“So… something like that happened to you...” Max said.
We had met in the restaurant where I had explained my part of the story. Let me tell you, I was a bit scared because my boss was a man that showed his anger when annoyed. At the moment he was unnaturally calm with his fingers connected while resting his heads on it while he took slow deep breaths.
“First I will tell you to stop acting like that. Now did you get this man’s name?” He asked looking at me.
“It showed only Fredrick when the notification said I was about to be raped.” I said.
He kept muttering that name and nodded.
“So now let’s get to what we should do…!” He said and began to think for a moment.
“First off, you should tell that little girl, the one that came with Leon’s class, what happened. She must be worried. Doing this will let her know that she should keep charge of Leon’s things. Now, you should leave and go find a combat type class. You don’t have one right?” He asked and I nodded my head. “Considering your personality you should have gotten alchemy and some herb related production skills right?” He asked and I nodded to that.
“I suggest you search for something like a Druid. Druids use nature magic which involves a lot of plants and animals but you can specialize to hit the requirements for advanced class upgrades for that class. They can change into several kinds of classes but you will learn it if you go check it out.” He explained.
“So Druid, is it like the kind that shapeshifts into animals?” I asked.
“Yes and no. They shapeshift but it’s into anything they study. They can also mix alchemy with their nature magic to get similar effects from plants they have studied. Jonathan is a druid and has gathered some info so if you come to the central region and join the guild we can show you some advanced class choices. Where were you heading with Leon?” Max asked.
“Southern region, I think if I travel with Levi I can still move the hive through her since she and Leon are linked at the head of it. I think…” I said.
“If you can then that is good, if not then you should leave and tell her to train or something. His class is too strange because I think it’s an exclusive class so no one else can have it.” He said.
“Yeah, I figured that part out already. It is really interesting but whatever. I will look into the class, and will probably take the girl with me because she is still young and leaving a child alone is too much.” I said, making him nod and chuckle.
“What?” I asked.
“Oh nothing… I think you said once she calls him daddy right?” He asked me.
I tilted my head confused why he brought that up but I just nod confused.
“Yeah, when she is around strangers she makes a haughty princess persona but she is a shy daddy’s girl.” I said, making him chuckle again.
“So… I guess you want her to call you mommy?” He said with a large grin.
…
It took a very long moment before my mind registered what he said. I let my head droop a bit and my hair, that I had left loose, covered my eyes.
“Jonas…” I said in a cold tone making him freeze. “Please don’t say that again okay?!” I said in a very calm tone but I noticed a cold sweat covering my bosses forehead.
He nodded a lot and I lifted my head up and a smile was on my face. “Alright, anything else we can plan to do?” I asked.
“Errr… if you plan to follow the plan from before then I suggest going to the central region Starter city Zenova and join the guild then go on your way to the southern region. You planned to meet up with a group you met there right?” He asked and I nodded. “Then that is fine, this is a game so we won’t hold you back. Anyway, I suggest checking in on Leon when he wakes up with the doctor but you should head back to the game as soon as possible. It will be a few days before Leon wakes up again so we should get busy.” Max said and I nodded.
“One thing, what of Leon’s job?” I asked.
“He is on medical leave, I’ll be passing by the hospital to get the official documents so there won’t be any paycheck discount. Don’t want such good scientists falling into poverty.” Max says with a smile.
Seeing that it was all resolved we head our separate ways.
I return home but as soon as I enter my room and see the VR glasses I frown.
"Damn it! How will I tell her!?" I shouted to myself.
I go take a bath first to try and cool off and truthfully forget everything.
Letting the cold water wash over me while just staring at the floor I stood there.
After a while I got tired of standing and left. I barely had the motivation to do much at all but I still force myself to do at least basic stuff like drying my hair and at least put on a shirt and underwear.
I look at the glasses that will send me into VLO and lay down in bed while putting them on.
"AI total house lockdown. Connect via wireless connector to Virtual Reality Immersion Unit. Call me if any visitors arrive and forward any call to me in game. Instantly alert authorities and me if anyone tries to invade my house." I said.
