!]
The giant eyeball of fire stares at me. I can barely even feel the heat coming off him at this point, it doesn't make any difference when the ambient temperature is this high.
[I do not know precisely how deep the third stratum goes, as I have never exited it into the fourth. We are almost as deep as I have ever been, however.]
Well that's something at least. To be honest, I probably don't want to go much further. We're too far from the Colony for the Altar to be as useful as I need it to be. Only the support of Tiny, Crinis, Invidia and Al gives me the confidence to venture this far out, but that faith is starting to wane.
I can endure the constant barrage of attacks pretty well, the others, not so much. And the heat is literally melting Crinis, she's barely able to keep her form together on my back, dripping down my sides like an oil stain. I'm having to maintain a mini ice domain just to keep her going.
[Do you still have the trail?] I demand of the demon.
His eye flashes.
[I have it.]
We didn't come this way on a hunch, we did manage to get ahold of Torrifex's scent. Al and Crinis were the ones to detect him, getting a whiff of his mana on the edge of their awareness. Unfortunately, the big coward is still retreating, probably to meet up with his nefarious siblings.
They won't get away. I'm going to flatten those tier eight demons if it's the last thing I do!
The air is thick with ash and smoke. Lava flows are everywhere. In some places, they still jet up into the air, hundreds of metres high, before falling back to the strata floor. This deep, with the mana so dense, everything I hate about this place is magnified.
[Oop. Look out, Tiny, I think there's another one coming up.]
The ape turns his head with interest, despite the sweat dripping from his matted fur. Poor guy. As we run, we see yet another abandoned fortress.
They've become more and more common as we've descended, which makes sense, since the juicier resources of the stratum are to be found deeper down. Clearly, whoever owned these places has decided that it wasn't worth defending them in the current climate, and fair enough too. Built into cliff walls, or atop jutting peaks that thrust up from the plains, these are often intimidating-looking fortifications, possibly housing gates and precious resources that are now swarming with demons.
At least the little monsters aren't spawning on them, but the more advanced ones are climbing up there to do battle with each other and get a quiet moment to evolve. Two objectives rather at odds with each other.
To keep Tiny's mood up, I've been letting him go and have a nice therapeutic rampage when we pass close by one, just so he can vent his frustration.
All this running with too little battling isn't good for the big ape's mood and it's a real downer when he starts pouting all over the place.
[I think we'll cut close by this one,] I tell him, [so go and have some fun. Invidia, back him up, would you please?]
[I willssssss.]
[FIGHT!] Tiny cheerfully announces before he starts bounding off, electricity sparking from him.
I watch him go before turning my attention back to our surroundings. There's nothing here right now, but that could change in an instant, need to be alert.
[Do we think they're on this level?] I ask Al.
[It is… possible,] he returns, and that's the best news I've had all day. Climbing down those damn pillars is an absolute nightmare.
[Alright then, we'll continue our sweep. Let's hug close to this fortress so we don't get too far apart. How are you doing, Crinis?]
[I'm… just fine, Master.]
[Rubbish. You're struggling, and that's fine. Let me know if I can do more to help. Are your senses still sharp?]
[I'm keeping… an… eye out.]
[Excellent. That's all you need to do, alright? Don't tax yourself.]
She wouldn't even have that ice domain if I hadn't just gone ahead and done it without asking her. Suffering in silence is the Crinis default, and it's a habit I hope she grows out of. Everyone needs help. Heck, I need it all the time.
Hopefully, we track those damn demons down soon, because I am building a lot of pent up rage myself, and I can't wait to unleash it!
-x-X-x-
After further hours of roaming back and forth, trying to get a sniff of our prey whilst fending off the endless tide of demons, we finally get another hint.
It's Al who manages to catch a glimpse, and he lets us know with his usual even demeanour.
[I found something,] he says.
[Oh yeah? Like what?]
[I believe I have detected a trace of almost pure ash mana. It is… unusual.]
[Get at the point, man, enough of your waffling!]
[What are… waffles?]
[Argh! Damn your endless curiosity! What is so unusual about this ash mana?]
He glares at me, which is quite the intimidating glare, I might add, and I know that the question of breakfast foods has only been delayed, not resolved. Nevertheless, he continues.
[Its purity.]
I swear to gandalf, I'm about to flatten this damn eyeball into a pancake. Perhaps he senses my rising ire, because he elaborates without further prompting.
[I suspect it has come from Pyrixan. Only she, that I'm aware of, could manifest such a powerful and concentrated form of that mana.]
[Goody.]
Is it nice to know we got a hint of our enemies? Yes, of course, but I'd rather it didn't come in the form of manifested destruction in the form of concentrated ash mana.
[Where are they?] I sigh.
[I found the trail at the edge of my awareness. Several kilometres that way.]
[Holy moly, you can sense that far?]
[I can.]
[Impressive stuff. Well, let's get a bit closer and see if you can sniff out anything as we go.]
[Agreed…. Now, waffles.]
[Oh for -... fine.]
We begin a more restrained hike in the indicated direction as I explain to the giant eyeball of flame about the joys of breakfast baking. I've been told that waffles are great with syrup; personally, I never had the chance to try it, but these are the little details Al is all too happy to gobble up.
After ten minutes of careful travel, Al pipes up again.
[It's them.]
After all the running around, it's almost a shock to hear him say it so casually.
[What? Are you sure?]
The eyeball flares with intensity.
[I am.]
[Well… that's good news! We finally caught up to them! How about that, gang!]
Tiny gives me an eager thumbs up, Crinis flops a limp tentacle and Invidia simply flutters his wings as he holds his little body aloft, glaring into the distance. That serves as a timely reminder that we aren't in peak shape. Tiny might be eager to battle, but he's been healed dozens of times over the last few days and isn't exactly fresh in terms of stamina. None of us have properly rested for three days, which isn't the worst thing for us to deal with, but we've been more or less constantly fighting for that time.
To top that off, we're almost certainly walking into a trap.
I mean, after dragging me all this way down into the bowels of the third, away from my Colony, it had better be a trap. If they went to all this effort just to inconvenience me, that'd be annoying as heck. I fully expect, nay, demand a trap be sprung when I go to fight them.
[Hey, Al, I just had a thought, is it a trap, if you know it's a trap?]
He stares at me.
[I… am unsure what you mean.]
[I mean, is the element of surprise an essential component of a trap, or is it a trap regardless?]
Al just looks confused, so I let the matter drop.
We've been doing our best to restrain our mana signatures, Al and I sharing the burden of handling Tiny's since the big ape can't do it for himself. As we draw closer and closer to the spot Al has detected our fearsome trio, we redouble those efforts.
Not that it's hard to spot us if someone wanted to. Amongst the seething ocean of demons, we stick out like a sore thumb. I'm huge, for one, and we're covered in a moving purple dome of energy that flattens everything around us.
Could I bring down the gravity domain in order to make us less conspicuous? Yes, yes I could.
Will I?
There is no way in heck I'm bringing that thing down. We'd be swept away in a tidal wave of nibbling demon larvae. No way, no how.
We creep forward until we crest a ridge of stone, and there, below us, lies a basin filled with dense, burning hot mana, with thick clouds of ash and smoke curling through it like a malevolent snake.
Even the larvae don't seem to want a part of that basin, since it's one of the precious few places the ankle biters don't appear to spawn.
[M-master,] Crinis wheezes. [I can sense the enemy….]
