After a while I heard Levi calling me. I was in the Holy Land practicing light magic.
You would be startled how much I leveled up. This place is a mage’s dream home. In the 6 hours i trained i gained 4 levels in [Light Magic] making it level 6. [Light Orb] got all the way to level 7 and [Healing] was a bit hard to train only got to level 6 but that is two levels from where it was before.
Also though it’s weak, if i used Light orb and tossed it at an undead i could injure them.
Besides Light magic i trained a bit in Fire magic getting it to level 4 and [Fireball] rose to level 4.
I totally need to spend a lot more time here. I can totally become OP with training and breeding my bugs in here and not even need to leave this place since I can simply hunt the monsters that are appearing. When they evolve in new terrains I can throw them back into the old terrain and make a new evolution.
Still that would be boring so i will enter and train every so often as i travel or when i am resting.
Leaving the confines of the world’s best magic training area, I enter the palace and find four of the policemen.
Yes, in the kitchen. They were stuffing their faces with the cold soup I had made them but they had reheated it.
“Should have guessed…” I say as I enter the room.
Oh if you are wondering, Levi is stuffing herself on the meat of weak rabbits she is capable of killing from within the hive. It also seems she gained several extra stat points and 3 levels since i had allowed her to go hunting. Come to think of it, i haven’t distributed her points in a while. Looking at them I saw she had 60 points stored up. Her current Agi and End were above 60 so I first even Str and Dex to 60 which cost 26 points. 34 left, I split that by 4 and got 8 each point with 2 points remaining. This is her current stats.
Status
Name:
Levi
Race:
Queen
Level
16
Stat points
2
Health
100%
Mana
100%
Stamina
100%
Class:
None
Satiety
100%
Thirst
100%
Strength
68
Agility
68
Dexterity
68
Endurance
73
Intelligence
120
Wisdom
120
And this is mine with skills and all.
Status
Name:
Droso
Race:
Human
Level
25
Stat points
0
Health
100%
Mana
100%
Stamina
100%
Class:
Arthromancer
Titles
Madman Murderer, The Rabbit Annihilator
Satiety
58%
Thirst
67%
Strength
65
Agility
50
Dexterity
66
Endurance
60
Intelligence
34 (+10)
Wisdom
34 (+10)
Skills
Unconscious Notetaking [Passive]
Speed reading [Passive]
Bug Lore [Basic Level 5]
Herblore [Basic Level 4]
Identify [Basic Level 3]
Taming [Basic Level 3]
Bug Language Comprehension [Max Level]
Glaive Mastery [Basic Level 7]
Hive Portal [Basic Level 4]
Hive Mind [Max Level]
Dance of the Bugs [Basic Level 1]
Cooking [Basic Level 6]
Butchering [Basic Level 5]
Swarm Strike [Basic Level 1]
Educational Strike [Basic Level 2]
Mapping [Basic Level 2]
Spin Crush/Slash [Basic Level 3]
Haggling [Basic Level 1]
Meditation [Basic Level 1]
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Mana Aura [Basic Level 3]
Magic
Fire magic: [Basic Level 4]
*Ember [Basic Level 3]
*Fireball[Basic Level 4]
Water Magic:[Basic Level 1]
*Droplets [Basic Level 1]
*Waterball [Basic Level 1]
Wind Magic: [Basic Level 2]
*Breeze [Basic Level 1]
*Wind Cutter [Basic Level 1]
Earth Magic: [Basic Level 3]
*Pebble [Basic Level 1]
*Boulder [Basic Level 1]
*Earth Shake [Basic Level 2]
Light Magic [Basic Level 6]
*Light orb [Basic Level 7]
*Healing [Basic Level 6]
Dark Magic: [Basic Level 1]
*Dark ball [Basic Level 1]
Yeah… I know her stats are higher than mine. After this dungeon run is done I’m going to go check with Thomas and the Training hall training for something to help with that.
“So what have you been doing?” Gelot asked as he took another spoonful of soup.
“Been training my healing magic and some fire magic. Found a place with lots of mana in this world that makes it easier to train.” I said making them curious but since I didn't say anything more they didn’t ask though I could see Harm wanting to ask.
While we ate I told Flor about the Forest of Night and a few other plants and stuff I saw. Her eyes were glowing but she pushed it down because soon the others arrived and it was time to leave.
I look outside before opening the portal. There wasn’t anything waiting there so we left and began moving.
With everyone out the vanguards walk towards the way we haven’t gone and after a moment we start walking after them.
We didn’t encounter anything in the corridor but we found out the reason why when we reached one of the rooms that had split.
There was a large burning pile of corpses in the room.
“This was put to burn some time ago.” I say as I look at the state of the burned bodies. They were still only charring.
