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.

said finally. “It’s still

“You’re sure.”

get clear readings with so many cores between the mythic and us, but a signal that strong is hard

“Go for it.”

let his mind dwell on the best case scenario. If they managed to dig in deep enough and

he roared to the surrounding mercs. “We get a little deeper and

they redoubled their efforts. The fighting was thick along the edge of the shields as the insects continued to press

long as the ants couldn’t use the full weight of their numbers, it didn’t matter where they fought them, on the

more experienced

to make a

noted how tense he looked. The pressure was

ready,” he

older mercenary steadied him with a firm

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

he took a

to it,”

Hartos roared. “Another ten metres and we’ll start! Listen to your crew leaders and keep your eyes on the

pressure the insects put out. Twice the size of a human, the giant soldiers were intimidating beasts, especially when they came in large numbers. They were everywhere, climbing over the roof, on the walls, even walking on the shield itself or lunging up from beneath. Along with the rising

slash through the shield. “They could hit us with ten times

Hartos chuckled.

ants may be smarter than 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 a hundred other reasons. Besides, even if more came, it wouldn’t make

Artis called

to get to work then,” Hartos

his orders to the hundreds of gathered

only thing in his mind was confusion as the ground beneath his feet simply disappeared and he

mandibles scraping and scratching

as he flailed wildly with his arms, trying to grab hold of something,

as the entire expedition plunged downwards. What had

crashed into the stone floor, landing on his side. He managed to brace himself and prevent his head from smacking into the rock just in time, a trick Rillik had

in the name of the Path was that?” Hartos bellowed from somewhere nearby. “Sound off!

an undercurrent of tension that sent a chill through the young mercenary.

is the light?!”

in relief when he didn’t see any ants nearby. His mind had conjured a thousand ravenous mouths ready

later, he realised how strange that was. Where were they? They’d been

Something shifted behind him.

no,” he heard someone