Attention! Designation Glade’s integration is now complete. Your time within the Ethereal Plane has come to an end. You and your party members will be relocated to the world of Veil in one minute.
Kedryn, the newly minted Royal Elf, dismissed the notification with a broad smile. He had been passing the time reading and rereading the Adjudicator’s welcome message while Glade completed his integration. He had learned quite a bit, such as the demographics of the world they were about to be placed on as well as some foundational understanding of how someone leveled. It was all very basic, but every little bit helped.
As he looked around, taking in the serene beauty of the Ethereal Plane, Kedryn honestly wondered if would ever make it back. He certainly hoped so, but doubted it would be anytime soon. Knowing his relocation onto a world called Veil was imminent, Kedryn savored the majesty all around him as his anticipation ratcheted up to near uncontrollable levels. Everything had changed.
He was now an honest to god elf, which was so incredibly awesome! Like Luke Skywalker finding out he could use the force awesome! The Adjudicators had already swapped out his things for what he assumed was something more appropriate. Instead of combat fatigues, Kedryn was dressed in an immaculate white wizard's robe with red trim. He had also been given a pack filled with a change of clothes, some basic utility items and a water skin. He was a little frustrated that his rifle and sidearm had been swapped out for a deep red wooden staff that may, or may not, be magical. He certainly hoped so, but he lacked an identification ability to verify.
Not that he was complaining. The Adjudicators could have dropped him off with nothing but his underwear and he would still be just as happy as he was now. After years of dreaming, he was no longer the sad human loser with a recycled name and absent parents. That person had been wiped from existence along with the memory of his name. Now, he was Kedryn! A magically empowered elf that was about to be unleashed into a world filled with adventure! He could finally write his own story. Never in his life had felt so… free.
The moment the countdown reached zero a rush of power washed through him. One moment he was sitting on a cloud admiring the Ethereal Plane, and the next he felt the cold hard earth surround him as the group appeared within a cavern.
“Awesome!” he breathed, his heart racing as he took in the darkness around him. He idly wondered what kind of starting area they were in.
“Quiet!” a woman hissed in a language Kedryn understood, but had never spoken before. “Your bumbling about will attract attention!”
Kedryn’s smile grew to epic proportions as he let the musical language of the elves wash over him. It was one thing to read some notification window that he had learned Elvish, but experiencing it first hand was… well, it was so much more!
Knowing that first impressions were critical, Kedryn took a few moments to collect his thoughts and survey his surroundings. The tunnels were aglow in a barely discernible, ominous red glow that highlighted the many pillars of stone scattered around them. Beyond that was near impenetrable darkness.
Unsure of what to do next, Kedryn put on his most charming smile and turned to the breathtaking elf next to him.
“We don’t seem to be in any immediate danger,” he idly commented, his voice barely above a whisper. He was about to say more, but was interrupted.
“Of course we’re in danger!” the unknown girl hissed. “The Adjudicators are not known for their mercy!”
“Sure…” Kedryn said, not willing to correct her. His experience thus far had been nothing but good from his perspective. Not only had they saved Glade, but they had granted him one of his most desired wishes! Unsure of where to go next with the conversation, he went with the first thing on his mind. “Do you happen to know where we are?”
The moment the words left his mouth, Kedryn desperately wanted to pull them back. Who asked such a lame question when there were so many other useful topics he could choose from? Like what was her name? Is she really from Veil? Or, more importantly, was she into royal elves?
“No,” she hissed. “Do you?”
“Sorry, no,” he said lamely.
“Do either of you have any weapons?” the girl asked, indicating both himself and the Captain, who was nothing more than a pile of shadows at their feet.
“Just this,,” Kedryn said a little too quickly, holding out the staff the Adjudicators had given him. He had no idea what weapons the Captain had been given in lieu of his more advanced gear. Probably something like a spear. Or a club. Captain Glade seemed like the kind of guy who would choose brawn over magic.
“That's better than nothing,” she muttered under her breath, taking the staff from him to test its weight. “Can you use it?”
