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.

“You’re sure.”

so many cores between the mythic and us, but a signal that strong is hard to

“Go for it.”

his mind dwell on the best case scenario. If

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

along the edge of the shields as the insects continued to press in on them from all sides, but

their numbers, it didn’t matter where they fought them, on the surface or in the heart of the nest. In fact, the nest was better, since that’s where most

nearby, still doing what he could to support the more experienced fighters closer

a fortune?” he

he noted how tense he looked. The pressure was

ready,”

him with a firm grip on

we’re holding off the insects just fine. We’ll start pulling them into the shield and harvesting cores. You’ll be drowning

he took a deep

to

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

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 heat the deeper they went, it was an oppressive, suffocating way to fight. It was

flung another slash through

Hartos chuckled.

they’re protecting something and don’t want to leave their posts, or they’re fighting other monsters, or a hundred other

mark!” Artis called from amongst a cluster

get to work

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

time to be afraid, the only thing in his mind

image flashed through his thoughts of mandibles scraping and scratching

as he flailed wildly with his

him as

stone floor, landing on his side. He managed to brace himself and

bellowed from somewhere nearby. “Sound

of tension that sent

is the light?!” Hartos

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

was. Where were they? They’d been everywhere around them only a moment ago, so what

Something shifted behind him.

no,” he heard someone