Chapter 72

Etson National Forest, Etson - 7:48 AM

I hurtled towards the ground as I tried to get my bearings. Looking at the golden bowling ball falling with me, I Pulled it close enough to grab on with both hands and Lifted it. My deceleration was fast and painful on the arms, but I managed to make it to the ground without breaking my legs. I rolled on impact to disperse the force of my landing and immediately ran for the bottom of the tower and the cover the metal supports granted me.

The buzzing noise circled the tower, hiding behind the staircase as it spun downwards faster and faster. I grit my teeth; I knew what this was, and it meant there weren't two Guardwasps but three coming to investigate.

At the bottom of the stairs, a small brown Vespae only a foot tall took an absurd ninety degree turn without slowing down and shot towards me at an alarming speed. I had been given enough time to figure out my plan of attack, and I spun towards it, arm outstretched. My timing had been spot on, and I swung the thirty pound bowling ball directly into the Vespae’s abdomen.

We met eyes for the split second that my bowling ball connected before the tiny wasp flew towards the ground, bouncing against the tower. Without turning, I used Push on one of the fire bombs in my bandolier and fired it sideways at the Vespae. It recovered quickly and flew upwards. The bomb exploded, washing me with heat while catching the wasp’s back half. I swore under my breath; I had been hoping to catch the wings.

I watched as Betin, the Fairyfly Vespae, flew away on wings covered in hairy bristles. This Guardwasp had been the one I expected first and foremost, but seeing Crausdel and Vermon had lulled me into a false sense of security. The Vespae were more serious about an attack on them than I anticipated. “All the same,” I said to myself as I ducked out from under the tower. “Three here means three dead.”

While I was free from the tower, I didn’t return to the cabin where the group was lying in wait. I pulled out one of the crossbow bolts that were still coated in Talspra’s poison and waited, keeping an eye out for Betin. The Vespae was unnaturally fast due to the liberties the system had taken when creating her, and she had the capability to become invisible for short amounts of time. Completely unfair, but there was nothing that could be done about it but kill it.

I kept my hand with my golden bowling ball raised slightly above my head. It was more of a signal for the others not to start shooting than for me to actually defend myself with, and it got the message across. None of the group had fired at Betin earlier, and I appreciated them sticking with the script. Not that it would last very long; I could hear the loud, anxiety-inducing drone of the Vespae forces heading our way.

Ignoring the wound in my side, I sprinted towards the lookout tower staircase. The plan to get them swarming around me could still be salvaged if I could get up there. I jumped at the base of the stairs, clearing several of them at once before the buzz of Betin’s wings filled my ears. Throwing myself down, a rush of wind blew over me. I landed so that I could see in the direction the Vespae had flown, but all I could see was the fire raging through the trees.

“C’mon, fight me fair and square!” I yelled into the air as I resumed my climb up the tower. Betin’s invisibility wasn’t permanent, thankfully, and as I ascended I caught sight of her out of the corner of my eye. She was looking out towards the forest fire as if trying to see if her comrades were almost here. Calculating the right path, I threw the crossbow bolt ahead of the Vespae and Pushed.

The projectile caught Betin just below her wings and I saw a look of intense pain flash over her insectoid face. She dropped a few feet before she did the Vespae equivalent of gritting her teeth and began flying towards the top of the tower. I didn’t bother with the stairs anymore as I wanted to catch up with the little bugger, and instead opted to climb the tower directly. Since speed was of the essence here, I tossed my golden bowling ball back into my inventory.

I made my way up the side of the lookout tower as quickly as I could, literally leaping upwards every time I caught a metal strut. Betin flew inside the room, and I heard her collapse on the wooden floor. Based on her moans of pain, she was having a hard time with Talspra’s poison. It was due to her small size, I knew, and it would take a lot more poison to affect the incoming Crausdel or Vermon the same way.

Throwing myself onto the staircase, I entered the room to find the crossbow bolt floating in midair in the corner. Betin may have been able to make herself invisible, but not the items she had on her. I had lodged the ammunition right beneath one of her wings, and she couldn’t reach it to get it out. Lunging forward, I aimed to grab her.