Since they were burning and thrown out I opened a portal into the drying room to feed the flare flies.
I then start to look around and I tell the others. Normally in dungeons people leave marks to know if they passed through if they are too dumb to not use the minimap or they are NPC. It’s said NPC don’t have a few systems like player's, Minimap being one.
Like I had expected there was a large stab dent at the entrance of one of the doors.
“Guys, this way. Whoever passed through went this way.” I shout.
We follow that path to see who it was and to easily get through the first floor.
As we walk we find more piles of bodies, which I added to the pile in the hive.
The corridors had piles of bodies but no living rats were left. We crossed three rooms that were cleared out and in each one we found it cleared.
“We should be getting to the end of the first floor i think.” Ripley said.
As we walked I suddenly heard the clash of weapons. Then the explosion of magic.
“There is someone fighting up ahead.” I warned everyone.
We got ready and walked slow and reached the last room. It was much larger. The room had a corridor that turned with a flight of stairs that circled around to a kind of arena surrounded by sewer water that poured from the pipes. In the middle of the arena we saw two groups. One was dressed in full white plate armor and the other had a black cloak with strong wings on their back and what looked like a bug antenna attached to the hood.
The group of hooded people had 10 people but 2 were already dead while the other group had 6 but 2 were dead but the rest were showing signs of confidence.
“YOU CUR! YOU DARE DISRUPT THE WORK OF THE CULT OF THE GREAT BEELZEBUB!” One of the remaining hooded men said.
“Don’t try to act tough. We already killed most of you, now we just need to kill the remaining plague.” One armored man said.
As the group of knights started moving, we watched from up on the terrace where the entrance to this room which would be the last room to go down a floor would be.
“DIE SCUM OF THE LIGHT!” The man said like a madman as he pulled out a scroll opening it and then pulled out a dagger and stabbed his own hand before smearing it on the scroll.
The scroll lit up and began unfurling and making a circle over the man. Soon the circle turned pitch black in the center.
The man was laughing like a madman.
“COME MY MINIONS AND FEAST ON THE FLESH OF THESE INSIGNIFICANT PALADINS AND THE RATS THAT ARE WATCHING US UP ABOVE!” he shouts.
All of us instantly felt a chill down our spine.
I turned around quickly and opened a portal.
“QUICK INSIDE!” I shout.
Everyone runs in and I push Levi inside.
“What about you!?” Gelot says.
“I’ll try to fight and save them but you guys go!” I shout and push him inside and close the portal before they could exit.
Then I came out and made the paladins shocked seeing me.
“GET OUT OF HERE!” One of them shouts but suddenly from the black hole a buzzing came and a black cloud swarmed out and began to fill the room.
I instantly used my bug lord and it worked.
[Demon Vampiric Mosquito]
These were demon bugs, so these really were cultists.
I felt real fear from these things, it was a morbid fear from my very being and it wasn’t unjustified. The reason was that the bugs attacked the corpses and drained them of everything. It left the bodies as skeletons with only the minimum of anything which makes me panic.
It gets worse when they finally attack the paladins.
They try to fight but the bugs are only the size of a hand and number thousands. What can they do but be overwhelmed?
It was only thanks to the armor that they could protect against the bugs for a while but soon one got in through the entrance then another and soon they were being sucked dry of their fluids. They were much more cruel than my own. Mine only sucked blood but these drained everything leaving only some dried skin, muscles and bones that fall like mummys to the ground.
When all the paladins were killed in an instant they finally turned to me.
For some reason I was petrified in fear. It’s not like anything I saw, this black cloud was even scarier than the nightmares black cloud.
I watched shaking as the cloud came at me but before it got within 10 meters of me a portal opened. I feared it was Levi but suddenly a deafening sound of thunder came out of the portal hitting the head fly and travelling down the line all the way to the paladin's metal armor before being dispersed.
The massive electric shock had completely destroyed the line of mosquitos that were coming at me and from the portal the Thunderbolt Darters and Lightning Striders began to flood up as it grew larger.
They make a large circle around me when all of them are out and at the order of the queen they begin to circulate electric pulses through the wall of flying bugs.
The swarm still came at us but as soon as they approached the electricity jumped onto them and travelled down the line killing dozens.
I heard a ding after the second shot. At that time the cultists called the bugs back to not lose more.
“YOU CUR!! YOU POSSESS MASTER’S POWER!!! CAPTURE HIM!!” The man shouted.
This time was different. The bug swarm split in two and came at the same time. It made me realize that the lightning would follow one path only making my blood cold.