[You mean those three gigantic demons in the pit? Yeah, I can see them.]
[N-no, not them.]
[We are surrounded. Interesting.]
I look behind and I can't see anything except the seething tides of monsters. Al and Crinis have managed to spot something, though.
[Surrounded by what? I mean, other than the obvious….]
[There are strong demons hidden beneath the larvae, thousands of them, all around us.]
[Oh, thank goodness.]
For a second there, when I saw the three big demons down in the basin, I'd feared the worst. Thankfully, they didn't let me down. The trap is a bit simple, a little basic overall, but hey, kudos to those demons for being willing to hide beneath the nasty little biters.
[Alright then, we see them, they see us, I assume, it's time to get down there and get to business. Tiny? You are not allowed to start fighting until I tell you, alright?]
He looks disappointed but nods.
[You do realise these monsters would rip you in half without blinking, right? They're two tiers more evolved than you.]
He shrugs.
[Whenever I can't decide if you're brave or stupid, I talk to you and the answer becomes crystal clear. Let's go.]
-x-X-x-
In the centre of the basin stand the three biggest, ugliest, most vicious-looking demons I've ever clapped my thousands of lenses on. Torrifex looks much as I remember him. A brutal, gigantic monster who towers over the rest of us, even Tiny, smoke billowing from his back and curling around his feet.
Now that he isn't moving around as much, I can see a little more detail of the big guy. His skin kind of looks cracked, with burning light shining through, as if he's got lava running through his veins. Those jackalish features aren't any more appealing than they were before, and his wickedly curved claws tipping each of his four arms don't look any nicer than they did before.
His sisters, if anything, are worse.
Pyrixan is hard to even look at. Not because of her terrifying appearance, but because of the slowly revolving cloud of ash that covers her at all moments. I can catch glimpses of the demon within, and what I see isn't great. My impression is of a withered blob of flesh covered in eyes, each of them weeping black ichor.
Lovely.
Somonax, on the other hand, appears in her full glory, not bothering to conceal herself beneath cloaks of ash or smoke.
She's… terrifying.
The first thing I see is the blades. I mean… there's a heck of a lot of blades. Thousands of the damn things. They swish and swirl through the air in elegant motions, like a dance… of DEATH. Thanks to their movement, I can make out the wire-thin threads that link them back to their host. In the middle, Somonax stands like a spider in the centre of a web.
Of the three, she's the most humanoid, two arms, two legs, one head, boring, standard stuff. She's still huge, of course, as a powerful tier eight monster should be.
Her face is… well… let's just say she looks happy! Half of her head is taken up with a wide rictus grin of needle-like teeth, the other half is pretty much just red eyeballs.
It's… a unique look.
A thought intrudes on my mind.
[Welcome, little worm!] Torrifex appears to be in a fine mood, bellowing across the mindbridge the moment I allow it to snap into place.
[You're awfully cheery,] I grumble, [quite different from the last time I saw you. As I recall, you scurried away after I dispensed a right whopping.]
The gigantic demon doesn't appear too pleased with this description of events, but his arrogant tone doesn't alter a whit.
[The Demon God wished you to be tested, and so you were. I had not been sent to kill you, that is the only reason you still live.]
[You slithered away like a little worm, that's the only reason you are alive. And now what? Arconi-butt wanted me tested, and I passed, naturally, and then you drag me down here and trap me with your two sisters, for what, exactly? Is this another test, or have you gone off script?]
The Ancients want another monster to rise to their level. I don't know exactly why, but they actively try to create claimants to that vacant throne. The Call is just one tool they use, sticking this damn hook in my guts to 'encourage' me to descend and grow stronger. The various monster cults were literally created by the Ancients for this purpose, putting members of the surface races to the task as well, all to find and foster the twentieth Ancient.
So it made sense that I, as one they've put their greedy eyes on, would be tested. What doesn't make sense is that after passing the test with flying colours, Arconidem would then want to lure me down here for a rather uneven three vs one battle to the death.
Which leads me to suspect that Torrifex and his merry crew are no longer acting on the orders of the Demon God. In fact, they may be going against his wishes in a particularly narrow way.
[The Demon God has ordered this stratum be made clean for his return. You and your Colony are not demon, so you will be removed.]
[That's true. But he didn't order you to kill me, did he?]
The big demon grins all the wider, the fire beneath his skin growing brighter until flames begin to lick through the cracks in his skin. That's all the answer I need.
These morons are jealous that the big daddy demon god paid attention to someone else. As heralds, they were supposed to be the special children, the favourites, but they were sent out to test a piddly little ant.
Or perhaps they aspire to sit on the throne alongside papa? Be the second demon to ascend to Ancient. Would be a rather special achievement, sure to elevate them in the eyes of Arconi-butt.
I sigh.
[Well, come on then. You three are giant sacks of experience and Biomass, just waiting for me to claim. You cannot imagine how hard it's been to afford my mutations.]
In a separate message, I speak to Al.
[Make sure you hit them with everything you've got. We need to unleash everything we have.]
To Crinis, Tiny and Invidia: [Keep the reinforcements off my back for as long as possible. Don't push yourself too far, Crinis, if you don't survive, I'm going to be super mad at you.]
[I-I-I-I won't, Master!]
[What, won't survive?]
[I mean I will!]
[Good then. Let's get to it.]
And just like that, I swagger down into the basin, with three tier eight demons waiting for me. Their auras are staggering, battering me. Torrifex is the same as before, heat and dominance pressing in on me like a vice, but the others are just as bad. The pressure emanating from Pyrixan feels like it's eating away at me, nibbling at the edges of my mind. Somonax… hoo boy. Violence, blood, murder, death. A manic, rabid, gibbering need to cut and thresh boils the air around her, rolling off in waves that try to push me back as I step forward.
I resist them all, staring the three of them down as I languidly click my mandibles.
[Well then. Shall we?]
HOOOOOOOOWWWWWWLLLLLLLLLLLL!
-x-X-x-
It's not easy to create and conceal something like a gravity bomb. The raw mana I pour into the damn thing, and its generally unstructured form, don't exactly lead to a stable, easily hidden spell.
The gravity bomb has always been a weird bit of magic. I first discovered this technique, and mana compression, when I blasted a croca beast directly in the face with a ball of pure mana. It's probably possible to do something similar to a gravity bomb with any sort of mana, a fire bomb, a water bomb, a lava bomb, or whatever.
It's not like I'm utilising some fancy, gravity only spell-form, all I'm doing is taking a huge chunk of mana and packing it into a dense ball before letting it rip.
But for some reason, I can't imagine any other type of mana working nearly as well as my special, purple, crushing magic. Once I compact it, smush it together, the mana itself takes over, sucking in everything it can get, compacting by itself, just like a black hole.
And when I release it, the bomb emits that terrifying pull, consuming the air, stirring up the wind and eating even the light. I can't possibly imagine any other mana type could come close to the devastation of this spell!
HOOOOOOOOOOOOWWWWWWLLLLL!
The bomb screams through the air, creating a vortex of twisting wind as it goes. This one is dense, with a ton of mana packed into it and empowered by the Altar. I didn't hold back even a little when preparing it, and now that this delectable dish has been served, I hope that these three demons manage to enjoy it.
By the by, am I shifting forward by any chance?
