Down With The Gods

This section of the forest is bright, clearly revealing a brown and orange millipede-like creature. A few meters ahead, an empty A3M with its doors open stands abandoned.

“Is that grandma’s?” Mira asks.

The creature appears to be crossing the forest, but due to its sinuous length, the end is nowhere in sight.

“Look!” Wyn says.

Upon closer inspection, the giant millipede is actually a series of millipedes conjoined like a chain, with each millipede’s head attached to the rear of the one in front. As the creature pauses, Wyn notices a cascading gulping motion along its interconnected bodies, imagining that the front millipede must be feeding, passing the food down the chain.

“Gross. Saw this in a movie once,” Yu remarks.

“How old were you when you watched that vent forbidden movie? A fetus?” Mira asks.

“...Well…” Yu begins to sing, avoiding the question.

While the team is captivated by the creature, an earie approaches their A3M from the left side of the forest, and trailing behind it is the front millipede head. Realizing the vehicle can’t be crushed, they stay inside, bracing for impact. However, the rear end of the creature attempting to trap the earie from the other side catches them off guard. The earie leaps onto the A3M just as both ends of the millipede sandwich the vehicle. The impact sends Mira and Anish tumbling from their seats. As the creature crawls up the vehicle, the girls can't contain their screams of disgust.

“Where’s the package?” Yu asks.

“Maybe it’s under another section? Or maybe, just maybe, it’s a girl…or trans,” Wyn responds.

“No wonder you two get along so well,” Mira mutters.

The earie jumps onto the millipede. The heavy ears break the arthropod’s dorsal, releasing a fume of green gas. The earie falls headfirst into the millipede with only its legs visible from Wyn’s angle. The legs struggle for a while before becoming stiff and disappearing into the millipede, who shows no sign of discomfort throughout the ordeal.

Unlike other creatures in the forest they’ve come across so far, the millipede latches onto the A3M and begins shaking it violently. Anish, at the helm, transforms the vehicle into a robot, hoping the creature will release them from its spiky multitude of legs.

“Let’s get out,” Wyn says.

“How?” Anish asks.

The millipede accidentally knocks the A3M onto its side. The commotion in what might be the brightest area of the Twilight Forest attracts nearby creatures, which begin attacking the millipede. When the millipede finally crawls off the vehicle, Anish seizes the opportunity, opens the door, and uses a gust of wind to propel everyone out.

The scene below is nothing short of chaos. Dark purple bear-like creatures, the bone huggers; dark blue and green crocodilian creatures on tank wheels, the crocs-on-wheels; shiny emerald mamba creatures with five heads, the mambas number five; and even Mira’s favorite, the mona lizards join the fray, attacking both the millipede and each other.

While airborne, the team is swarmed by black, flying, toe-shaped, fluid-sucking creatures known as the mosqui-toes. These creatures have sharp needle-like legs that cause severe itchiness when they pierce the skin. Wyn quickly drives them away with several well-placed cyclones, but the presence of the mosqui-toes attracts other flying predators.

The roundos – chunky, snowy white, one-eyed, perfectly round, puffy flyers – and the hawkians – gold hawks with sickle-shaped feet, sickle-shaped beaks, and kunai-shaped scales instead of feathers – emerge from the trees, eager to feast on the mosqui-toes.

A roundo attacks a hawkian, prompting the hawk to unleash an icy cyclone. The cyclone hits its mark but also heads straight for Wyn and team as they fend off the swarming mosqui-toes. The cyclone sweeps up every member, along with the roundo and several mosqui-toes. In the midst of the chaos, another hawkian swoops in, snatching a mosqui-toe from within the cyclone and piercing Anish’s thigh with its beak, carrying him away.

As the cyclone dissipates, the remaining four are scattered in different directions, with Wyn and Yu landing relatively close to each other while Mira and Christine are sent elsewhere.

Wyn and Yu find themselves surrounded by the same creatures Wyn had used one of their brethren's muscular arms to press against the hippothesis’s teeth – the bone huggers. These creatures, who were heading toward the millipede, now turn their attention to the men, who are struggling to stand up due to the frost on their arms and legs. Wyn envelops his fists and feet with rocks to defrost the ice, while Yu does the same with water. The four bone huggers lunge at the men, arms open wide, in an attempt to give them the strongest of hugs. Wyn summons two rock pillars for two of the huggers to hug, while he and Yu dodge the remaining two.