“Are you asking if I have wicked bo staff skills?” He asked, flashing her a smile.
There was a moment of uncomfortable silence as the girl stared uncomprehendingly at Kedryn.
“Yes…?” she said slowly.
It was at that moment Kedryn came to the horrific realization that all of his pop culture references would be lost on whomever they encountered from here on out.
“Sorry,” he muttered, a piece of his soul dying inside. “The answer to that question is no. I can likely hit something with it, but not with any sense of precision. That being said, I am a mage!”
He held back that he hadn’t yet figured out how to cast magic yet. He was certain he would be able to figure it out later.
After a moment of uncomfortable silence where the elf just stared at him uncomprehendingly, Kedryn decided it was time to take his staff back.
The moment he held his hand out, the girl turned away, blatantly ignoring his unspoken request to return his staff. It was obvious she was weighing the pros and cons of striking out on her own.
Knowing he had only seconds to dissuade her of that idea, Kedryn changed tactics.
“My name is Kedryn,” he said, adjusting his already outstretched hand into a welcoming hand shake. “What's yours?”
The girl's head whipped around, staring at him in disbelief.
“Your name is… Kedryn?” she stammered with a look of complete surprise.
“Yes! I mean, sort of. My full name is Bei’Kedryn Serevlir,” he said with his most charming smile, the name rolling off his tongue like it was the most natural thing in the world. “Royal Elf.”
He didn’t have to add that last part, but it felt really good saying it out loud. He was no longer the human boy with generations of baggage attached to a name.
The girl squeaked something unintelligible.
“Sorry, I didn’t quite catch that,” Kedryn said, leaning forward.
“My apologies for my… rudeness…” the girl stammered so softly he could barely make out what she was saying. She then added a hasty, “your eminence,” before practically throwing his staff back at him. “If I have dishonored you…”
“None of that, now, thank you very much,” Kedryn interrupted with as magnanimous a tone as he could manage. Clearly, bringing up his name and his race had been the right call. She had gone from openly debating the merits of robbing him to complete subservience in less than a few heartbeats. A part of him knew he should probably clarify the whole race change thing and all its likely implications, but he had plenty of time for that later. Until then, it was likely best if he used his role playing skills to convince her that he was indeed a Royal Elf. At least until they had built a better foundation of trust.
“So, what’s your name?” he asked, doing his best to strike a nonchalant pose, which was a lot more difficult to do in robes than he thought.
There was another long pause before she answered.
“Riya,” she whispered, her voice strained. “Da’Riya Ab’Loshere.”
There was another long pause before she added in a voice so low he had to lean in to hear what she said.
“Banished Elf.”
The last statement was delivered with all the poise and grace of someone facing a firing squad.
Kedryn didn’t know exactly what Riya was so afraid of, but the last thing he wanted was to ostracize their only potential ally. That, and she was really hot. Like, out of this world hot.
“Well met, Riya,” Kedryn said with an open smile. “I’d imagine our next step should be waking Captain Glade and then we can begin exploring these caves. I’m assuming you don’t know where we should go from here?”
Riya’s perpetual look of absolute befuddlement almost made him laugh. Slowly, she shook her head.
“Well, that's unfortunate,” he sighed, absently wondering if he focused on role playing the system would grant him the acting skill. “I guess the only question now is whether we wait for the good Captain to wake up naturally or do it the fast way.”
A scraping sound echoed in the dark, interrupting their conversation.
“What was that?” he asked, turning to look into the darkness. Riya did the same.
“I can’t make them out just yet…” she began, but stopped mid sentence. “Magma beetles!” she hissed, quickly moving behind Kedryn.
“Well, that makes my choice easy,” he said with a smile, leaning down to shake the Captain’s shoulder. “Fast way it is.”
----------------------------------------
“Captain Glade, we’re about to fight some monsters!” The overly excited voice of Glade’s wayward Corporal broke through the haze of sleep.
Instead of responding, Glade sank deeper into the dreams of swirling mists, floating islands, and annoying cloud puffs. As he did, Glade idly wondered if Vlad had force fed him one of his homemade pills again. If so, he would gladly take another. Sleep of this quality was as rare for him as hearing Mother openly curse, which was never.