I shift my body to look down and, sure enough, my legs are being dragged forward, carving their own little furrows in the ground. In the distance, the bomb continues to fly away from me, and the more I look, the more I realise that I can't really see it properly. The thing is sucking in so much light, I can't even see the edges of it anymore, it's more like a… dark blob, a void, that moves through the air, rocketing toward the target.
So… this thing is pulling me forward… even though it hasn't expanded yet….
Oh… my… Gandalf….
[Duck for cover! Run! Dig! This is a code purple! CODE PURPLE!]
So saying, I spin myself around and throw my massive ant frame forward with all my strength. The moment I hit the deck, I start digging into it, face-hands flying as I rip through the rock, moulding it with earth mana as I go.
Tiny jumps in beside me and starts tearing into the ground with his thick fingers, a look of cold determination on his face, for once. It wasn't easy to impress on the big ape just how serious a code purple is, but I eventually explained that it would crush all his muscles to nothing and he nearly fainted on the spot.
[Invidia, are you down here?!]
[Yesssss.]
He doesn't sound happy about it, but I'm glad. In just a few seconds, it's not like we can dig far, but anything is better than leaving ourselves uncovered. I dumped as much gravity mana into this as I could while still concealing the spell. With Invidia helping to hide the mass of power, the bomb absorbed so much mana it had become a pure black sphere, rotating within me like a cold and indifferent beast.
HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOWWLLLLLL!!!!!
I turn around, my head poking out of the hole we dug just in time to see the bomb zipping over the final metres. The wind has been whipped into an absolute frenzy, to the point the bomb appears to be the centre of a newly formed hurricane. The winds are so fast, I swear I see larvae being lifted up into the air by their force, carried away to goodness knows where, or, most unfortunately, thrown toward the centre of the mess.
I don't even know what the three demons have done in response to my opening gambit, the chaos caused by the bomb is so total, it's impossible to pay attention to anything else.
When it reaches its destination, the bomb flickers for a moment, and I dig my claws as deep into the rock as I can.
Here it comes….
In a flash, the bomb expands, manifesting itself as a slowly rotating void, like the eye of an all-devouring god.
Then it expands again.
My eyes almost boggle out of my head at the size of the thing. This is double the size of my previous biggest bomb…. DOUBLE!
I'm way too close for this! Every damn time, the thing that gets the closest to killing me is my own damn magic!
As the gravity bomb reaches its full size, the most terrifying pull I've ever experienced takes hold, and everything goes wrong. The ground cracks and splits, the air screams, lava boils up, only to be dragged into the void.
Light is gone, sound is gone.
In the vicinity of the spell, everything is gone.
Holy moly. What have I created? I'm not sure if I'm more horrified or terrified, as that sickening dragging sensation is working its deadly magic on me as well! I've been rather impressed with my new body, but it doesn't take a genius to figure out that my mass has gone up rather significantly in my last evolution. The Gravity Compressed Diamond is so dense only Tiny can compete with it.
It's great stuff, but it doesn't exactly help when I'm trying to avoid being dragged into a miniature black hole.
[Master Grip (IV) has reached level 11]
Now that helps. Precious Grip, save me now!
The scene in front of my many-lensed eyes is a nightmare. The ground is being ripped up, the light is disappearing and the air is being dragged in so fast I can't hear anything except the high-pitched scream. If the wind speed picks up any more, then I'm going to lose an antenna!
I really should have tested a full strength Gravity Bomb before I let one rip…. How many times am I going to fall for this?!
With a mighty bellow, Tiny thrusts his hands forward and buries his fingers deep into the stone below. Must be nice having unbreakable bones! Now if only he had those bones on the outside….
Invidia is protected by clinging to the big ape and Crinis is stuck to me. Al… I'm not sure where Al wound up, I hope he can keep himself far enough away.
Holding tight, I pour every ounce of strength I can muster into holding my ground in the face of the thing that I created.
With a little luck, even those tier eight demons wouldn't have managed to survive it.
-x-X-x-
When the black hole finally flickers and fades away, I release my death-grip on the rock with a sigh of relief.
The basin as it had been is pretty much gone. What remains is a twisted, blasted landscape, ripped and torn apart by the strength of the gravity bomb. It doesn't look like I cast a spell, it looks like a natural disaster took place. This is on the same sort of scale as the mountain-exploding eruption magic I hit the termites with.
In fact… if I'd cast this bomb inside the mountain, it may have just hollowed the damn thing out.
Huge chunks of rock have been ripped up, pulled by the unrelenting force of the bomb. They almost look like fingers, curling up from the floor and reaching toward the place the spell had detonated.
Phew.
Considering how much of my precious, non-replenishable Altar resources I poured into that one, the effect needed to be worthwhile! I hardly expect it was enough to kill the tier eight demons, but I'm hoping it was enough to do some damage, at the very least.
Before the ash, smoke and dust can settle, I emerge from my temporary bunker and begin to cautiously advance. My gravity sense is going crazy as the normal order of the planet reasserts itself, causing that sense to be useless, but my vague sense of the future is still present and I rely on that as I edge forward.
[Quite the blow, insect! But not enough!]
Well… I'm glad you're dumb enough to announce it, and give away your general location via the bridge.
[Al! Time to go all out. Unleash everything you've got on them!]
With no need to hide anymore, I conjure a wind to blast the debris away, clearing the field in an instant.
The three demons stand defiant.
A little battered… but defiant nonetheless. I think Torrifex might be regrowing an arm….
Somonax appears to be covered in ichor, but I'm not sure that isn't just her natural state, given all the blades. Pyrixan… is still surrounded by a cloud of disintegration death.
I hadn't expected that bomb, as devastating as it was, to be enough to finish these powerful demons off, but I'd hoped. Ah well, I guess we go in and do it the old fashioned way.
I snap my mandibles together before I begin to run forward, while Al gathers power into his eye and unleashes a heatray as thick as a car at Somonax. The grinning demon slashes out with her thousand swords, slicing through the mana and cutting the beam apart, but it's enough cover for me to get closer.
All of my mind constructs kick into overdrive as they weave innumerable threads of mana, each contributing to the greater whole. I don't have bottomless gravity reserves, so I'll need to rely on my omni-elemental construct at times in this fight. The little stuff won't do, either. Bolts or even spears of ice won't do squat down here, the demons are resistant to heat as well, which leaves me having to rely on something a little more solid.
Spears of stone, as dense and thick as I can make them, begin to hurtle at Torrifex. The big demon brushes the first few aside contemptuously, but they don't stop, and he quickly grows frustrated, fire billowing from his maw.
I use the chance to close in on Pyrixan, jaws open wide as the swirling cloud of ash sits waiting for me to approach.
VOID CHOMP!
Empowered by the Altar, the bite attack is dramatically more powerful. The void forms between my mandibles, drawing Pyrixan in and tearing away fragments of her ash-shield, revealing a little more of the amorphous eye-blob that she is.
How do you like these apples?!
My mandibles slam shut with a deafening roar and Pyrixan… just takes it. The swirling ash condenses around her and, though it buckles under the weight of my bite, it doesn't break.
OUCH!
I release my grip and leap back as the ash begins to eat into my mandibles, dissolving them just through contact. Nasty stuff.
But the demoness doesn't want to let me go, the cloud of ash surges after me like a living thing. Wherever it touches my chitin, it strips away a tiny fragment of the diamond, but enough tiny fragments will add up quickly if I get surrounded by the stuff.