[Affirmative... Lockdown initiates!] The robotic voice said.
Seeing it had worked I started up the VR glasses and felt the common dizzy feeling that came with entering the game.
Levi PoV
I was watching over daddy and the cow tits woman that was wearing some farmers' clothes appeared.
As I watched, the titty fiend suddenly opened her eyes and sat up suddenly.
"So you're here already..." she said with a frown.
"I was watching over daddy which you should have done!" I tell her pointing at her face.
"I was watching him but in our world, the one where our real bodies are." She replied, making me sneer.
It's been three days since they were gone already.
"I found out some of what made Droso stay unconscious." Booby said, catching my attention.
"What!?" I asked, excited since she found out and could probably fix it.
"His body... both his body here and in my world lacked energy. Most of the energy in his body was suddenly used up for some reason and now..." she said and paused.
"What? What happened?!" I asked.
"Until he recovers his strength he can't ret..."
“YOU'RE LYING!!! DADDY ISN'T THAT WEAK HE IS STRONG AND CAN BEAT ANYONE!!" I shout.
"He isn't going to die!" She said, massaging her head thinking. "Ah! That's a good way!" She muttered. "Right, the best way I can explain it is that Droso overexerted himself and wasted almost all his energy to the point that it left his body in our world weakened leaving both bodies unconscious." She says.
"So… he just needs sleep?" I mutter.
She nods, “Like I was saying, he can't return to this body until the one in our world recovers. Time flies differently so for travellers it will be around one month before he can safely return but for you..." she paused and took a big breath. "...It will be four months before he returns." She said.
...
"What?" I mutter. I didn't believe her.
"Levi, calm down before you cause the hive to panic!" She said sternly but I didn't want to hear her.
"Four... months..." big tears were gathering at the corner of my eyes. "No! *hic* No! NONONONONONO! DADDY WAKE UP!!" I shout and jump on my daddy's bed shaking him but he only responds by yelling in pain before I was grabbed by the cow.
"Stop that Levi!! Simply touching him will bring him pain!!" She shouted but I tried to fight back, kicked, elbowed and even tried to bite. I shot lots of stingers from my hands but she grabbed them making them all shoot at the ceiling and not come down but then i kept kicking.
"DADDY!!! WAKE UP DADDY!! WAHHHHHH!!! DADDY~~~!!!" My mind was in chaos and the hive was the same. I cried and kicked and shouted. Suddenly I felt my body be thrown on the ground and as I turned to fly to daddy I felt a hand reach my face and a stinging feeling on my right cheek.
SLAP!!
"BE QUIET!!" When I looked at the voice and the hand that slapped me I saw it was the cow. From her eyes was also a stream of tears falling down.
"DON'T THINK YOU'RE THE ONLY ONE WORRIED ABOUT HIM!! I saw him be taken by the healers of my world and the moment they moved him he fainted from pain! Do you think I'm not in the least worried about his health." She shouted at me while her tears rained down to the ground.
My head fell but the shock kept me stunned but soon the tears built up and clouded my vision. I saw she kneel down and wanted to move away but suddenly her arms came around my head and back and she pulled her in.
"I know you're worried, I am too but we have to stay strong... for Droso. If you don't take care of the hive then who will? Though you’re still little you are a ‘Queen’ and a queen's job is to take over when the king isn't around. I won't tell you to not cry but we have to work together, grow stronger and be prepared for when he returns." She tells me.
Hearing her words I completely gave in and hugging her tight I buried my face in her chest and cried. She just held me and let me cry until I couldn't anymore.
When I was finally calm she began to explain what she knew in detail and when she finished she asked me something.
"Levi... when you travel does the Hive follow you or do you have to return to where he is?" She asked.
"Me and Daddy share the command of the hive but when he is awake it stays focused on him. When he is asleep and back to your world I can’t move the hive unless he can’t come back." I tell her. It makes her sigh in relief.