At the same time two large portals opened and from them both hives of spiders rushed out. They quickly crawled onto the pillars and began to shoot out webbing which others would go in a different spot to connect there and make it possible to walk on it. Others ran on them weaving the string and making a strong woven net. It was so fast the process that you could barely see if you didn’t pay attention. At once the bugs crashed into the wall of web pushing it back nearly a meter but unable to push more. To make it worse the spiders that didn’t shoot webs began to do so and made a huge net that stuck to a large number of flies as they took to the air again. It was like watching them expertly fish the flies. The walls were completely covered in the flies that were caught and the small brown and grey spiders were going around paralyzing them and making them into bundles and removing them from the wall of webs.
My jaws were on the ground as i watched this casually close off the area I was in and used me as bait to keep catching more flies.
They were being split into two piles behind me which would be split between the two spider hives.
“DON’T FUCK WITH ME YOU CUR! HAND OVER GREAT DEMON LORD BEELZEBUB’S POWER THIS INSTANT!” the madman said in his fury.
In his hand was a fireball that he aimed my way and shot.
This time Levi did appear in the air and summon the Ice Flare flies who all start spitting the freezing acid and destroys the fire ball.
“Don’t be mean to daddy!” She shouts. She opens her palm and I feel the Vampiric Mosquitos go active as they are called on. They swarm out just like the demon ones but mine were clearly larger in size and had greater power.
They rushed the men but the second man grinned.
“HAHAH! DON’T FORGET ME YOU SIMPLETON!” He shouted.
He did the same as the other one and a new black hole opened up but before anything came out my own vampiric flies had swarmed him and the top Royal guard had grabbed onto the side of his head after pushing off the hood revealing his ugly face that was filled with scars and did something i would have prefered to not have seen.
Both of them jabbed their stingers into his ears right into his brain.
For the other one he was hit by several royal guard and had his arms restrained while the Queen herself landed on his head and at the very crown of the head penetrated his head.
This was a cruel way to kill and without a doubt it’s not something i would like to see again but it’s done.
I watch as their health drops at an unnatural speed against so few.
The swarms had also gone mad and weren’t a swarm anymore and just demon bugs going mad.
They were a true hive mind, they didn’t have a single personal thought unlike my own vampiric mosquito, or at least the queen.
When she was full she removed her stinger and let the others feed off the cultist. The same can be said about the two royal guards who let them go. Afterwards they were swarmed similar to how their own swarms had attacked the paladins.
When their HP reaches 0 their bodies finally collapse to the ground as they rapidly shrivel up but soon stop as all the blood was drained.
From there the spiders had begun to work and climbed to the ceiling and began to let down webs like fishing lines began to catch the flies by the dozen. I was really wondering where they got all these techniques since many of them were from cave dwelling spiders. I can’t recall the name but i am certain the spider was a small cave dweller that used this bug catching style.
The bug hunting goes on for over 3 hours and the thunderbolt darters and striders return to the hive while the others in the party come out and I explain in a bit of a daze what I saw.
Their jaws were on the ground but they couldn’t reject what I saw because they were watching the spiders effortlessly catching several thousand demon Vampiric mosquitos.
“I kind of fear how they will be later on.” Gelot says as he watches the efficiency of the hunting spiders.
“They will become humanoid so I guess human size will allow them to hunt large animals instead of bugs.” I say making him pale.
“I think i need a break.” He says while holding his head. The others nodded and I could only smile wryly at them since I can't blame them. Still before we could go off, we took no expense at stripping all the dead men of their armor. The paladins, I asked the guys to carry the bodies back to the church and explain what happened.
“Why us and not you?” Gelot asked.
“Because my bugs just effortlessly hunted demon bugs. They will obviously capture me and use me like a tool to fight the cultists so i plan to leave the city right now.” I explain.
“I’ll be going with him, I want to study the hive more so I will travel with you.” Flor said.
I had figured as much but it was alright.
On the dead cultists I found the robes which I felt would be bad to take and was better to burn because it was made with parts of demon bugs. As for anything on them, I found some silver which we split but nothing much.
There were no bodies that were useful anymore for the vampiric mosquitos but I told the spiders to take them. They still needed the first human meat sample to get their first evolution.
After the clean up we quickly leave the area. The spiders take down the curtain of webs and take it inside the hive since they can recycle it and when we left there were no bugs or bodies. It was as if no one had been there.
After we exit we say our farewells.
“Don’t want to tell us where you are going?” Gelot asked.
“No, if the church decides to… ‘ask you’ where we are, they could do some cruel things to you until you spoke. Also I bet they have lie detectors so let’s leave it at this okay?” I tell him.
He nods and we shake hands and say farewell.
As we leave, i let Flor into the hive and I started heading east towards the other explored regions and the only thought in my mind was, “I really need a mount!”