ALL NOVEL Chapter 92: The Hive
Chapter 92: The Hive
...
"Watch out!!"
*Bam!!*
*Screeeeeeeeeeeeeech!!!*
"Attack now!!"
In the middle of the vast and deadly desert, twenty Knights raised their spears and pierced the weak points of an Antlion charger that had his special attack blocked by Aspen.
*Kyaaaaaaaak!!!*
The Antlion screamed in pain after being impaled by twenty spears at the same time. However, it did not die just by that. The next moment after being pierced, the Antlion turned around and opened its enormous mandibles in order to decapitate one of the Knights attacking it.
The Knight's face went pale immediately after, he tried to move away, but the Antlion moved too fast and appeared in front of the Knight before anyone could do anything.
However, right when it was about to attack, suddenly numerous shockwaves started appearing all around the Antlion. As soon as they made contact with it, these strange shockwaves started destroying its exoskeleton before it then began tearing its insides apart.
[Resonance Destructor]
From behind all the group, Princess Yuuki could be seen pointing her staff towards the Antlion with a serious expression on her face. It wasn't long before the Antlion perished in front of that attack, leaving a very scared Knight who had to take a bit of a rest in order to recover himself from the near-death experience.
*Nom*
On the other hand, Aspen was just sitting on a nearby boulder eating a piece of beef jerky from his inventory. The princess, who saw him eating alone calmly despite the harsh situation they had just faced, decided to approach him and talk to him for a bit.
"Sir Aspen, I saw you crash against that Antlion's charge head-on, Are you sure you are alright?" Yuuki looked at him with a raised eyebrow while trying to see if the Antlion had left any wound or injury after Aspen crashed against it. However, not only did Aspen seem completely uninjured, but he also seemed to be treating the fight they just had like another daily occurrence.
"Hmm? Yeah, don't worry about me. Even if I received some damage or injury, it will eventually heal anyways" Aspen turned to look at Yuuki with a surprised look in his eyes not expecting her to talk to him, but since the Antlion did not really inflict any damage, Aspen reassured her that nothing had really happened.
"Hmm... If you feel bad or something like that, then tell us please, you are the only one that can stop an Antlion's charge after all, and we could be pretty defenseless in the case you were injured"
Aspen just nodded his head before he continued eating his jerky with a calm expression on his face.
Yuuki's eyebrow twitched a bit when he saw Aspen's carefree response, but she still continued smiling at him nevertheless.
"Sir Aspen... I heard that you surpassed my record at the Mage's guild... Do you perhaps already know some type of magic? Or are you actually trying to start learning magic from the Guild?"
"A bit of the two options actually, I'm just looking to expand the amount of magic that I'm able to use... No one knows when even the most useless of magics will come in handy after all"
"But that's no good, if you don't focus on just one type of magic, you will never really master any of them. Our brains after all have a limit in how much can they learn in a lifetime, and if you concentrate on just learning a great number of them, you will never be able to use any of them to their greatest potential"
"Well, I'm pretty good at learning. So it's not a problem for me at all, besides, it doesn't even take me that long to learn a new type of magic"
"Hmm... if you say so..." Yuuki narrowed her eyes a little while looking at Aspen, but ended up shrugging her shoulders after seeing Aspen's stubbornness.
"Hey, tell me... how many mana drops have you consumed until now in order to be able to break my reco-"
"Captain, a horde of Antlions is coming our way!!!"
"What?! How many of them are there?!"}
Right before Yuuki could finish her question, suddenly the soldier who was watching their surroundings came running with a pale face toward his Jeffrey.
"Their numbers surpass what I believe to be 40 of them, I could say that ten or more of them are Antlion swarmers, while the rest of them are Antlion chargers!!"
Jeffrey's face wasn't better than that of the soldier that reported everything to him. Although it was true that Yuuki had actually decimated an entire army of Antlions with her magic, it was true that the Antlions were too busy dealing with the soldiers to care about Yuuki in the slightest. However, in this situation, they were outnumbered and overpowered as well. Yuuki could deal with the Antlions in due time, but if no one stopped the Antlions from attacking her, then that could be it.
A human being is still a human being even while having enormous amounts of magic.
"They must have heard their companion's screams... Aspen, you protect the princess, we will hinder the Antlions so that she can use her magic and destroy them before they breach our formation!!!"
Aspen looked at Jeffrey and nodded his head. Jeffrey saw this and smiled slightly seeing that at least during dangerous times Aspen could stop being selfish and follow orders properly.
Unfortunately for him, that wasn't the case here.
"Sounds good, but I have a better idea. You guys protect Yuuki, while me and the boys take care of these bugs"
"What?!"
Suddenly from behind Aspen, appeared a rather big luminous portal, and eleven small Snow Flinxes jumped out of it before looking at their surroundings with caution.