“Captain Glade!” The voice came back. Again, he ignored the Corporal. Whatever the issue was, he had full faith and confidence that his team could deal with it.
“Go’she liafere do raine! Galle shi fierre iss Maggmir Zhuke’in?!” came a frantic, feminine voice from his left.
“Kei?” The Corporal responded in the same musical language. The unknown woman repeated the phrase, but this time she said it slower, like she was talking to a child.
“Oh, good idea,” the Corporal replied, not taking the obvious hint from the girl's harsh whisper that being quiet was ideal for whatever situation they were facing. Even asleep, Glade could read a room. “Oh, right, you didn’t understand that… Ka sier’re. Dones’te da iss sonfah.”
The moment he had finished speaking, Kedryn resumed shaking Glade’s shoulder, this time increased intensity.
Knowing that he was going to regret it, Glade gave in to his better judgment and willed himself back to the land of wakefulness.
“I’m awake,” Glade grumbled, forcing his eyes open. Absently, he grabbed the rifle laying next to him as he took stock of his surroundings. What he found was anything but encouraging. They were in an underground cavern with some sort of glowing fungus that barely provided enough light to make out shapes. On top of that, the cave was filled with the awful smell of rotten eggs, oppressive humidity, and the bitter taste of sulfur.
As he tried to make sense of their surroundings, a flood of memories hit him like a mack truck. Everything from the raid going horribly wrong to being bound up in silvery threads of mist flashed through his mind, reminding him that his worst nightmare had come to pass. He was alone with the Kid.
Glade groaned, his shoulders sagging as the reality of his situation came crashing down. He had really hoped everything up to that point had been nothing but a bad dream. Hell, he would even take Vlad drugging him over the nightmare this was turning out to be.
“You’re awake!” the Corporal cried out in excitement. “I can’t see in the dark very well, but Riya says some mobs are coming our way. Do you happen to have dark vision?”
“What was that about a mob?” he asked, trying, and failing, to understand why the Kid thought they were in danger of a group of disgruntled people. Before the Corporal could answer, an ornate digital image of a rolled out scroll appeared before Glade’s eyes, heralded by a blast of brass instruments trumpeting loudly in his head.
Congratulations! You are the 12th member of your race…
Glade stopped reading. This was just like what had happened in Ghana after Vlad had slipped him that green pill.
“What is happening?” Glade growled, his voice remaining little more than a whisper as he did his best to block out the brass quintet screaming in his ears.
“Oh! I bet you’re just now seeing the welcome message!” the Corporal said, sounding more excited than a dog at a squirrel farm.
“What are you talking about?!” Glade snapped, pointlessly waving his free hand out in front of him to try and dislodge the hovering screen. “And what were you saying earlier about monsters?”
“Riya says there are some monsters called Magma Beetles heading our way,” the Corporal said. With it being so dark Glade couldn’t see the wide grin on the Kid’s face, but he could definitely feel it in the tone of his voice. “I can’t see them yet, but it sounds like they’re coming toward us.”
The gaudy screen with ornate writing was perfectly postured to block Glade’s vision, which followed him no matter where he looked.
Without warning, the marching band in Glade’s head culminated with a flourish, giving him a momentary reprieve before it started up again. In that moment of quiet, his perception of the world around him changed as several large somethings could be heard scraping their way toward them.
This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.
Glade pulled his night vision attachment down and activated it. The red tinged darkness lit up into an infra-red glow of hazy monochromatic greens and grays. The floating screen, which hadn’t changed color with the goggles, still hung in the air, blocking his view.
Using the edges of his peripheral vision, Glade could just make out a slow moving swarm of dog sized beetles shuffling inexorably toward them. Their rocky exteriors and abnormally large mandibles were what drew his attention first, each one radiating heat the likes of which he had never before seen.
“Incoming!” Glade yelled, doing his best to be heard over the music blasting in his ears.