I pour more power into the gravity domain, but it's ineffective at keeping the drifting clumps of malevolent mana away, so I turn it off and switch strategies.
Time to introduce this demon to the business district!
POW! POW! POW! POW!
I fire wide blasts of acid in all directions, coating huge chunks of the ash in the stuff.
At first, it might seem like a nonsense move, but my acid has some beneficial properties. For starters, it eats away at mana! Not quickly, but it does do it, and secondly, it propagates itself, which means the ash that I shot will be destroyed eventually, the acid won't run out and isn't likely to be removed.
Gweheheheh!
How do you like that, you disintegrating demon of doom? Give me a little more time and you'll have no ash left at all!
Oh wait, she's producing more.
DAMMIT.
With her shield dispersed to attack me, the full glory of Pyrixan is revealed, and I have to say, I'm not a fan. She's like… a stalk, or… a chunky, twisted and bulbous pillar, covered in eyes. From the top of the stalk, a solid stream of ash is emerging, billowing out of her like smoke from a chimney.
Why the heck do you look so freaky?! Demons have such a ridiculous variety of evolutions and appearances, it's crazy! Are you really trying to tell me that this thing and Al AND Torrifex all share the same underlying species?! One is an eye made of fire, one is a four armed, smoke-billowing, jackal-headed juggernaught and the other is a… thing.
Only one solution to this mess.
More acid!
As if there's a holiday special and my produce is marked to clear, I unload rapid-fire acid shots at the demon, the wide area spray covering every possible avenue of escape.
Of course, Pyrixan doesn't look that quick, so she doesn't bother to dodge. Instead, she uses her newly produced ash to form a new shield around herself, which promptly gets coated in acid. So she starts to make more.
Of course, during this time, I'm still running and dodging from the remnants of the first batch she trained on me.
So annoying!
Oh, it looks like Torrifex got sick of smacking my spears away. That explains the giant fireball heading my way.
EMPOWERED DASH!
-x-X-x-
I skitter out of the way just before the ball of roiling flames detonates in a furious roar, scorching me on the back-zone rather badly. Despite sensing it coming, and despite using my empowered dash to basically teleport a hundred metres, I still got burned. That was one big kaboom.
Using the dextrous aim of my nozzle, I keep firing acid at Pyrixan to keep the pressure on her as I size up against Torrifex who looks like he's positively boiling beneath his skin.
A steady stream of heavy-duty stone spears still zips through the air toward him, but he's countered by enacting some variety of fire domain. As the spears draw closer to him, they twist, melt and warp, deflecting them from their path. He does occasionally get splattered with molten rock, but he doesn't seem to care.
Might need to rethink the stone strategy.
[Your life ends here, little worm!]
[You really need to learn the difference between invertebrates. Especially when you stand in the presence of the strongest kind there is!]
No matter how you slice the pie, ants are the king, or more appropriately, queen of the insect kingdom. Other bugs, to ants, are just food. After all this time running around on the third and seeing the demons swarming as they have, they are seriously starting to feel like bugs to me.
Torrifex rushes towards me, his huge frame displacing so much air his appearance warps, four savagely clawed arms cutting down at once.
Four separate sets of slashes formed by his Skill slice through the air towards me. At the point they meet, I can feel an indomitable might, as if the power from all four slashes has been concentrated directly at that point.
Luckily, my antennae are on the job and I had an inkling this was coming a moment before it did.
My nervous system fires with impossible speed and I'm moving the second the big demon's arms are moving forward, dodging to the right. As the cuts whip past me, they carve huge chunks out of the stone, digging a furrow as they travel, as if the rock wasn't even there.
I need to retaliate, but I have to be mindful of my resources. Everytime I get a good angle, I unleash a fresh blast of acid at Pyrixan, but she continues to sit still and pump out ash like a Victorian factory. Can we get some air quality controls in here?! Sheesh!
If she manages to reach a critical mass of ash, there won't be much I can do to slow her down. From what I can see, she can manipulate the stuff at will, which means she could chase me down and surround me unless I get far enough out of her range.
But I can't devote the time I need to prevent her manufacturing process because I've got Torrifex, a massive, unstoppable demon, up in my grille, literally trying to grill me.
Thinking quick, I pressurise as much water mana as I can before I unleash a torrential jet of water at the huge demon. The second it touches his fire domain, the water evaporates, but I continue to pour it on.
Soon enough, vast clouds of steam are billowing out everywhere, blocking my view of the target.
But he can't see me either, for the moment at least. Time to get Pyrixan!
I turn and dash, rushing the weird Ash-demon with my mandibles peeled back for another chomp. I've got a tiny window here, so I need to make the most of it.
VOID CHOMP!
Empowered by the altar, the chomp is once again ridiculously overpowered, but my stock of altar juice is really starting to run low. Even mutated to this point, it can't keep up with the demands of these high level Skills, especially when it isn't getting refilled!
No matter. If I unleash all of my altar power, I refuse to believe it won't have an effect!
Surrounded by a growing mound of acid-coated ash, Pyrixan almost appears to have put down roots. She glares at me with her many eyes, but I'm resistant to her ire. What I'm not resistant to is the aura of destruction that emanates from her. Even without her ash cloud, it's eating away at me!
Thankfully, my body is composed of seriously dense materials. It's going to take you a while to chew through this carapace!
With a devastating roar, my mandibles slam shut once more, and I can tell she felt it that time. Without the same coverage from her cloud, she wasn't able to block all of the ridiculous amount of force my chomp applied.
Stone shatters and the floor beneath us buckles under the pressure as the almighty void chomp is unleashed, and Pyrixan reels back. That hurt her!
Unfortunately, this next bit is going to hurt me….
Like a bat out of Hades, Torrifex streaks out of the steam, smoke trailing behind him and a look of pure rage twisting his face. Although, it has to be said, he looks super mad pretty much all the time. This guy needs a massage or something.
I sensed him coming, of course, but I had to commit to putting the hurt on Pyrixan while I had an opening. Looks like I'm going to have to take a hit in exchange.
Sigh.
Once again, his four arms slash, this time directly onto my carapace. I do everything I can to minimise the damage, shifting the angle of impact to maximise my defence, dodging at the last possible second, even using a smidge of force mana to shield from the blow.
It doesn't help much.
Pain explodes in my side as I'm sent reeling through the air. Like an ant-shaped missile, I'm blasted away, flying hundreds of metres before I slam into a stone pillar, sending showers of stone and dust flying.
Holy moly! He just embedded me into the side of a mountain! Who does he think he is? Godzilla!?
Legs waggling, I pry myself out from the rock and drop down the plains below before I dash back toward the fight. I can't leave Al there by himself. He's been one on one with Somonax all this time, and as much as I'd like to believe he's holding his own, I really don't think that's the case.
My side aches fiercely and I don't hesitate to activate my healing gland to repair the damage.
It's not super easy to look at the side of my body, but I can tell he managed to crack the gravity compressed diamond, a super impressive feat. If I'd skimped out and opted for a cheaper material, I may well have been cut in half in that moment.
Viva the spending!
-x-X-x-
As it turns out, Al is not doing all that great. The amount of fire mana the eyeball can bring to bear is absurd, and the concentrated beams he produces would punch a hole in just about any monster I've ever seen.
But Somonax just doesn't seem to care. Whatever the hell those wires on her back are, she can work up some serious momentum as she whips her thousand blades about. As far as I can see, those sword-like appendages have a few effects built into them.