"W-what is that strange creature?"
"They look really fluffy..."
"What is Aspen doing?!"
"They are rather cute..."
Hearing the comments from the Knights, one of the Snow Flinxes turned around and opened its mouth threateningly, revealing several sharp teeth that could probably rip apart one of their arms easily with enough strength.
"Nevermind, they look fierce enough" One Knight shook his head and shuddered a bit.
Suddenly, Aspen arrived beside them and created a rather big wall of sand blocks that hid them from the vision of the Antlions. Since the desert was made of sand, it camouflaged rather perfectly with its environment.
"You guys hide behind this wall and cover my back or something like that. I will take care of them and gather their attention. You guys can shoot arrows while Yuuki casts her magic on them, easy to understand right?"
"But I am the Captain here!" Jeffrey looked at Aspen with an upset expression seeing such a ruthless subordinate.
"Then do you want to go there?" Aspen pointed towards the Swarm of Antlions moving towards them at a terrifying pace.
"..."
"..."
"We count with you Aspen, we will never forget your sacrifice and bravery" Jeffrey saluted Aspen with a soldier-like salute and went to hide with everyone else behind the wall.
"..."
*Sigh...*
"Very well, Fluffy, come here!"
*Kriek...*
One of the Snow Flinxes approached him and looked at him with a serious expression on its face.
"You guys deal with the Antlion chargers, I will take care of the flying ones..." Aspen took out the Blood butchered from his inventory and dashed rapidly towards the incoming nest.
*Bam!!*
Aspen jumped high into the air and looked at the Antlion swarmers flying towards him at a rapid speed. They seemed to be ready to rip apart their prey with their mandibles now that he was unable to move due to being in mid-air...
Yuuki, the Knights, and Jeffrey looked in horror seeing that Aspen was going to get devoured right after jumping into battle. However, unlike their expectations, when the Antlion used his mandibles to cut apart Aspen, this one had already vanished completely from his previous spot.
Now, Aspen was somehow above the Antlion swarmer with his Blood butchered raised high into the air ready to cut his enemy in half.
*Screeeeeeeech!!!*
The Antlion screamed in fury seeing its prey escape from its attack, but without even noticing, its wings had already been severed in half, and the Antlion fell to the ground helplessly.
*Bam!!!*
After crashing heavily against the ground, the Antlion tried standing up and reassess its situation. However, it soon noticed that he was not alone.
*Kiek*
Eleven cute little Snow Flinxes were looking at it with their sharp and dangerous teeth bared. It wasn't long before the Antlion swarmer's screeches reached everyone's ears.
Aspen fell to the ground not long after, he turned around to look at the sand wall where everyone was hiding and raised his voice seeing that they were all looking at him with dumbfounded expressions on all their faces.
"Aren't you guys gonna help a little?"
...
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In another part of the world.
...
inside a gigantic structure similar to a castle, a man wearing blue robes and a white mask with a beak on it laughed maniacally while looking in front of him.
"Hahahahahaha!!! It's marvelous, MARVELOUS~!!!"
Besides him, a woman with red hair was resting on the ground with a desperate expression on her face. She had several bruises on her body and seemed to be trembling several meters away from the man laughing in a corner of the room.
In front of the man, an enormous eyeball with a green-colored iris, and made completely out of steel could be seen there, attached by what seemed to be an umbilical cord with another eyeball that was mid-way being finished. It had an enormous amount of cables inside it, and a strange generator at the center filled with green-colored flames that could give chills to whoever saw them.
"You are really Marvelous~... MARVELOUS I SAID!!" The man grabbed the woman by the shoulders and shook her hastily with eyes filled with madness.
*Hik...*
The woman cried while being shaken by the man, she could just have shaken the man away but was too scared to do so.
"Oh, don't cry, we are making this for the sake of humanity. You should understand, right? Once everyone in this planted dies, their souls will be saved by our Lord Cthulhu and allowed to be part of his enormous power!! Are you not happy~? ARE YOU NOT?!"
The woman just continued crying, she was too scared to answer the man properly. The man had tortured her even for no reason at all. She was too scared to even say one thing wrong and get tortured once again.
Being skinned alive, forced to walk on fire, pierced by thousands of needles without being able to even escape, or simply being beaten up to the point of almost dying, before being healed up by potions and then repeat everything once again.
"Boring~"
The man threw her to the floor and continued caressing the giant eyeball with a voice filled with ecstasy.
"Yes, soon our Lord will come back, and will be even stronger than a thousand years ago... Only three more of the lost parts are needed, and even that fucking piece of shit will be unable to defeat us"
At the door of the room, two red eyes could be seen observing everything that was happening with a sad look on his eyes.
"If only someone could end all this hell..."
...
