Chrysalis

The ant stared at them. Rillik, Elly, Drake and Lacos stared back.

A pause.

Rillik swore viciously, then began to turn the boat around, not bothering to hide his frustration.

“Let’s just kill it and get on the mountain,” Drake said. “There’s only one.”

Rillik didn’t bother answering, still openly cursing.

“There is never just one,” Lacos quoted the advice their leader had imparted earlier in the day, then he pointed over the monster.

Drake turned to see where his friend was pointing, it took a moment, but he eventually noticed several sets of antennae poking from behind trees or around the edge of a bush. It was like the ants were hidden, but not so well that they wouldn’t be found if you actually tried to find them.

The ant in front of them clacked its mandibles several times, the sharp, percussive noise ringing out in a rhythm that felt distinctly like mocking laughter.

“Ah, shut up you damn monster,” Rillik growled as he hauled on the oars.

The rest of the crew slumped in the boat.

“That’s the fourth time we’ve tried to land today,” Elly groaned. “How are they always waiting for us when we get there?”

force a landing,” Drake grumbled.

chin in one webbed

of groups have made landfall already, maybe hundreds. The ants should have their… jaws? Do they have jaws? Their jaws full dealing

moment, staring back at the ant still standing in the

the side, “and why we play it

out there earning money

in his seat, glaring at the mountain as

don’t know about, Drake?

little anger bled out of the man, but he

quickly,

of rushing in blind before the message starts to sink into your thick head? Are other groups on the mountain? Yes. Are they making money? Yes. Will they all make it back? Not even close. Every group is going to take heavy

it to be ants, but isn’t that a good thing? They’re first stratum monsters, not fourth, and they have strong cores.

just shook his

a minute, would you? You see a monster from the first stratum laughing it up on the fourth and you think you’ve found a free buffet? Don’t be daft. And look at the way they behave.

mercenaries considered the evidence they’d gathered from a morning

shoreline, there has to be. Except that

laying traps, even openly taunting us. All signs of intelligent behaviour,”

possible they even have some sort of primitive tracking device like we

looked at him as if he were insane, but

the Dungeon think of next?” he groused. “There’s thousands and thousands of the little buggers lighting up that mountain like a maypole, an ocean of gold to mercs like us, but it’ll be incredibly dangerous to try and take

silence for a