For one, they can obviously cut through mana with ease, since she's gleefully slicing everything Al sends her way. For two, whatever they and the wires are made from, it sure as heck isn't a material native to the third. I refuse to believe something that advanced isn't more expensive than what a demon is given naturally. Third, and I'm not sure how she does this, but she can clearly control them independently.
All thousand of them.
Luckily for me, they appear to only have a range of fifty metres or so, otherwise, she could probably be slicing up me and Al at the same time. If I were to hazard a guess, Somonax has a rather large chunk of brain matter hidden away in her demonic pocket dimension, similar to Invidia, but unlike Invidia, all that grey matter is devoted to whip and blade control.
It's an incredibly straightforward strategy, one I'm sure she's poured a ton of her evolutionary energy into. Many blade, blade cut good, more blade, more slashy.
It's like if Tiny were obsessed with swords instead of fists and muscles.
Somonax probably has more going on under the hood than just this, but I don't have the time for a more in depth examination, since Torrifex has spotted me again.
POW! POW! POW! POW!
Now that I'm in range and Pyrixan is still refusing to move, I oblige her by resuming my rapid fire bombardment of acid in her general direction. At this point, she's surrounded by a disgusting, bubbling mass of acid and ash, like a particularly noxious swamp. The acid approach was my best approach by far, but I can tell that I'm losing the battle. The demon probably doesn't feel the need to move since she feels all she has to do is sit and pump out ash until she eventually has enough that I can't fight back.
As aggravating as it is, I don't have the time to devote to slowing her down, since Torrifex is about to blast me with another fireball of doom.
Give me a break already!
He doesn't. Real shocker there.
Empowered Dash!
I get my butt out of dodge and once again get singed on the backzone for my trouble. The area behind me is a scorched, still-burning crater after that shot. I mean, more than it was before. The third stratum generally adheres to a 'blasted wasteland' sort of aesthetic, but after being exploded by a gigantic fireball of doom, it has achieved a whole new level.
Well, my plan from the beginning was to unleash all of my resources as quickly as possible and this seems like an appropriate time to follow through.
I didn't spend those precious seconds running back to the fight idly considering how Somonax has mutated and evolved.
Well, I did do that, but thanks to having multiple mind-constructs I can do multiple things at a time. Like make two separate gravity bombs.
I line up the two demons and unleash the two bombs, empowering both for good measure.
HOOOOOOOOOOOOOWLLLLLLLLL!
HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOWLLLLLLLLL!
These are obviously much smaller than the supermassive effort I started the fight with, but empowered by the altar, they'll do a lot of work if they connect.
Once again, Pyrixan doesn't seem to want to move, covering herself in her cloud to absorb the blow.
Torrifex, though… he does seem as if he wants to dodge, but having just unleashed his fireball, he needs a moment to recover. He'll be able to avoid the point of impact, sadly, but he'll be close enough that the after effects will be difficult for him to avoid.
Which is good enough.
The two bombs reach their destinations and expand, unleashing their full fury. Once again, we are treated to the shrieking wind and groaning stone as the forces of gravity run wild, tearing everything apart to sate an insatiable hunger.
Once again, I have to note that two bombs don't seem to play nice with each other. Everything caught exactly between the two spells is relatively fine, since gravity is basically balanced out there, but that's a razor thin line to tread. Everything else is just getting shredded.
[PITIFUL INSECT!] Torrifex roars in fury. [I will REND YOU!]
[You should focus on surviving. I would, in your position.]
With those two dealt with for the time being, I need to turn my attention to Somonax. I'm sure Al would appreciate the help.
I'm really starting to run low on resources here… that reminds me.
[Hey, Invidia! Have you finished laying the groundwork?]
[The ground isssss alssso mine!]
[I mean… sure? But are you done?]
[Almosssst.]
[Fantastic.]
That idiot better be right about this. If not… I guess it won't matter if not.
[Alrighty, Al! I'm here to help! How are th-]
HOLY MOLY!
My antennae explode with sensation, and a tenth of a second later, a wall of swords descends on me. I whip all my legs beneath my body after throwing myself to the side.
WHAM!
Oof! That one stung. The force slams me down into the ground, allowing me to skip the 'stop' and 'drop' and getting straight to the 'roll'. Which I do. That was nasty! I think she managed to cut a chunk out of my precious carapace!
[Al? You still kicking?]
[I don't have legs…]
[That's not… never mind. Are you ali- well clearly you're alive. How are things going?]
[Not… well.]
[Great.]
-x-X-x-
Somonax's face is twisted into a permanent grin, her needle-pointed teeth as long as a man's arm flashing in the red light. From her back, the thousand wires spring, each connected to one of a thousand blades.
I've used almost all of my Altar energy to tie down Torrifex and Pyrixan for the moment, but I'm doubtful those two bombs will be strong enough to kill them, which means I need to make the most of this two-on-one time I have with this demon of endless slaughter.
[Alright, Al. If you've got anything left to give, you better give it now. I'm going to run in and see what I can get done.]
[I will try.]
I'm keen to give him a motivational talk, a bit of the ol' 'there is no try' stuff, but I don't have it in me right now. I knew running headlong into the tier eight demons was going to be tough, but right now, I feel like I've unleashed everything I have and they're just taking it. Once my Altar runs dry, they'll be able to squash me like a pancake at festival time.
Time to go for it!
Somonax grins… or… just maintains her normal expression, as I turn and rush directly at her, launching a barrage of compressed stone spears as I do.
Those blades make quick work of the projectiles, shards of stone go flying in all directions as each spear is detonated when cut. I knew she'd be able to defend herself, all I wanted to do was tie down at least some of her limbs as I made my approach.
Dash!
I lunge forward with all my speed the moment I pass within the range of her wires, and it's a good thing I do. From a dozen different directions, hundreds of those gleaming red blades slash down and the best direction for me to dodge is forward.
Even so, I get a few slices on the rear-guard for my trouble.
Seriously? Why always the commercial zone?! Doesn't matter, push forward.
The barrage of stone spears continue, and each one is expertly shattered by a slash from the demon. She's not even moving her body at the moment, because she doesn't have to. I can't hurt her unless I get closer, and doing so plays right into her strengths.
My future-sight antennae are on fire as I receive tingling warnings of hundreds and hundreds of individual movements at once. Even with so many brain constructs to process the input, I'm struggling to keep up!
I roll to my left, leap forward, drop low, then rush forward again, my claws gripping so hard I rip chunks of stone out of the ground every time I change direction. The closer I get, the faster and more concentrated the blade attacks become, until I feel I'm facing a storm of swords rather than a demon. She's basically making a solid wall in front of me! I can't push forward without getting cut!
Well, time to put the gravity compressed diamond to the test. I didn't harden my defences this much to shy away from a few little slashes!
Here we go!
Six legs blur as I rumble toward the enemy, my jaws pulled back ready to bite. Immediately, a rain of blades comes down on me, battering into my carapace a thousand times a second.
Oof!
I stagger, but continue to move. From behind, a concentrated hyper-beam of burning light erupts from Al, spearing toward the demon. Somonax tilts her head and gathers her blades, parrying at the last second, slicing through the mana.
A chance!
VOID CHOMP!
The jaws of dark light manifest themselves and begin to close on Somonax, but the demon doesn't seem afraid.