“Maggmir Zhuke’in!” the unknown girl yelled, pointing in the direction the bugs were streaming from..
“How are you all able to see them?” the Corporal shouted, turning about in a vain attempt to locate the danger. “I can’t see anything past my own nose down here!”
A surge of annoyance filled Glade as he shot a disgusted look the Corporal’s way.
“That’s what night vision goggles are for, “ he grumbled just under his breath. He knew it likely wasn’t entirely the Kid’s fault he didn’t have any of his government issued gear due to their unique circumstances. The little balls of cotton candy had been rather insistent and had shown incredible power. Still, that didn’t absolve the Kid from allowing the puff balls to take his military grade weapons and issued gear and replace them with what amounted to a halloween costume!
“Do you see anything yet?” the Corporal asked, interrupting Glade’s thoughts..
Glade shook his head in self recrimination. Now wasn’t the time. That would come later, when he had ample time to rip his new soldier a new one.
“There is a swarm of massive beetles directly in front of us,” Glade growled, his frustration about everything in general bleeding through. “But I can’t get a good bead on them because of the damn holographic power point presentation hovering in front of me!”
“Oh, that would be the welcome message!” The Corporal responded with an excitement that proved he was oblivious to the danger in front of them. If Wildfire had been close, she would have kicked him. “You have to get through the prompt first before it goes away. It took me roughly 20 minutes to read through it…”
“How do I make it go away!?!” Glade yelled, interrupting the Corporal as he continued to track the bugs’ movement along the right edge of his vision.
Out of nowhere, two beetles emerged from behind the hazy glow of a stalagmite. Relying on his hours of training, Glade swiveled, aimed as best he could, and fired.
Flashes of light accompanied the mild popping sound from the suppressor attached to his rifle, though the noise was drowned out by the constant band ringing in his ears.
Turning his head, Glade confirmed the two bugs he had targeted were lying on the ground, twitching. Unfortunately, that was the moment several more rock covered beetles lumbered out of the shadows.
With a growl, Glade fired where he thought the overgrown bugs might be, careful to keep himself between the beetles and his companions. Only by swinging his head from side to side could he confirm if the aggressive insects had been killed, incapacitated, or if he had missed entirely.
“You still have your gear from Earth!?” the Corporal asked in surprise. “How did you manage that?”
“Not a good time!” Glade growled, shooting two more exposed beetles. “Tell me how to get rid of the marching band and the damned screen first!”
“Oh, right. Sorry!” Kedryn said sheepishly. “You need to mentally scroll down the page until the end. Once you start to scroll, the trumpets should stop.”
Glade tried to follow the Kid’s advice, splitting his focus between taking down what insects he could while mentally screaming at the screen to move.
Frustration mounted as the horns kept blaring inside Glade’s head and the notification refused to budge.
The beetles were now within spitting distance. The only good news was the monstrous insects were slow. Glade knew he should have been able to dominate this situation with ease, but the floating screen and trumpets kept him from effectively managing the insects’ advance.
The girl's voice rose above the music in his head, clearly trying to point something out.
“Riya just said you need to keep them from eating any metal! That, and she is asking why you aren’t shooting the ones directly in front of you,” the Corporal translated.
“What!?” Glade roared, swiveling his head about to locate the one’s directly in front of him.
“Argh! This is so lame!” the Corporal complained. “My first monster encounter and I can’t even see what's going on! Elves should have dark vision or something, shouldn’t they? There has to be something I can… do…” The Kid’s voice trailed off for a brief moment, before coming back far more excited than he had been before. “I forgot! I can cast flame!”
“Cast flame? What are you talking about!?!” Glade yelled. “Tell me how to get rid of the floating computer screen!”
The Corporal began muttering something unintelligibly, completely ignoring Glade.
Cursing whomever had dumped the Corporal into his care, Glade did the only thing he could think of. He stopped shooting and used his finger like he was scrolling on a smartphone.
Much to his relief, the music immediately stopped when the notification began moving.
