Chrysalis

[DAMMIT CRINIS! I can't see!]

[It's fine!]

[How is it fine?!]

[IT JUST IS!]

[No! How the heck can I fight if I can't see the enemy?! What is even happening?!]

[I'll fight for you! You don't need to do anything!]

[Are you kidding me?! There's no way you can take them all on by yourself!]

[Watch me!]

[I CAN'T!]

I'm currently entombed in a shell of Crinis after all. Not only is she covering my eyes, she's covering all of me! How is she even doing this? She sent her entire body through my shadow in a flash! So much faster than she was able to use the Shadows before. This can only mean one thing…

[You've evolved!]

[Of course, Master! Did you think I would rest before coming back to your side?]

[Well… no. I didn't.]

My Vestibule tingles with energy, causing panic to spark inside me.

[Wait, Crinis! What's the Colony doing?!]

[Oh, they're coming! They'll be here any minute.]

Through the liquid shadow flesh of Crinis' body I can sense the ongoing battle. Thuds and impacts ripple through her form as she takes damage that had been directed at me.

They need to

seem to want to stop.

Crinis! At least let me see what's happening!

the pitch black Crinis had inflicted on me. She appears to have gone through a few changes whilst I was gone. A writhing mass of flesh and tentacles rises from my back like a pillar, three separate mouths gaping and gnashing at the air as she sends her limbs twisting through the air toward the Golgari. For their part,

[Crinis! Are you alright?!]

me, Master. I'm here

to get off me, Crinis. We need to end

to my right crumbles as a huge

"LEEEEEEROOOOOOY!!!!"

by Crinis, the war cry of the dumbest ant in the history of the species floods the tunnel as a HUGE soldier bursts through the wall and dives headfirst into combat. The Golgari are

since my pheromone

need to fix this! NOW!]

The Golgari are overwhelmed in seconds, buried under an avalanche of insects. Only

Dammit.

Eldest has been

"West tunnel, clear!"

"East tunnel, clear!"

Scouts every hundred metres for a kilometre in

the emergency tunnels! Earth mages at

council been

"They're on the way!"

my antennae, finally freed from Crinis' death grip, I feel the welcome buzz of my family wrap around me once more. The Vestibule is completely

I yelled at her, but she's still clinging

Crinis, Invidia. We

[Yes, Master!]

[Harrrr.]

[Yesssss.]

own way and gather around me as I begin to

friend Jim went?" I ask the

should find him a few hundred metres down the tunnel. Take a left

"Thanks."

I think that was a scout. Judging by the long antennae and sleek carapace design, it would be weird if they were a soldier. As time passes and I move further away from the site of the battle, the number of ants congregating actually increases. More and more of them are flooding out of the nearby tunnels and climbing out of small emergency tunnels that they've dug every second until I feel as if I'm inside the nest, rather than some tunnel