THUNK!
Two hundred swords come down together, concentrating their force on a single point as they attempt to stab through my carapace. The force of the strike sends my legs splaying wide and the underside of my carapace slams into the ground, but I maintain my attack.
For her trouble, the demon has managed to sink her weapons almost thirty centimetres into my carapace, almost enough to get through, but nobody wins a prize for 'almost'!
Eat mandibles, you grinning demon!
With a thunderous roar, my jaws slam shut, but I don't get the feedback I was looking for. What happened?!
I cast about wildly until I realise where the enemy went. She's above me! She jumped out of the chomp?!
Spinning in the air, Somonax pulls her thousand blades together, forming them into a gigantic point that she aims straight at my midsection before plummeting down with the force of a comet.
I still can't believe how fast that dodge was. Not only is she so crazy strong, she's fast. Dammit!
Well, I can be fast too.
Empowered Dash!
My Altar is gasping for energy at this point, but I zip from beneath the strike a half-second before the demon lands, smashing the rock and sending boulders and lava soaring into the air.
Holy moly! That was close….
Wait a second, is it getting dark out here, or is it just me? My minds spin as I try to keep up with everything happening and the sheer overload of sensory information, along with managing my constructs and spells as I cast for something I can use to my advantage.
The gravity bombs have burned out and expired, which means Torrifex and Pyrixan are free once more and I didn't manage to land so much as a mandible on Somonax.
Stupid demons, why do they have to make this so difficult?!
From behind me, a dark cloud rises into the sky and my poor ant heart sinks in my chest. What at first seems like a pillar, towering a kilometre into the sky quickly transforms into a tidal wave that curves down toward me.
I can hear the rushing sound as a wall of air is pushed back into me by the overwhelming ash cloud.
Where the heck did this come from?! Pyrixan was holding this back all along?! That's cheating!
My minds churn and I create a barrier of stone that wraps over me into a hollow dome that I frantically reinforce just before the ash breaks like a wave and washes over the battlefield, burying everything in a layer of ash.
Immediately, I can feel my defensive stone begin to collapse as the power of destruction consumes it like a potent acid.
My mind constructs burn as I pour every ounce of mana I can get my hands on into reinforcing the stone and thickening it. Anything to keep that damned ash from touching my shiny carapace!
-x-X-x-
Hunkered down in my little bunker, I can't see much, or even sense much, with the surroundings filled with ash, so it's no surprise that Torrifex's fireball takes me by surprise.
A brief flash of powerful fire mana, followed by my stone barrier glowing cherry red then melting away is all the warning I get. Even my antennae don't give me enough of a heads up to do anything about it. All I can do is curl over like a pill-bug and hope for the best as the devastating fire erupts all around me.
Quite naturally, I'm sent flying by the force of the explosion.
My legs waggle in the air beneath me as I try to get my bearings and assess the damage. Firstly, HOT! That was a spicy meata-ball! I'm literally smoking, there is smoke coming off my carapace.
Stupid demons! How dare they sully my shininess with their pitiful magic? I'll make them pay! Or, I'd like to make them pay, but perhaps not right at this moment. Looking down, I can see the vast ocean of dense ash clouds waiting for me to land in them, and I'm not too keen on the experience.
Shield mana! Don't fail me now!
With so many mind-constructs churning constantly, I manage to create the shield beneath my legs just as I reach the peak of my arc, before I begin to descend.
Holy moly, I really got shot high up. I might be able to see my house from up here!
Of course, this means I'm stuck in plain sight, about fifty metres off the ground.
Beneath me, three tier eight demons glare upward with hungry gazes. Torrifex is so mad he's practically boiling, I swear if he gets any more red he's going to explode. Or maybe he's just preparing another massive fireball to detonate me in mid-air.
Yep, that's definitely what he's doing.
Please, Invidia, I hope to goodness you've finished your work. I also hope that idiot can do what she said she can do. Otherwise I'm going to thwack her right into the next century!
Torrifex launches his fireball, and at the last possible moment, I dive from my platform and freefall downward. Behind me, the fireball detonates like a miniature sun. A very angry, rage-filled sun.
My entire vision is filled with red, but I don't allow it to distract me. Sunk deep into meditation, I let my fears and worries slide from my thoughts and concentrate on what I need to do.
I'll only have one shot at this and I need to make it perfect.
My brains burn fiercely as I push them as hard as I can, sucking in mana, pumping it into the contructs I'm maintaining, and weaving the resulting mana into the spells I need. It's mind-meltingly difficult, but I need to get it done before I hit the ground.
Which is in about one second. Everything happens at once.
A wave of ash rises to meet me, followed closely by a thousand blades slashing upward, seeking to pierce me through. A great rushing sound vibrates along my antennae to the point I can't hear anything else.
I couldn't have asked for a better chance than this, all three of them, packed so tightly together. I can do this! All I need to do is survive, which… should be fine?
The thousand blades of Somonax crash into me at once, smashing me from every side simultaneously. A moment later, the ash cloud envelops me and I can't see anything but black, and can't feel anything but pain.
Somonax manages to cut massive grooves into my diamond carapace, but not enough to get all the way through. Not on that strike, at least. After that, the destruction properties in the ash take over and I feel like I've been dipped in acid.
It's very unpleasant.
My HP drops precipitously and continues to fall as time passes. When I finally manage to hit the ground, I'm down to half, which is worrying, but it's greater than zero. So I win.
Take this, you fools!
Doing my best impression of Pyrixan, a colossal burst of mud explodes outward from me just as I contact the ground. As if launched from a geyser, the brown, mucky substance rises like a tidal wave before it crashes down, carrying everything with it.
In that instant, everything around me is coated in a thick layer of mud, including the three demons.
FLASH HARDEN!
One moment, I'm surrounded by goopy mud, the next, it has frozen solid, hardening like concrete in the blink of an eye.
Of course, concrete isn't going to keep tier eight demons still for long. I think I have… one second?
[TINY, CRINIS, INVIDIA! LET'S GOOOOOOO!]
Quick as a thought, I summon my pets before I reach out to the nebulous connection I maintain with my most irritating student.
[Get your pretentious butt in here right now!]
There's a purple and pink flash, followed by a strange pop, and a little ant manifests directly on my head.
"It isn't pretentious if you're BRILLIANT!" she cries.
"No time for stupid! Do it!"
Thankfully, she doesn't waste any time on further words and I feel her mana swirling. Quickly, it resonates with the enchanted pods Invidia removed from his mouth and buried around the basin.
I have no idea what was in them, liquid of some kind and a bunch of inscriptions, from the sense I got with them, but now that Brilliant is working her spell, I can feel an absolute torrent of power unleashed from them.
At the same moment, the three demons break free, but it's already too late.
Lightning flashes, my vision blurs to nothing.
Tiny, Crinis and Invidia reach my side just as we are ripped from our location in space and moved to somewhere rather different.
[Tiny?]
[Hrrr?]
[Were you always a cat?]
[HRRRR?!?!?!]
"My bad! One second!" Brilliant cackles.
Another flash and we are back in the third stratum. But not quite where we left.
-x-X-x-
I don't even need to look to know where we've landed. Before sight returns to my eyes, I heave a sigh of relief.
Through my Vestibule, a torrent of energy floods in. The Nave hums with power, and soon enough, the Altar begins to rapidly fill. That's not all. My fatigue washes away, my acid and regeneration gland replenish at absurd speed, allowing me to trigger another wave of healing that makes my body thrum with vigour.