Knowing full well he looked like an idiot, Glade scrolled as fast as he could. The message was easily several pages in length and would have taken him forever to read. Ignoring the information, he focused on moving the screen with as much speed as he could muster. The moment he was done, another prompt appeared.
Do you wish to close your personal planetary guide? This information was tailored for you and will not be accessible once closed.
Yes/No
Without hesitation, Glade jabbed yes. He ignored the fact that he was likely losing some very valuable information. He would interrogate the Corporal at a later time, though that thought didn’t fill him with comfort.
The message screen in front of him winked out of existence, revealing something straight out of a nightmare. A literal hoard of oversized beetles were bearing down on them from less than 10 feet away, several crawling over each other in an attempt to reach him first.
Glade immediately backpedaled, pulling the trigger as fast as he could. As he did, a cascade of prompts opened in Glade’s vision, completely obscuring his lines of sight yet again.
Glade screamed in frustration, instinctually willing the notifications away in a flash of anger. Much to his surprise, they vanished.
“Thank god for small favors,” he growled, now fully able to see the small army of insects marching inexorably toward them.
“Eat flame you sorry excuse for grubs!” Kedryn cried right before a flare of bright, iridescent flame erupted from his outstretched palm, drowning out his infrared goggles.
Light blindness was a very real, very dangerous effect when using night vision goggles, especially during combat where a momentary distraction could mean the difference between life and death. Sudden exposure more often than not blinded the untrained, resulting in the wearers either being stunned or severely distracted.
Years of training and in-grained reflexes took over as Glade closed his eyes at the first hint of a flare up, tearing off his helmet and goggles with his off hand. Opening his eyes, Glade accepted the stinging pain of overly bright light, not quite believing what he saw.
A medium sized ball of flame sat cradled in the Corporal’s outstretched hand, revealing a half dozen or more beetles in the flickering light. Their carapace was a rough shell of volcanic rock with a pair of hand sized gleaming onyx pincers clacking excitedly as they approached.
“I could have sworn I pumped more mana into…. arrgghh! Ow, ow, ow, ow!!” the Corporal cried out, frantically waving his hand about in pain.
Under other circumstances, Glade would have sat back and enjoyed the show. But they were in real danger here. If the Corporal’s light went out, he wouldn’t have the time to put his goggles back on.
“Don’t put the flame….” he began, but it was too late. The Kid extinguished the flame, plunging them once again into darkness. “...out,” he finished lamely.
Burning pain lanced up his leg, surprising him as a beetle bit down around his ankle with its mandibles. Glade instinctually lashed out with a kick, the weight of the creature shocking him just as much as the pain had. Still, he was able to knock over the beetle, freeing his now lacerated boot.
Another beetle barreled into his other leg, but instead of using its mandibles it used its body weight to knock him to the ground.
Glade could feel the bug’s overly sharp mandible slice into knee, throwing him off balance. The moment he hit the hard surface, another bulldog sized beetle pounced on his arm like an overgrown cat, using its massive weight to pin the limb to the ground as it forcibly yanked his helmet and goggles from his hand.
“I need light!” he cried out. A moment later, white light erupted into existence above the unknown girl's outstretched hand, bathing the area in an ethereal glow.
Ignoring the fact that the girl could somehow conjure light, Glade took quick stock of their situation. What he found made his heart drop. The beetles were in a frenzy. Three were already fighting over his damaged body armor that lay several feet away, and another two were gnawing away at his boots with his feet still in them. One beetle had even rapped its massive maw around the end of his rifle, barrel first.
Not one to waste an opportunity, Glade pulled the trigger. The beetle at the end of his rifle exploded, spraying white gore and rocks into the shadows.
Instead of scattering at the violent end of one of their own, more beetles took its place, piling onto his rifle all at once.
Searing pain brought his attention back to the beetle straddling his arm, which had sliced into his pinned arm as it tried to eat his helmet.
Glade roared more out of anger than pain, abandoning his rifle under the scrum of rock covered bugs to pull his sidearm from its holster. The next moments went by in a blur as he first put a bullet into the beetle pinning his left arm to the ground and then two more bullets at the beetles attacking his boots. The spray of both noxious liquid and rock fragments splattered everywhere.
