Chrysalis

Things were not meant to have gone this way.

Zluth compressed himself a little as he slid to the side, carefully not looking at the gruesome scene taking place nearby. Though, try as he might, there was nothing he could do about the sound.

CRUNCH. CRUNCH. SLURP.

All Zluth really cared about in the moment was that it wasn’t him who’d been on the chopping block. When the Krath’lath was done with her grisly task, she gurgled grotesquely as she absorbed the flesh of her consumed tribesmates.

“Failure is not acceptable,” she said when she had finished. Then turned her stalks toward Zluth, who froze in place for a moment.

“Of course not, Krath’lath. The three urudesh who proposed this assault were clearly inferior, a blight upon our tribe.”

“We are indeed stronger for having removed such weakness,” the Krath’lath agreed, her eyes burning into his. “As the one responsible for the health of our tribe, I only wonder if I have removed all of the failures.”

She was still hungry? Zluth fought with himself to maintain his calm.

“In what way have I failed?” he declared confidently. “I was the one who found the intruders. I was the one who escaped their notice and brought word of their impure mana back to the tribe.”

Burning red eyes atop dozens of stalks turned toward the Krath’lath, who visibly gnashed her teeth. Her body was visibly shuddering in pain as she digested those she had consumed, absorbing their potent acid and using it to refine her own. Punishing weakness was accepted, welcomed, celebrated, within the tribe. Wanton slaughter was… at times forgivable, but not when it would impact the tribe.

A weak tribe would become food for their rivals. Literally.

“Very well,” she declared finally, before she released a particularly noxious cloud of gas. The very air seemed to sizzle with the potency of it, and Zluth felt his own guts roil at the scent.

of her fellow Krath. She had clearly refined a powerful acid indeed, and he hungered to

the time; his position was not strong enough

best torture these invaders,” the Krath’lath declared, grinding her jagged teeth. “Speak, and I

their pets to assault the invaders via

our enemies any further,” Zluth proposed. “We have learned they are capable of strengthening

green slime sizzled

them with pets or proxies and

ask what we should not do,” the Krath’lath turned her bulging eyes

reason. Zluth felt the stirring of both fear and rage coiling in his slug-flesh. This was a dangerous moment,

enemies alive,” burbled Zassin. “Once we toxify them in the sludge pits, we will know everything needed

to Zluth, and he held firm under their gaze. As the only Krath to lay eyes on the invaders directly, it was natural that

extremely difficult. The enemy remains inside their field of corrupted mana at all times.

capture that one,

easily

too much for the Krath’lath. Despite her disgustingly distended flesh, she launched

to tackle and hold her down until the rage had passed. When she had regained control of herself, she

common enough occurrence, so nobody looked at her the

Krath were always…

or eight…” she

a beat to be sure she didn’t intend to speak any more before

get a precise reading of the monster’s core, but