"Good, that makes things better for us. I think that while he is like this we should gain a class for ourselves. You can get one right?" She asked and I nodded. "Good, then we will both travel together from now on and if anyone asks you are travelling with me and are an insect variant of Demi human. Don't call yourself a queen but a demi human." She said and I nod.
"Good..." she muttered and sighed and looked at me in her lap.
"If you want to stay a few hours with him in the bed I can leave for a while." She asked.
I shake my head as I get up.
"No, daddy will just get hurt from that so we should leave. Head to a town that will teach us a good class." I say.
She nods and I open a portal for both of us.
The first thing we do is buy leather armor for us both. I need it to hide most of my natural armor but I make sure that my wings and abdomen are exposed since they don't fit in human clothes.
Some people looked at me strangely but we don't stay in town for more than half an hour and leave.
We don't even care about being seen so I make some bugs pick up Florista and we fly high following the road.
I had lots of bugs that were tier three gather food for those still at rank one. When daddy returns he will find all of them tier 3.
Monica Pov
Okay now this really sucks.
I had the job to find the real person behind the player Droso. This was easily done by getting the chiefs authorization and using it with the AI's to find the address where he registered from. Now what sucks.
XCom Inc. Gm center is at the actual facility of the company in the East coast USA but I found that this guy lived all the way in Richmond, Virginia on the west coast.
If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.
Even flying at high speeds with the flying function of my car it still took me a full five hours to reach it.
Now after calling and connecting the company AI I found the address and was now in front of the two story house knocking on the door.
It's been like this for around five minutes.
"Come on, if he was back in the game the home AI would have warned him!" I said impatient.
After another round of knocks I lost my patience.
"Hey house AI where is your owner?!" I shout
"Owner Leon Holmes is currently out! How may I help?"
"Do you know where he went?" I asked.
"Negative! This unit wasn't informed of the location!" it replied.
"Did he leave with someone?" I asked.
"Affirmative! Owner Leon Holmes was escorted by two doctors to an ambulance followed by friend Debbie Grimm!" it replied.
Ambulance! That means the hospital! Why was he taken there?
"Do you know which hospital the ambulance went to after it took Leon?" I asked.
"Processing! ... location found. What is your reason for speaking with Owner Leon?" it asked. This is a normal procedure to keep criminals away. It probably activated a lie detector system.
"I am from XCom Inc. and wish to speak to him about what happened." I reply.
"No lies detected... location is this!" it said and a projector appeared next to the door making a map appear with the hospital appear as a red dot.
"Thank you." I said and ran back to the car and told it the location.
It was all the way in the downtown area on the other side of town but it was a relatively quick flight since the car flew over the city directly into the parking lot.
Going to the first floor I head to the counter and ask the receptionist.
“Mr. Leon Holmes? Yes he is currently in the emergency room under observation and unconscious at the moment. The doctors estimate 2-4 days before he wakes up.” The receptionist said.
“What happened?” I asked her.
“The medics at the time said he was laying on his bed immobile and when they touched him he fainted from a sudden burst of pain. Are you family?” She asked.
“No… but I may know what actually did that to him. May I speak with the doctor in charge?” I asked.
“One moment…” She says and calls up the doctor.
After a moment the doctor appeared and came over.
“This is her?” He asked and the nurse receptionist nodded. He then sticks his hand out and I take it with a shake.
“I’m Monica Benjuva, can we talk somewhere private?” I asked.
“I’m Dr. Martin Booth and please come this way.” He said, leading me to his office.
“Just so you know, I would prefer to keep what is in this disk under wraps.” I said as I pulled out the disk.
“Seems like something rather sensitive but seems fine enough to agree to. Let’s see it.” He says and gives me the space to his PC.
I insert the disk and start to look through the video.
I show him only from the moment after he teleported the woman away.
As it played and it showed his eyes turning… that way and me appearing.
“My god! What is that!?” He said with his forehead drenched in cold sweat.
“My first thought was maybe a secondary personality or a bug in the game since it clearly showed him unconscious in the game system.” I said.
“Don’t people get ejected in these kinds of situations?” the doctor asked.