Without hesitation, Glade shoved the corpse of the beetle off his arm and blindly rolled away from the swarm of beetles massing on his rifle. Head swimming with pain, Glade continued to ignore the bright point of light emanating from the girl’s outstretched hand. In his immediate opinion, what was one more oddity in this sea of madness?
As if the heavens themselves decided to mock him, a warm glow began to emanate from first one, then two, then more of the beetles’ overly sharp mandibles as they swarmed over the remains of his abandoned equipment.
“What in the world…?” he stammered as the warm glow quickly ramped up into blistering heat. Glade watched in stunned disbelief as both his goggles and rifle melted into puddles of slag before his very eyes.
Several bursts rang out as the heat exploded the few rounds of ammunition left in the rifle’s magazine, killing one of the bugs that happened to be standing on top of the weapon’s remains and wounding two more.
The other beetles ignored the dead and dying insects and immediately began lapping up the molten metal. For the first time in years, Glade froze as he tried, and failed, to comprehend the scene before him.
Another flash of firelight flared to life in Kedryn’s hand.
“Round two sucka’s!” the Corporal cried with a maniacal grin, throwing a ball of flame at the closest beetle.
The fire splashed harmlessly over the rocky carapace.
“Not that I’m complaining or anything,” Glade growled as he loaded a new clip into his sidearm. “But that didn’t seem to work!”
“Sorry!” the Kid called out, followed shortly by the girl yelling something at them in her musical language. The Corporal responded, and in the exchange Glade caught a very important phrase.
“... Bei’Kedryn Ri’Serevlir…”
Glade’s memory immediately locked onto the Kid’s newly adopted name. Kedryn. He didn’t know why that moment was burned into his brain, but it was. Not that it distracted him from the more pressing matter of defending themselves. The moment he finished reloading, he began spraying bullets into the mass of beetles, trying hard to remember why that name didn’t sound right. .
“Contact right!” Kedryn called, charging with his staff as two bugs came out of the shadows.
Glade nodded his approval, shooting even more beetles as they continued to swarm. It was about time the Corporal got into the fight. Fortunately for him, the Kid’s actions effectively covered Glade’s flank.
Within moments, only two of the monstrous beetles remained. Both had stopped draining the remains of his melted rifle and were vibrating violently.
THe unknown girl began yelling at them, gesturing emphatically with her empty hand toward the vibrating beetles. Kedryn responded in an excited tone in the same language.
Glade turned away from the two vibrating beetles and focused on the other threats in the area. Namely, the ones the Kid had been battering with his staff. Kedryn had done a good job of incapacitating the ones on his side by flipping them onto their backs. However, he was having a bit of trouble doing any lasting damage with what looked like a walking stick against the bugs’ rocky exterior.
Two shots later, the beetles stopped moving.
The girl continued to yell, her voice quavering as fear lit her eyes. Glade groaned when he saw the Kid’s smile grow even more manic.
“Sir, you are not going to believe this! You see those vibrating Magma Beetles behind you? Well, they’re going through a forced evolution! Riya says they can evolve their carapace into whatever metal they ingest! Isn’t that awesome? They could be invaluable crafting resources if we could leverage them properly.”
Kedryn paused as the girl began yelling louder, pointing emphatically at the remaining bugs..
“Oh, and Riya says you need to kill them before they finish growing their new carapace out of that metal they ingested,” Kedryn said, still smiling like he was on vacation.
“Say what now?” Glade asked in disbelief. Bugs simply didn’t grow metal skin. That was impossible.
He was about to explain that very obvious detail when the ever changing reality of their situation made itself known. Again.
The beetles’ rocky carapace began dissolving before his widening eyes, replaced with a sleek, matte black covering that looked an awful lot like carbon steel.
“That' confirms it,” Glade complained, aiming his side arm directly at the exposed eye of one of the beetles. “I’m high on Vlad’s homemade remedies again. No other possible explanation.”