That crazy little ant actually pulled it off. She told me she was getting close to mastering dimensional travel, that the Colony would soon have gates, but her ability to pop in and out of places was growing stronger all the time.
Before, she was able to take me along with her, but now she can bring along a few more for the ride.
Tiny, Invidia, Crinis and Al have all made it back safely through the dimensional jump. We've arrived back at the top of the third stratum, between two cities held by the Colony. Safety.
Of course, us five weren't the only ones Brilliant managed to bring back.
Not far away, Torrifex, Somonax and Pyrixan stand enraged and confused. I can't blame them for that, being whipped through dimensions is more than a little unnerving. Disorienting doesn't really cover it either. If I were to describe it, I'd say it's kind of like having your brain pulled inside out and then snapped back the right way. It's going to take them a moment to recover, and I'm glad for it. I need to get some HP back.
Of course, I'll be able to fire the regeneration gland every minute or so, considering how many ants are around. There are millions of them, and they aren't even that far away.
In fact, there's several hundred thousand arrayed all around us.
While I pull in energy as fast as I can, the ants waste no time in making their presence felt. I'm too far away to hear the command be issued, but in short order, the sky is filled with a barrage of acid quite unlike anything I've ever seen before.
In a wide circle, thousands and thousands of ants lift their abdomens, take aim, and fire. Huge jets of concentrated formic acid rise into the air, then hang for a moment, before they begin to descend. I wouldn't describe it as a rain of acid necessarily, or even a deluge. It's more like the sky became acid, and then fell.
Before the demons can orient themselves, megalitres of formic acid crash down on their heads, obscuring them from sight. Quickly followed by the second barrage, then the third.
If they had enough in the tank, the Colony could probably produce an ocean of the stuff here and now, but sadly, the scouts who specialise in this sort of long range bombardment can't keep it up for long. After the fifth shot, they're out of juice and the place the demons had been standing is literally awash with hissing, sizzling acid.
I watch all of this take place after scurrying to a safe distance, still hoovering in mana and churning it through constructs, preparing my next spell.
I think the acid welcome will certainly hurt the massive demons, but I don't think it'll be enough to destroy them. I need to be ready.
From deep within the newly formed acid lake, bubbles begin to rise as the dark liquid stirs ominously. More and more bubbles rise, and soon, the entire pool is a frothing, boiling mass.
From deep within, a sphere of pure fire rises, surrounded by a cloud of acidic gas as the fluid in contact with the shield itself is immediately vaporised. I can already sense the surging ash within the flames. The three demons aren't happy.
When the trio emerge into the open, their suffocating auras batter into me, even more intense than they were before. Things aren't going according to plan, and I don't think the heralds are all that happy about it.
The air itself seems to burn around Torrifex as he seethes with fury, his skin shifting and bubbling as the fire within him rages out of control.
Pyrixan has transformed into a column of pure ash, the aura of destruction emanating from her is so thick even the acid vapour is dissolved to nothing as it draws close to her.
Somonax is the most terrifying. Her bloodlust has become so thick the air around her has become tainted red. Each of her blades glows bright, twisting around her as if each has a mind of its own.
It's an intimidating sight, but the Colony didn't only bring ants to this party. From the encircling army emerges a host of demons, almost all of them tier six. These are the demons who live in Colony occupied territory and remain free from Arconidem's compulsion.
From long range, they unleash their fury, a torrent of fire and ash and rage that covers the three heralds once again.
Even at tier eight, being besieged by thousands of weaker monsters must be a massive pain in the backzone. After the torrid fight we've been through, they can't be in their peak condition, but even so, I know that this won't be enough.
As the demons pour out their firepower, I watch carefully for any hint of motion. My brains feel like they're melting, pushed to the limit, each of my dozens of mind constructs is frantically working to draw in mana and add it to the spell I'm preparing.
The spell itself is beginning to become hard to control as I pack more and more power into it. To provide enough power, I had to create a gravity mana construct, and that thing is positively humming with all the raw mana I'm pumping into it.
As I work, I keep one eye on the Altar, watching as the precious, precious energy refills rapidly. With this many ants around, I'm practically overflowing with Will.
All I need is for the three demons to be pinned down for a few more seconds!
[ENOUGH!] Torrifex booms, his mental roar so powerful it flattens many of the demons and ants flat against the ground.
[The demon god commands you obey! AND YOU SHALL!]
He glares at the demons who dared to attack him and his sisters, as if his eyes alone were enough to destroy their Will and force them to succumb to Arconidem. Perhaps he does have some method to affect them. Pity I'll never know.
[Arconibutt has got nothing to say until he can drag his sorry backside up here and say it himself!]
My own mental bellow isn't quite at the same level as the herald's, but it's enough to carry across the field of battle.
[Now get squished!]
Empowered by the Altar, I unleash the greatest, most concentrated Gravity Well I've ever made.
The demons are engulfed in a pillar of darkness from which not even light can escape.
-x-X-x-
Honestly, even I'm impressed by the spell I've created. The Gravity Well is as dense and packed full of mana as I can make it, emptying out what was left in my gravity mana gland, as well as whatever I could gather and push through the construct.
Every drop of energy that had gathered in the Altar was also sucked into it the moment I opted to empower it. The new mutation gives even more power to gravity spells, really kicking the effect up a notch.
The end result is a pillar of pure darkness, crushing the three heralds with a truly mind-boggling amount of force.
All I can really do is stand and watch….
Unlike the gravity bomb, there isn't a need to fear for my life, since the strength and force of the well is controlled by me, but it isn't like I can just throw stuff into it willy-nilly either. Goodness knows what would happen if I tried… certainly not me since I've never tested.
[How's it going in there?] I decide to fish for a mind bridge connection, but I don't find one, so instead I just broadcast toward the pit in which the demons are currently being flattened.
I don't get a response… so I assume they aren't feeling as talkative as they were a minute ago. I can still sense them in there, though, so I know they're still alive.
I have a worrying feeling that even this isn't going to be enough. My mind-constructs feel limp, as if they're all slumped over a table with their faces buried in lukewarm, microwaved curry, but I kick them back into action.
Stupid my-own-brains, we can rest later! Besides, all of your fatigue is being washed away by the pure energies of the Colony, and all the other weirdos who wound up in the Nave. Time to stop feeling sorry for myself and start pumping out more mana!
With so many ants around, even the Altar is refilling with power at a steady rate.
I quietly amass power and mana while I wait. Watching this happen is kind of cool, but also… sort of boring? It's not like the Gravity Bomb where the wind is howling and everything is going nuts…. The pillar of darkness just… stands there… and the demons are stuck at the bottom of it, being squished by the force.
After a while, I let my legs splay out and rest my carapace on the ground, idly triggering a fresh wave from the regeneration gland to patch me up. I've noticed the repairs from the fluid released by the gland take a lot longer to fix up my new carapace when compared to the old one. Presumably, the issue is with density. Thankfully, I have some mutations on the plating to help pick up the slack, but I may need to look at other solutions.
[Come on now…. How are things?] I broadcast again.
No response.
[Arconidem is a butt!]
[YOU DA- Arrrrrgh!]
Oho! Still kicking in there, just not enjoying himself very much. I almost feel sorry for the three of them, or I would if they hadn't come so close to turning me into Biomass.