Then I pulled backwards, my feint successful as the bolt moved in a way that made me think she had tried to stab me with her stinger. I resumed my lunge, grabbing the Vespae by her hairy carapace and wrestling her to the ground. My chest was punctured by the Fairyfly’s small stinger, and I let go of what I assumed was Betin’s shoulder. Reaching down towards my new wound, I felt for the implement lodged inside of me and gripped it tightly.

Betin screamed as I pulled the stinger out of my rib cage and snapped it. The black stinger appeared in my hand followed by the rest of the Vespae’s body. I didn’t have much time to do anything else as the sound of gunfire started going off and bullets broke the glass windows of the lookout tower. It was then I noticed that the droning noise from the approaching enemy forces were on me now, and Vespae soldiers were swarming around the small room. Several began to skewer the kill box I found myself in with their spears, and I rolled to the center without letting go of Betin.

The small Vespae tried to bite, claw, and sting her way free, but she didn’t have the Strength to escape me. Getting up onto my knees, I pinned the wasp down and grabbed at one of her hairy wings from the base. Her exoskeleton creaked as I pulled the wing free with a gush of blood and gore. Betin screamed in pain, but I wasn’t done with her yet. I was, however, done with this tower.

Reaching into my inventory, I pulled out Boss Steener’s Golden Bowling Ball once more and raised it high above my head. A few spears managed to nick my arm, but the damage wasn’t worth getting distracted over. I brought it down towards the wooden floor, using Drop to get extra momentum, and braced myself. The wooden floorboards shattered from the force of impact.

A moment of weightlessness overtook my body before I began falling from the lookout tower once again. This time, Betin was coming along for the ride. The Vespae appeared woozy from the pain, and no longer fought back against me. Knowing that she couldn’t fly with just one wing, I let her go and used Lift on my bowling ball to slow my descent to something more manageable this time. Betin crumpled on impact, and the items she left on death had appeared by the time I reached the ground.

I grabbed the small rondel dagger and blue skill book at the Vespae’s feet, throwing them into my inventory. As I turned to run, a shadow eclipsed me. A large, hulking figure blocked my way, and I was face to face with Vermon, the Megalara Garuda.

A rare male in the queen’s service, Vermon was nearly nine feet tall and built like a brick house. His jet black carapace shined in the light, and his brown wings were spread out behind him. Wicked claws topped the end of his four arms, and they reached for me around the tower’s struts. I backed away, but those weren’t the most worrisome things in Vermon’s arsenal.

The Vespae opened its large mandibles, each as long as its arms, and clamped down on the metal struts between us. Before I had a chance to exit from some other side, Vermon managed to snap the struts like twigs. In a flash he changed his target, going after one of the four long pillars holding up the lookout tower. The thicker metal took him more effort, and I scrambled to pull my Vague Stick out of my inventory in time to stop him without getting in range of his claws.

I managed to pull the weapon out, but I was too late. Vermon twisted his neck, and the metal snapped. The tower shifted as one of its main support legs broke. The Vespae laughed and backed away, pointing upwards. I turned and looked to see the Vespae soldiers had begun pushing the tower. It was going to land among the people I brought with me.

Diving through the struts away from Vermon, I hit the ground and rolled to my feet only to dodge several spear thrusts in a row from Vespae soldiers who were flying above me. I willed the Vague Stick to become shorter, thickening it into a lance I could comfortably use with one hand. Blocking with the golden bowling ball was strange, but something I had grown accustomed to over the years. Surprisingly, the “shield” didn’t hurt my fingers at all when I stopped an attack, so the only problem was its size and shape.

I ran towards the cabin as I attacked the swarming Vespae. Gunfire was still ongoing, and every so often the wasps above me would collapse, causing me to have to dodge out of the way. Those that weren’t taken down by gunfire found themselves skewered by my lance. They would attempt to stab me from a distance, but overextend as the curvature of the bowling ball didn’t stop them in their tracks like a shield would.