“Actually no. Unconscious is a state like coma. Only after a sufficient time after the person falls unconscious will they wake up but in normal cases it’s from stamina or mana exhaustion. This isn’t a normal case.” I tell him.
“Well I can see now why this should be kept in the quiet then. Such a thing like that… thing should be kept hidden more for the safety of the person it possesses. But I do feel him being conscious of the fact there is something in him is better.”
Flor PoV
I didn’t have any control of how or where the bugs fly. Levi controlled the large mosquitos that were on my back while she flew with her own wings.
Our destination was a large trade city between the Western region and Central.
Central region was the largest region while the other four were like expansions originating from it.
The nearest town on the way is nearly 2 weeks distance by foot but we travel by air and save a lot of time. At the speed we move, it would take no more than four days to reach the next town and there is no way for any kind of spy to secretly follow us at the speed we move.
Along the way, Levi asked for several detours. The reason was that she wanted to feed the bugs, specifically the Vampiric Mosquitos. They were the most advanced bugs she had and her knowledge of the bugs evolution seems to step from this request.
“Why did you want to feed them? And what exactly?” I asked.
“Unlike their first evolution which is simply to eat a lot in their early stages and the second stage where they need to be breed to have 1 stat each specific point, the third tier of evolution has more requirements. Tier 3 as daddy calls it has several stages within itself. Stage one is to become tier 3, after that is the 2nd stage which most of the tier three bugs already accomplished and that was to taste human or humanoid flesh or blood. The third stage determines whether the bugs become monsters or humanoid, you need to feed them either monster meat or humanoid meat. This will make them more humanoid or more monsters. There is one last stage where they do the same as the third stage once more. After that requires them to enter the holy lands.
At that stage they will remain inside for days, weeks or even months as their body absorbs the super dense mana inside and mold their bodies. Both monster and humanoid need to go through the Holy Land.” She explained.
“So there was something like that? This class is too mysterious, so what are you going to hunt?” I asked.
She simply pointed forward as we passed the upper tree coverage of the forest. What entered my view was a bandit camp.
“Wait you're not going to attack right?” I asked her.
“Of course I am, they are extremely useful for all the bugs, humanoid meat is extremely nutritious and bugs gain a tremendous amount of benefits from eating their corpses. From one body I can feed not only the Vampiric Mosquitoes but the dragonfly nymphs that are soon to reach their mature phase and if they get some last minute nutrition they will be much stronger than they would be otherwise! Do you think this Queen doesn't know how to treat her loyal minions?!” She said making her pompous princess persona appear.
Still, to hear such a thing come from a child makes me feel a bit uneasy. Still her antenna shook a bit and soon a large portal opened in front of us as the Vampiric Mosquito Queen flew out. Her body was large and would send a chill down anyone's spine at seeing the size. Behind her came even bigger mosquitos that surrounded her before a huge swarm flew out.
With the minion class flying forward the Queen and her Royal Guard flew near the back. The sound of a mosquito’s wing isn’t that loud but gather enough of them and it becomes a loud buzz. With almost half of them having already evolved once after drinking blood from the rabbit men the four large wings on their back held nothing back in terms of the strength they flew at.
With about level 1 human strength each one can fight a newbie player and considering they have natural weapons and tough exoskeletons they it would be hard to actually beat them without leveling first. As for the bandits, they were all level 50 to 80 yet a swarm of blood sucking bugs isn’t something they would have experienced fighting.
The image of those Demon Vampiric Mosquitos appeared in my mind and I began to wonder what happened to them.
“What happened to those demon bugs?” I asked.
“They were eaten, they did quite a good service in strengthening all the Hive spider races. Most specifically the Stealth spiders, they have formed a small village hive in the trees of the dark forest after daddy’s speech! This great one will soon have her own assassin and spy unit!” She said, proud of herself.
Down at the bandit camp the men had pulled out their weapons and were hacking away but just like how bugs are hard to hit when small, the speed, while relatively slow, was still erratic and made it hard to hit.