[I put everything I had into that spell. You'll be lucky to make it out.]
[But when I do, you are FINISHED!]
[I guess we'll find out….]
Yup, all three of them are still kicking. I'm impressed. Also… when the heck is this spell going to end? Surely soon….
I better work a little harder gathering mana.
As I do, I decide to pick myself up and skitter a little closer to the pillar in order to get a better sense of the demons. The closer I get, the more the gravity sense in my antennae goes absolutely bonkers, which is a bit distracting, but I manage to channel it out.
All around, the thousands upon thousands of demons and ants watch from a safe distance, barely moving as they wait for the result.
I feel a little self conscious.
Probably, somewhere out there, a damned ant is already working on a prototype sculpture to capture the moment.
"No statues, dammit!" I roar with my pheromones, but there's nobody close enough to smell it.
Oh, the spell is ending. I can see it flickering a little at the edges. Over the next twenty seconds, the force of the spell drains away and visibility returns. As the last vestiges of the spell fade away, I tense, but I sense no movement from the three demons.
After another few seconds, I step forward and peer down into the hole created by the well.
About ten metres below me, atop a packed and super compressed surface of rock, the three demons glare up at me… from their positions wedged into the stone.
[You good?]
More glares.
They don't look all that good. The three of them may have survived, but not by much. I have to give it to them, they've been significantly tougher than I expected them to be. Good for them.
[Alright then, here comes round two!]
Well, the first spell lasted long enough that I've managed to put together another one. It isn't quite as dense, and I don't have the same oomph from the Altar, but it should do the job.
For funsies, I invert the direction of the force and extend the pillar all the way to the ceiling of the stratum.
After a few moments, the three demons are yanked from their sconces on the floor and then whipped upward with truly shocking speed until they slam into the roof.
[You have slain level 601 Unique Monster 'Torrifex']
[You have slain level 615 Unique Monster 'Somonax']
[You have slain level 628 Unique Monster 'Pyrixan']
[You have gained XP.]
[You have reached level… ]
[You have reached level… ]
[You have reached level… ]
[You have reached level… ]
[You have reached level… ]
Ahhhh. Precious levels. Haven't had such a rush of these in quite a long time. And three unique monsters? Even more delicious.
[You have reached level… ]
[You have reached level… ]
[You have reached level… ]
[You have reached level… ]
[You have reached level… ]
[You have reached level… ]
But that's… seriously a lot of levels….
-x-X-x-
A great sense of relief floods through me as the notifications continue to rain down. In the end, my overwhelming gravitic magic, empowered by my Altar, was able to be the difference maker, just like I hoped it would.
Honestly, the power I get from the Altar, and the unbelievable strength of the gravity spells, feels a little like cheating, especially when combined. It feels like it wasn't that long ago I was just a little, midget hatchling, scraping out a living hiding on ceilings and fighting for my life against the claw-centipedes.
With this evolution, I feel like I've finally tipped the scale. Now I can annihilate monsters even more highly evolved than I am!
MUAHAHAHAHAHAAAA!
All I need is hundreds of thousands, preferably millions of my siblings standing around cheering me on, ambushing my opponents and helping me whip them through dimensions in order to set up perfect conditions for the fight.
Yessssssss. My strength shall shake the heavens! Or more appropriately, the depths!
Wait… what about the Biomass!?
When the Well fades away, I keep a keen eye out and manage to see the precious, precious Biomass falling from the roof of the stratum. Must collect! If it lands on the plains, it'll be consumed in an instant by a gajillion larvae, producing the strongest mini-demons this stratum has ever seen.
With a tremendous amount of effort, inverted gravity bolts and platforms, I manage to collect the food in one place and hold it floating above my head, away from the ravenous gremlins.
There must be thousands of points of Biomass here, I will not allow it to be wasted! I still have so much mutating to do!
[You have done a great thing here today,] Al says, connecting a bridge with me as he floats over. [The heralds would have stopped at nothing to purge your people from this place, and pushed all the demons into following Arconidem's Will. Here, at least, there will be some respite.]
Such a nice thing to say. Ever since I heard about it, what that Ancient bumface has been doing has rubbed me the wrong way. It's good to know that the demons in the Colony's territory will have a little respite at least.
[You're welcome,] I say. [I'm glad I could help out your people and keep my siblings safe at the same time. I suppose you still have to deal with the compulsion, but at least you won't have those big morons chasing you around and trying to force it on you. How is that going for you, by the way? Still holding alright?]
[It has been… difficult, to maintain my presence of mind, at times. The power of Arconidem has been growing as the mana levels continue to rise. Right now… hmm…]
The fiery eyeball trails away and I watch him in confusion. I don't think I've ever seen Al run out of words. He seems to be thinking… about something. In fact… I think he's going to close his eye!
[Don't! Stay with me Al, what's going on?!]
I don't want to look into that void again. Never again!
[I... am confused. The compulsion from Arconidem… I am not feeling it clearly at the moment. In fact, I am barely feeling it at all….]
[Huh. That's surprising. It's a good thing, though, right?]
[It is…. But I do not know why.]
Ah, I can see that's super bothering him. For a demon who wants to know everything, being unable to explain how something this significant has occurred must be vexing.
[Well, if you can figure it out, let me know. If we can get more demons to free themselves from the compulsion, that'd be great.]
I wonder….
[Hey, Invidia,] I say to my friend over our private communication channel. [Are you experiencing the compulsion from Arconidem anymore?]
The little wings of my favourite Envy demon flutter a little as he ponders.
[It isssss gone.]
Huh. Well, that's great news!
[That's fantastic! We should celebrate!]
I feel a huge weight lift off my carapace knowing that Invidia, for some weird reason, is free from the invidious grip of the big butt from below. I don't know why the Ancient is so keen on sending all of his kind on a rampage in the third, but I'm not a fan. If there was one demon I wanted to be free, it was Invidia.
[All right. Let's head on back to the nest and get some rest. It's been a long few days.]
Ain't that the truth. After the emotional rollercoaster I've been on, even I'm exhausted.
Under the watchful eyes of hundreds of thousands of ants and tens of thousands of demons, I gather up my team and we make our way back toward the nest. I bring the Biomass along for the ride, of course.
To make travelling easy, I utilise the gravity domain until thankfully, blessedly, we make our way back into the giant nest beneath Roklu without any further incident.
Naturally, we are the centre of attention as we wander through the gates. All the ants and, surprisingly, not a small number of demons come to check us out as we make our way inside. I can only assume word of our deeds has gone on before us and the news of the dead heralds has spread wide through the Colony already.
When we finally manage to get into a private chamber, the four of us, along with Al, slump to the ground. I'm too tired to even eat, despite the wealth of Biomass waiting to be consumed.
Well, I'd better get started on it anyway.
[Come on, everyone, let's eat and then get some sleep.]
[Are you sure, Master? We are fully mutated, we don't need it like you do.]
I wave an antenna to dismiss her concern.
[That's tier eight Biomass and you guys are only tier six. That's going to be a metric bum-load of points for you guys. I mean, I need the points, but it's more efficient to give it to you.]
We nom away at it, but end up having to stop halfway through. It's just too much food.
As I settle in for some nice, restful torpor, I decide to take a peek in the nave, have a look around the Colony before I sleep.
To my surprise, I see Al in there, staring at me.
What the heck?!