Chrysalis

Hartos looked around and was satisfied with what he saw. The mercenaries had managed to penetrate the mountain in good order, and despite the intensifying attacks from the ants, they had maintained their formation.

He couldn’t help but sneer. Those fools who’d refused to join him would be crying bloody tears when they saw the haul he returned with. Thousands and thousands of ants surrounded them already, and soon enough they’d be dead, just waiting for their cores to be extracted.

But it didn’t hurt to be careful.

“Artis!” he barked.

“What?” his long-time crewmember replied, sounding harried.

“I need you for a second.”

“Make it quick,” she snapped, “this shield doesn’t maintain itself.”

He frowned, both at her tone and the implication of her words.

“Are we really being pressured that hard?”

The mage glared at him.

“Of course we are! Look around you, the bugs are endless! No matter how much firepower we pump out, they keep coming.”

“But you can hold?”

“Yes, we can hold. It’s just very difficult work!”

He nodded.

“Good. I want you to check and make sure the mythic is still asleep. We don’t want to be in here when the damn thing wakes up.”

“That’s the truth,” the mage muttered.

She fumbled about in her robes and removed the array from one of her dozens of pockets. She stared at it intensely for a few moments.

“Well?” Hartos demanded.

“There’s tens of thousands of monsters in this mountain, wait a damned second.”

He turned his eyes back to the struggle along the perimeter as the mage continued to study the device.

she said finally. “It’s still

“You’re sure.”

cores between the mythic and us, but a signal that strong is

“Go for it.”

worst case scenario could be avoided, the leader let his mind dwell on the best case scenario. If they managed to

to the surrounding mercs. “We get a little deeper and we can set

edge of the shields as the insects continued to press in on them from all sides, but so long as the mages held the barriers in place, they would hold the

as the ants couldn’t use the full weight of their numbers, it didn’t matter where they fought them, on the surface or in the heart of the nest. In fact, the nest

young lad Drake was nearby, still doing what he could to support the more experienced fighters closer

a fortune?” he

Drake turned around, he noted how tense he looked. The pressure was clearly getting to

I’m ready,” he

with

just fine. We’ll start pulling them into the shield and harvesting cores.

took a deep breath

forward to it,”

and we’ll start! Listen to your crew leaders and keep your eyes on the prize! Efficient

everywhere, climbing over the roof, on the walls, even walking on the shield itself or lunging up from

he flung another slash through the shield. “They could hit us with ten times this many.

Hartos chuckled.

the average, but that doesn’t make them as clever as you and me. Perhaps they’re protecting something and don’t want to leave their posts, or they’re fighting other monsters, or

Artis called from amongst a cluster

get to work then,”

of gathered mercenaries, but before he said a word, the

to be afraid, the only thing in his mind was confusion as the ground beneath his

mandibles scraping and scratching at

as he flailed wildly with his arms, trying to

as the entire expedition plunged downwards. What had

to the ground heavily. Drake crashed into the stone floor, landing on his

Hartos bellowed from somewhere nearby. “Sound off! Get the shields up! Are you

with an undercurrent of tension that sent a

the light?!”

later, a dozen bright fires flared into existence, casting their surroundings into stark relief. Drake almost sagged back to the ground in relief when he didn’t see any ants nearby. His mind had conjured a thousand ravenous mouths ready to descend on him and

strange that was. Where were they? They’d been everywhere around them only

Something shifted behind him.

no,” he heard