Despite the cacophony of beating wings and gunfire, the sound of the tower toppling was easy to hear. I attempted to move further away from where I knew it would impact, but found a veritable wall of Vespae keeping me from it. Gritting my teeth, I decided to do something absolutely stupid.

Stopping, I turned around and swung my lance in a wide arc to stop the soldiers pursuing me from getting too close. The move worked, and I glanced up at the tower. It was finally falling, and I jumped in its path. Some Vespae followed after me, attacking me with their spears with no regard for their own safety, but I threw up Shield to stop them. I couldn’t take my eyes off of the falling tower.

My Shield broke just a second too early, and a few of the Vespae managed to pierce me. I grunted in pain, but refused to stop making myself as small as possible for the inevitable fall. The tower finally hit the ground, kicking up a huge cloud of dust and knocking me off of my feet. I fell to the ground from the force of the small earthquake the collapse caused, and breathed a breath of relief only to begin coughing immediately.

Just like the smoke, I could see through the dust cloud as if it weren’t there. A whole swarm of Vespae laid at my feet, crushed by the collision. The metal struts had warped enough that, if I hadn’t fallen, they surely would have struck me in the head. I carefully removed myself from the fallen tower and began running towards my group of gunners. They were still shooting on the other side of the tower where I had been before, which suited me just fine as I knew they couldn’t see me.

I was disappointed to find that neither Vermon or Crausdel were among the crushed Vespae, but it was to be expected. They were a cut above these low class soldiers, after all; while it was acceptable for the soldiers to give their lives for the hive, that wasn’t true for the Guardwasps. I looked around for any sign of them. Vermon was still on the other side of the tower, disoriented from the cloud of dust but easily found as he was over twice as tall as the other Vespae.

Taking this opportunity, I spun my Vague Stick and gave it a good underhand throw to take advantage of the Heavy Strike passive my Seven-Tenner Bowling Shirt provided. I Pushed it towards the Guardwasp’s head in an attempt to strike him down with a critical hit.

Unfortunately, the Vespae soldiers were jostling him around too much. Instead of piercing through his eye like I had planned, the lance struck one of his mandibles. The force of the blow caused it to crack, but not break, and I swore under my breath only to get another mouth full of dust. I Pulled the Vague Stick back as the Vespae started looking for me.

I was about to try again when the sounds of human screams reached my ears. My head snapped towards the others, and I saw that Crausdel was already among them with a swarm of warriors. Not as many as I had behind me, but enough to cause trouble. Francis and Benjamin were keeping the Guardwasp at bay with flashes of flames while Mary had taken to attacking Vespae soldiers with the bayonet on the end of her rifle in order to protect Daniel and Stu. A quick glance back showed me that Vermon had taken to the skies and left the dust cloud.

Swiping open my inventory, I tossed the bowling ball back in and willed the Vague Stick into the shape of a spiked spear. Crausdel was the priority now, and I was in the perfect position to sneak attack her. I began running alongside the length of the tower towards my companions.

My estimates of where the tower was going to strike had been proven incorrect, as it fell short by about twenty feet. The cloud of dust around the humans was not nearly as thick, and I watched as Crausdel attempted to push through the flames to attack Francis with her spear.

The metallic green wasp was a swift fighter, but not one to brave the heat when she had the advantage of numbers on her side. Francis, on the other hand, was screaming and throwing everything he had at her. Benjamin was even breathing his Gaseous Breath, attempting to catch her in a combo with Francis’ flames but she proved too mobile.

I didn’t have time to be stealthy with the Vespae horde rushing towards the sound of gunfire, but the dust and the sound of wings beating made a good cover for me. Emerging from the cloud, I picked out a move from Gloria’s playbook. I leapt into the air and used Air Step, getting two steps in before bracing my Vague Stick in both hands. Once I was above Crausdel, I Dropped with the spear while still gripping it tightly.

A gout of flames washed over me as I pierced through Crausdel’s thick carapace, but it wasn’t as bad as it could have been due to my Heat Resistance passive. Benjamin and Francis immediately stopped when they realized I was now in the line of fire. “Todd!” I yelled as the Emerald Wasp hit the ground at my feet. I rolled with the landing, bringing the Vespae with me before throwing her off of my spear and in the Amalgamancer’s direction.