Hundreds of bugs swarmed each bandit and when one died two would attach themselves to his arm and pierce the leather armor with their stinger before being hit off.
Several got on their bent back and were now sucking their blood. One that was still not evolved rapidly grew as the blood transformed them.
The Queen just overlooked while she kept her vision trained on the largest house.
A moment later the door blew open and a very huge man appeared. He was a huge bear beastman and was the Queen’s target. The huge amount of blood she needed to feed on could only be satisfied by the strongest target.
One by one the bandits of all races fell and mostly only those with strong skin or were inorganic races were spared.
That said the bear bandit was now looking at the swarm with disgust.
“Marshal come out here and burn these bastards!” The man said and soon a small lanky human appeared and turned pale at the swarm but quickly began to cast a fire spell.
The Queen was intelligent, she had gained faint hints of reason and intelligence when she drank the blood of that hidden boss rabbit man. She signalled for her minions to retreat into the air and instantly all the bugs flew up.
With her rights as one of the lesser Queens of the hive she opened a portal to the Volcanic Cavern.
From it an even louder buzzing came.
“Hurry that larger one seems to be the leader, kill it and the rest will die off! She is doing something! HURRY!” The bear man shouted as he felt a cold chill run down his spine.
The mage finished and pointed his staff upwards releasing a torrent of flame but as it reached halfway was stopped by some kind of barrier.
It wasn’t a barrier, though the men didn’t see because of the flames, in front of the flames was a swarm of Flare Flies and their tier 2 Nitro Flasher.
The flames ended near the back as the flies were all within the flames eating the flames itself. They rapidly grew stronger as nearly all the Flare Flies grew nearly a third their size by eating the fresh magic flames.
As the fire died the smoke was left near the area the flames died down in.
Everyone was shocked and wondered what had stopped the flames.
When a sudden wind blew they saw a large swarm that glew red.
All the Flare Flies and Nitro Flashers were releasing a bright red glow from their light.
Slowly they moved with the Nitro Flashers forming a cone shape pointing their blinkers together. All the Flare Flies did the same and slowly mana from their body flowed down the line and soon reached the Nitro Flasher.
As the mana hit them the red blinker grew brighter on the first row, after becoming nearly blinding it suddenly turned blue, then the next one. There were seven rows and the front row had the largest Nitro Flasher.
As the mana finally reached it the blinker on her abdomen suddenly flashed and turned bright blue before from it a sudden flash flame erupted hitting the ground in an instant.
What had just happened was the swarm attack of the Flare Flies evolutionary line. Similar to the Thunderbolt Darter that can gather lightning from their bodies the Flare Flies can transfer their fire mana to another but they need to eat a large amount of flames just before executing the attack because they don’t have a proper Queen or tier 3 leader. This attack was done by the Vampiric Queen guiding them at the cost of the final strongest Nitro Flasher being extremely injured.
The others returned to the hive after that all of them were very injured from the exertion without proper guidance but the last one was the biggest one that was on its last leg but still alive. Its abdomen was pitch black from the burns. There is obviously a limit to their resistance.
On the ground the bandit camp was destroyed and a number of remaining bandits were on the ground. At the center of the attack the mage had built several layers of mana shield and his final shield had thankfully survived but he was nearly fainting from the exertion.
The bandit leader was filled with fear. He realized that attack was nearly four times stronger than the attack the mage did. It was a Blue Flame Torrent of Flame while the mage only shot a red flame one. The bugs ate the flame and made them stronger as they gathered it together in their tiny bodies. This showed to the bear beastman that the bugs had some level of intelligence.
“Shit! Why is this happening!?” He shouted. The next moment the previous swarm advanced at him and he pulled out a large axe.
“Don’t underestimate me you fucking bugs!” He shouted and his axe began to glow. He wasn’t a magic user but was still a warrior and could use skills. With his natural bear beastman lineage and his high level, warrior class skills, and strong equipment as well as the bandit boss having a powerful body which is what had attracted the Queen's attention, he was hard to kill.