Wyn sidesteps forward, allowing the incoming hugger to collide with the one hugging a pillar in front. When a bone hugger initiates a hug, it begins by lightly holding the subject in its rock-enveloped arms. The hug gradually intensifies, accompanied by a continuous soothing humming that adds to the eeriness of the process. The embrace ends only after the subject becomes motionless. The accidental friendly hug kills its companion instantly after a loud crack. Wyn follows up with a cyclone, chakrams swirling within. The blades lodge into the hugger’s back, causing it to roar loudly before turning back to face Wyn.

After dodging, Yu thrusts his blade toward the back of a hugger with a water dash. While the blade is inside, Yu quickly performs a water jump to lift the blade upward. Since the blade fails to slice through its shoulder, the hugger violently turns around, flinging Yu away from the rest. The hugger doesn’t follow Yu; instead, it turns its attention to Wyn.

Surrounded by three huggers, Wyn summons three rock pillars in front of each of them. He then conjures descending cyclones to further slow them down. At this moment, Yu has made his way back. He stabs at the shoulder of a hugger. Leaving Yu’s blade lodged, Wyn summons an ascending cyclone, lifting the blade up through the shoulder. Having lost its purpose as it can no longer hug, the hugger detaches its injured arm and uses it to repeatedly strike itself until its demise.

Wyn summons more rock pillars to slow down the remaining huggers. Complying with Yu’s request, he shoots Yu with a cyclone aimed directly at a hugger. The crescent blade thrusts through the shoulder, while Yu collides into the beast, causing both to fall to the ground. Wyn, in the same fashion, shoots himself to sever the other hugger’s arm. The battle is won, but the two struggle to get up after the collision.

“Where’s the rest?” Wyn asks.

“No idea. We should hurry to find them!”

Wyn summons a fully-charged cyclone upward, clearing out the enemies in the sky. Without collecting the essence, they step onto Wyn’s mini cyclones to get a better view from above. However, the scene below is no less chaotic than before, and they’re still unable to locate their friends. Resorting to the team tracking feature on their bands, they see that the rest of the team is scattered, though Mira is not too far from Christine. Just as they’re about to head toward the girls, they’re attacked by the millipede’s poisonous fumes, emitted from sealable holes on its back – the centipede is directly beneath them.

Meanwhile, Mira, somehow blown into the darker part of the forest, tries to reorient herself back toward the battlefield. Fortunately, most of the predatory creatures in the area have left for the commotion. Feeling lost, she attempts to climb a tree to get a better vantage point, but her bust makes the climb difficult.

“Where is Anish when I need him!” she mutters.

“Mira?” a voice calls out.

“Christine? I’m so happy I could kiss you!”

“Like, no!” Christine replies.

“How did you find me, by the way?”

“With the band. It shows our locations.”

“Nice! Now, let’s get back to the boys!”

“We should, like, help Anish first. He’s, like, all by himself!” Christine suggests.

“Why does it show he’s on the move? He’s getting further from Wyn and Yu. Let’s regroup with them first.”

With the map displayed on the virtual screen, the girls run toward the battlefield. Distracted by the urgency, Christine is caught by an electric web despite Mira’s quick warning. Mira burns the web to free Christine, who’s now paralyzed. Before Mira can lift her, a creature drops down from a branch above, electrocuting them both with a web. The creature shoots another web upward to take the girls up onto a large tree branch with it.

While paralyzed, Mira and Christine still have control over their vision, though their attempts to summon attacks have been futile. What they see is a grotesque black creature, resembling a spider but with two disfigured heads. The red faces differ in size, with the rear one being larger. Its legs are replaced by pinkish tongues, as nimble as human tongues. Instead of extending from joints, the tongues protrude from gaping maws that ooze a nasty, gooey liquid. When the creature shoots webs, the tongues retract inside, turning the maws into spinnerets.

Wrapped in an electric web, Christine is completely immobilized. The creature begins nibbling on Mira’s leg, sending paralyzing electric shocks through her entire body as it feeds. Mira wants to scream, but her mouth won’t open. The only bright side is that the slow, paralyzing nibbling numbs the pain. All she can do now is close her eyes and pray for a miracle.