The Vespae unceremoniously slid across the dirt, stopping just inches from Todd. She twitched, trying to push herself up, but I had done severe damage to her. Todd looked from me down to the Vespae before shooting her twice in her head with his rifle. He swiped the air and a black box fell on Crausdel, absorbing her body before he made it disappear. Good, that meant she was in his Corpse Locker for later.

“Everyone, inside!” I yelled as I turned around. A tidal wave of Vespae was beginning to form in the settling dust. As soon as I issued the order, I heard the deep voice of Vermon come from somewhere behind that wave, and they all began moving. I turned to see everyone heading towards the cabin, Todd lagging behind only long enough to pick up a green skill book and a small vial of black liquid.

I followed behind him as some of the Vespae near the top of the wave began throwing their spears. Not enough to make a difference, but I looked up at them and Dropped them before Pushing them back into the enemy’s formation. It wasn’t a very good way to kill many mobs at a time, and I almost regretted wasting Mental Points on it.

Benjamin and Francis were just outside the front door with the other three already inside. The younger used his Tinder Twig to fling fireballs that were getting smaller with each cast while the older was continuing to spew Gaseous Breath in the enemy’s direction. The moment the gas touched any flame, it accelerated forward and scorched the Vespae.

Todd jumped through the door, landing hard on the wooden floor inside. The two mages followed him quickly after. Finally, I dove inside and Pulled the door closed just as the cabin rocked from the impact of a hundred plus Vespae slamming into it. Standing up, I locked the door and bolted it shut tight.

The inside of the cabin was just as bare as the lookout tower with nothing but tables left, though those were now flipped over for cover. We found ourselves in a wide open room with two windows, one of which was already getting swarmed by wasps. The only other room was a bathroom with an open door. I Pulled it closed before directing the troops.

“I want a steady stream of fire towards this window as soon as it breaks,” I ordered Benjamin and Francis as I pointed towards the one we could see enemies at. As if to punctuate my order, the glass broke. The exhausted mages still did as I commanded, however, and the wooden structure lit up around the window.

“Maybe that wasn’t such a good idea?” Daniel cried.

“All according to plan,” I said before pointing towards the other window. “Fire at will when they come from that way. After I kill that big son of a bitch, head towards the bathroom door immediately! That’s the only way we’ll survive this!”

The people of Carl’s crew nodded despite the fear I could see in them. It didn’t take long before the Vespae appeared at their window, and the deafening sound of gunfire filled the room. I moved so that I was in front of the door and pulled the Writhing Belt Whip from my pants. The weapon’s length fell to the ground, and I held it in one hand as I switched out the Vague Stick for the golden bowling ball in the other.

The door began to creak and moan as the Vespae attempted to break it down. I didn’t move yet, even as the heat behind me became even hotter. There was a very small window, and if I missed the timing then the only thing to do was get out of here without one of our main prizes. The door continued to take the abuse of the wasps on the other side, and then it stopped.

It was just for a moment, but I readied myself. The sound of a heavy impact was my only warning as the door was kicked clean off of its hinges and flew at me. I shifted the golden bowling ball forward, almost punching the door onto the ground where it bounced from the force of it all. On the other side of the new opening was Vermon, hunched over and looking inside. Bullets began riddling his body, and a quick glance confirmed that Todd was aiming this way.

I raised the Writhing Belt Whip and lashed out even as I swapped the golden bowling ball for the Vague Stick to increase my Strength.

Vermon’s exoskeleton was slashed by the speed and force of the whip, cracking it like the mandible had before. The Vespae took a step back, and I lunged. I willed the Vague Stick into the shape of a spear and thrust forward. My aim was true, striking the injury several times with quick jabs. Vermon fell to the ground outside, sitting, and I struck again with the Writhing Belt Whip.