Where he swung, the bugs would suddenly divide and evade at the Queen's orders and soon the bugs would pierce at the small openings in the metal armor.
Places like the joints were weak points and the Vampiric Mosquitos had long since developed a saliva with a poison that numbed the area it punctured but depending the area that numbing can eventually cause nerve numbing turning it into a weak paralysis poison.
The man was going in a rage as he felt the stings and he kept swinging randomly killing tens of dozens but after half an hour his reflexes started to fail him.
“Boss!” Some surviving inorganic bandits shouted. These were mostly golems or other spirit type humanoids.
If they advanced the Queen would surely summon the other elemental Fire Flies for each respective elemental creature.
Still as the strength of the bandit boss called him at the last swing he lost balance and fell to one knee. At this point two of the Royal Guard moved exceptionally fast. Their build was made to be even more aerodynamic when compared to the others. Their entire body was made to be much stronger than the Queen but their intelligence suffered yet under the Queen's instructions and their body’s strength made up for their shortcoming.
As one of the bandits saw the guard of the queen move he pulled out a bow. This was a golem but as he took aim at her a portal appeared and a new bug swarmed out and flew directly at him.
“Don’t think bugs can eat me!” He shouted and shot out but the Earth Flash Beetles turned their backs forward and as the arrow hit it, it pierced through only five layers of these bugs. The carapace of the Earth Flash Beetle was almost twice as hard as other bugs its own level of development but it will still die under a stomp but if you put them at the same level as the other bugs it would have one of the highest defenses only behind the Pill Bugs.
Seeing the arrow being stopped the golem was in despair, at the same time the bandit boss did a last ditch effort and stood up and swung his axe clumsily at the two Royal Guards but poorly missed as they swerved up and then did a flip and then rocket right into his eyes.
“ARAHHH!!!” He roared almost like a dying bear.
He tried to grab the two bugs but they had flown off by then.
From the pain he collapsed finally and the Queen finally moved with her Royal Guard and landed on him.
He could feel her heavy weight but had already lost the strength to move.
She moved to his neck and stung and began to drain him of his blood.
His bleeding wounds slowly stopped to bleed as blood was sucked out of him and the Queen's abdomen expanded to nearly three times her size and she turned deep scarlet.
After a bit she stopped and flew off leaving the Royal Guard to finish him.
She looked at the remaining bandits that were all elemental types and with a thought a portal opened and one by one the elemental Fireflies came out and hunted down their own prey, rapidly eating or sucking up the mana making up their body.
For me up in the air, I felt a fright at the pit of my gut. A bug army is something to fear for real and the Queen was even more a dangerous existence. They make such movements that it makes the bugs that only have strength equal to a level 1 player strength be effective against level 50 bandits.
After all the bandits were dead the bugs began to lift up the dried bodies and one by one they removed the armor until the corpses were naked and they began to open to transport the bodies inside and distribute them.
“Take the big bear to the Pill Bugs, while the mage, take and leave him to feed him to the spider Queen's.” Levi said.
The still exhausted mage was soon knocked out and taken to an area the Queens would be called and eaten alive, probably.
When everything was cleared out Levi had the items from the bandits stored in her palace and the place was searched for anything else and the bugs found more than 40 gold coins worth of money, after that it was clean and they didn’t find anything of worth besides provisions that were taken to feed more bugs.
“We can move now.” Levi said as soon as a new stronger Vampiric Mosquito changed with the one carrying me.
From there we continued on and like before every day we would stop by a bandit camp and she would raid them feeding them to the bugs so that they would grow stronger.
I’m sure rumors of something like this would soon get out if we miss a single bandit but she was efficient but I can't help feel that these raids were leaving a trace of where we passed. I hope she won't keep doing this or it will attract too much attention.
Soon enough we saw the town from far and before we reached the clearing around the town we landed and the bugs returned to the Hive and we walked to the gates.
The town was much larger and more outfitted then small villages we passed over on the way and would probably have different class guilds we can join. I think the boss should have sent someone here or there was someone in this area.