Despite his complaints, Glade pulled the trigger.
His aim was true as the first beetle’s head exploded in a spray of white mist. The moment it was dead, Glade sighted the remaining beetle and again pulled the trigger. Much to his surprise, the insect proved far more agile than expected, leaping to the side in an unbelievable display of speed and accuracy. Before he could re-orient, the beetle charged.
Taking careful aim, Glade fired another round.
A loud gong reverberated throughout the cavern as the magma beetle flew back from the impact.
Much to their surprise, the bug was still alive, having tanked the shot. Only now, there was a dent along the base of its neck leaving a fingers width gap in its defense where there was nothing but smooth carapace before.
“That can’t be good,” Glade muttered at the same time as Kedryn whispered, “Wow.”
The beetle hissed at them, then charged, eating the ground between them much faster than it had before.
Kedryn quickly stepped into Glade’s line of fire and swung his staff like a golf club.
A distinctive crack reverberated within the confines of the cave as the wood met the beetle mid-stride, knocking it into a nearby pillar before unceremoniously falling to the ground, where it lay stunned.
Shaking his head at the absurdity of it all, Glade holstered his side arm before pulling his knife free.
“Sir?” Kedryn asked. “What are you doing?”
“No sense in wasting ammunition,” Glade muttered, ramming the knife between the gap in the creature's carapace and into its brain, killing it instantly. After that, he sat heavily on the ground, gasping for breath as he took stock of their situation.
He ignored the few minor cuts and scrapes on his arms and legs, instead focusing on the damage done to his leg and hand. If Doc were here, he would be able to bandage him up without an issue. But as it was, he’d be lucky if the wounds weren’t already well on their way to being infected. Being out in the middle of nowhere with an injury and no medical supplies was like a death sentence.
“Sorry to bother you, sir,” Kedryn panted, the excitement on his face still evident. “But it looks like there are more of them. And they’re looking right at you.”
Glade looked up from where he was seated. A half dozen pairs of eyes were glittering back at them from the edge of the girl’s conjured light. Fortunately for them, these were much smaller, roughly the size of a football instead of a dog. Except for one, which also had the same matte black color as the beetle he had just killed.
Glade glared at the swarm, brandishing his knife in a halfhearted effort to defend himself. Strangely, the beetles followed the movement of his hand, clicking their mandibles anxiously.
“Sir, I have an idea,” Kedryn said. Glade could hear the light bulb in the Kid’s voice, but couldn’t really bring himself to care as he faced another small horde of demon spawn beetles. “Try moving your knife from left to right.”
Not seeing why he shouldn’t, Glade complied. Hesitantly, the beetles moved forward, tracking the movement of the knife as if it were the center of their universe.
“Try throwing it away from you,” Kedryn suggested.
Glade glanced at his Corporal with a barely restrained scowl. Not because it wasn’t a good idea, but because it would mean he was going to lose one of his knives.
Knowing he was going to regret this later, Glade unceremoniously threw the steel blade as far away from them as he could.
The moment the knife clattered to the ground, the beetles began moving, the one covered in metal shooting past the others with ease.
They watched in silence as the steel covered beetle pounced on his knife, heating it up with its mandibles.
“Good idea Corporal,” Glade said, gritting through the pain. “Now is our chance to leave them behind.”
As Kedryn helped him to his feet, a massive beetle the size of a small horse leapt from the surrounding darkness, pinning the steel wrapped beetle to the ground with a loud clang. Its chrome carapace reflected Riya’s light, and the group watched in disbelief as the massive insect pierced the smaller beetle with its already glowing mandibles, melting the smaller one from the inside out.
All the other beetles scattered as the girl muttered something harsh under her breath.
“What did she say?” Glade asked, unable to tear his gaze away from the macabre scene playing out before them.
“I’m not sure exactly, but I think I just learned my first elvish curse word,” Kedryn said with a grin.
Glade glared at the Corporal and started to count to ten under his breath.
In the confusion, no one noticed the swarm of smaller beetles drag Glade’s ruined body armor and vest into the shadows.