Just like it had Jickree, I wrapped the whip around Vermon’s neck. This time, however, Eldritch Chomp didn’t activate much to my disappointment. Instead, I backed up and yanked the oversized Vespae towards the door. He resisted, digging his claws into the ground as his minions attempted to cut through my whip. I growled from the exertion and lunged forward. With his claws occupied, there was no way for him to block my spear as I shoved it down his gullet.

Vespae attacks broke through my guard as I started backing up again. At Vermon’s feet was a thick black skill book and a club that looked a lot like one of his mandibles. I Pulled the two items so that they flew past me and into the cabin before I Pulled the corpse of my large enemy to block the door. “Todd, delivery!” I yelled over the sounds of gunfire, and the Amalgamancer scrambled towards me. “Wait until I have this door open!”

I removed my Writhing Belt Whip from Vermon’s neck and scooped his items into my inventory without looking at them. The belt was already around my waist and healing me by the time I made it to the bathroom door. Placing my hand on it, I activated Broken Boundary and quickly threw it open. “Everyone through!” I yelled.

Todd immediately threw Vermon in his Corpse Locker as everyone scrambled towards the glowing portal beyond the door. The Vespae were swarming through the window that Carl’s crew had been firing through, but none dared to brave the still burning wreck that had become the other window.

I jumped through as soon as Todd, the last one, ran through the doorway. The scene on the other side was a welcome one as we landed amongst a group of friendlies inside a large tent. Healers immediately jumped on us as we collapsed to the ground in victory.

"I'll be fine, no need to heal me," I said to the man who approached me.

"A-are you sure?" he asked, looking me over. The man still wore the EF of the Etson Faithful, but he looked genuinely concerned for me.

"It's weird, right?" Francis said. "Ant's damn crazy when it comes to pain. Saw his arm turned to charcoal yesterday and he just ignored it until it went away."

"We've got time before the main force gets here. I'll be right as rain by then," I said with a pained chuckle. The healer looked concerned at Francis' words and mine, but backed off to check on the others.

My clothes were bloody and full of holes, and I knew how bad it looked. The others had it even worse, but we had thankfully made it back with no casualties. A lot of injuries, but no deaths despite the odds.

I smirked as I looked behind me at the door we came through. The skill was definitely not supposed to work this way, but every exploit was here for a reason. The door and frame were connected to about a foot of wall in each direction. The walls were nailed to two beams that had been placed in the ground, technically making it a standing structure.

My amusement aside, I needed to check out the aftermath of the battle. I snapped open my menu and opened the Victory report.

[[Victory!]]

You have defeated the Scenario Boss [Betin, Royal Guardwasp Rogue]; +200 points.

You have contributed to the defeat of the Scenario Boss [Vermon, Royal Guardwasp Brute]; +200 (300) points.

You have contributed to the defeat of the Scenario Boss [Crausdel, Royal Guardwasp Scrapper]; +100 (200) points.

You have defeated x34 Vespae Warriors; +170 points.

You have contributed in defeating x97 Vespae Warriors; +194 (485) points.

That had been a hell of a rush, and I found myself grinning before I realized it as I checked out my points. I was sitting at a grand total of 5,281 now, and that had only been the first battle of the day. If I didn’t have so much self control, I would have begun laughing at the sight of my status screen.

"Do we have an ETA on when everyone's arriving?" I asked out loud.

A young, dark skinned man wearing greens and browns looked up from the corner. His eyes had been closed as if meditating, but he was quick to answer. "The token I gave Tommy is about twenty minutes out if they keep up this speed, sir," he said.

"Thanks, William." I nodded to the man and he went back to meditating. His class was Tracker, which allowed him to keep tabs on queries from a long distance. Although they were ranger-adjacent, they were used more often in logistics than combat.

"Enjoy the forward base, you guys," I said to my group. "Twenty minutes until we begin, so spend the time wisely. Benjamin and Francis, get your mana back. The rest of you, take a break."

The panting, exhausted group nodded and mumbled. I couldn’t help but chuckle. “Then, I’m heading outside,” I told them before leaving the now crowded tent for the humid morning mist of the forest.