At first I was confused, it didn't look particularly scary or anything.

The best way to describe what I was looking at is if you made a starfish the size of a medium-sized dog, and then had all of its arm-things have mouths on them, as well as an eye sticking out of the middle part.

It wasn't scary, just... gross...

But even beyond that, the name was really weird, and it made it hard to take seriously.

[test1 The Everlasting Multiple, Nemesis First Stage]

Danger Level: Moderate Threat

I signaled to everyone to stay out of sight and slowly approached the eldritch starfish.

Its massive eyeball turned to face me, and just... stared.

Eventually, I managed to get close enough to be able to look down at it.

From this angle, I could see what looked like... perforation lines between the arms and body?

You know, like when you have a piece of paper that's designed to tear easy? It looked kinda like that for some reason.

I used Leonidas to pin it in place and looked at it as thoroughly as I could.

The thing looked terrified as I measured it with my eyes.

That's when the ground started rumbling.

"It's time to run like a bat out of hell everyone!" I yelled, already sprinting past them.

Everyone else started running after me, trying to keep up, except Polyu, who was getting very good at flying with [Gravity Shift].

"Why are we running?!" Polyu yelled to cut through the noise.

As if to answer her question, a wave of starfish started chasing us.

There was so many, I didn't even know how to start counting.

"Nevermind, I figured it out!"

Luckily for us, they weren't nearly as fast as the Fifskae or I, nor did they have anywhere close to as much endurance as either party.

That said, we all ended up doubled over and panting at the end of the chase.

"Another happy landing." I joked.

"What?" Polyu asked, incredulous.

"Right, you guys haven't seen that movie huh?"

"Both of you shut up." Juohen demanded, his last rat's-ass clearly spent about a quarter-mile ago.

After we all had some time to recuperate, we reassembled.

"So, as you no-doubt noticed, the starfish thing has multiplied a lot more than originally anticipated. I was hoping to gather more information, but we would have been overrun in a matter of moments if I did." I steepled my fingers. "As to what we did learn: one, they probably work off of a hivemind, otherwise they couldn't have found us as fast; two, they don't seem very physically strong or tough, especially in comparison to what Nemeses are usually like... this is corroborated the the fact that it's a 'moderate threat' and not 'certain death' like usual; three, it had clear design intent. It was very obviously designed to be as it is, which is probably partly why they're not as tough as usual, which is to say, they're weaker in order to have a higher chance of splitting."

"We already knew they were designed, why is that something we learned?" Polyu asked.

I nodded at her. "Good question actually Polyu, the reason is because it lets us know that they were built to split, not like burn down the countryside and also it can split if that makes any sense."

She shook her head. "No actually, that doesn't make any sense."

I sighed, but before I could formulate my response, Hund stepped in to explain. "What he's saying is that the emphasis was on what the design was about, not that it was designed in general. So even though we knew it has been designed, we didn't know what its purpose was until now."

Polyu looked at both of us as though we were stupid. "I kinda assumed that it was like that already, why does it change anything?"

I cut back in. "Because it means that we may be outnumbered, but we're not outgunned."

Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

"Why didn't you just say that instead?" Polyu snarked.

"Because Andrew isn't very good at explaining things sometimes." Sydui replied.

"Hey! Who's side are you on?!"

Everybody laughed at my expense.

Over the next few hours, we figured out a plan of attack.

The next thing we have to do is capture a starfish and see what kind of poisons will work.

It turns out, we had four of those fish bladders left over, three "tear-gases" and one "Molotov".

It took a bit of prowling, but eventually we found another starfish all by itself.

"Stay low, but be ready to sprint at a moment's notice." I whispered.

I crouched quietly and strode toward my target.

Before this, I had wrapped a cloth around one of the heads of one of my bolts, and then used it to tie a bladder to said bolt.

The strange prepared bolt was horribly unbalanced as one would expect, but I could use Hole Puncher's ability to mostly ignore the problem at short range.

I double-checked my leather cloth that I had rolled up, making sure no kinks had formed while I was traveling here.

I finally lined up my shot and fired at the creature's center of mass.

In moments, it was hacking and coughing from all of its mouths, as well as watering from all of its eyes.

I took the opportunity to rush it and tackle it to the ground.

It made a screech in protest, and I found one additional mouth I hadn't seen... because it bit me.

It had its sixth mouth on the underside of its main body.

As much as it hurt, it wasn't that bad all things considered.

I covered all of its eyes and mouths with my leather cloth before sprinting away. "I've got it, we're leaving!"

It was not a moment too soon, as the wave of starfish began to chase us again.

This time though, they were coming from every direction and not just one.

"Piss! Rahyu, you're on deck!" I pointed at him, still running. "[Ascend, Echo]!"

Rahyu returned to his fiery form and dove into the ocean of starfish.

They screamed in agony as they were burned to a crisp, allowing us a path through.

Even then, we weren't out of the woods yet.

The starfish were still all around us and doing everything they could to stop us.

"Sydui, catch!" I tossed the starfish to her and pulled out Hole Puncher.

She barely caught it due to the short notice, and gave me a dirty look.

I smiled apologetically for a moment before anchoring my feet and waiting for the last Fifska to pass.

Once they were all past me, I fired into the crowd of Nemeses, obliterating dozens in a single shot.

I quickly unanchored and jumped backward onto a platform I made with Leonidas.

I then jumped again and dismissed the platform before making a new one to land on.

I continued using this method, jumping from platform to platform until I caught back up with the group.

A few Fifskae got cut off from the rest of the group, and the others started to turn to help.

"Keep running! I've got this!"

Hund looked up at me and nodded. "You heard him, let's go!"

I dropped down from my platform and took out the two "tear-gas" bladders I had left. "Everyone take a deep breath in and close your eyes! Shreddy, as soon as I land, rupture the bladders!"

'Got it!'

They did as they were told just as I landed and took a deep breath.

My eyes are going to hurt so much from this.

Shreddy Mercury took his cue and popped the bladders.

All of the Nemeses started to hack and cough.

I opened my mouth for just long enough to shout a single command. "Run now!"

The gas started to sting my eyes and throat, but I held in the scream I desperately wanted to release.

Everyone burst into full sprint again, pushing through the starfish as best as they could.

As soon as we were past the cloud, I shouted to the Fifska around me, apparently I had gone hoarse in that short amount of time. "Everybody, open your eyes again! It's about to get bumpy! Shreddy, see if you can topple some trees for us!"

'I'm putting in all the work today!'

'You are not, I am also demonstrating a large amount of efficacy as I always do as well.' Hole Puncher replied, monotone as always.

"Now's not the time you guys!"

'Right sorry.' Shreddy apologized.

Shreddy splashed out and cut down several of the trees behind and to the sides of us, allowing us more breathing room.

I saw that this wasn't going to work as it was, so I changed tactics.

"Shreddy, come back!"

'What for?'

"We're going underground!"

'Aw man, I hate digging!'

"It's that or letting me die!"

'I didn't say I wouldn't do it.'

Shreddy recalled himself before splashing down on the ground directly in front of all of us and slowly opening a hole in the ground.

"This is taking too long, everybody stand back!"

I fired Hole Puncher into the ground, making a small tunnel.

"Everybody follow me in!"

All of us ran underground as I made a tunnel as quickly as I could.

Leonidas really came in handy making sure the tunnel didn't collapse on us as we went through, because it definitely fell behind us as soon as I dismissed him

As we ran, I strained my ears as much as possible between shots to hear if I could find the other Fifskae that had gone ahead, and sure enough I heard the sounds of battle.

Rahyu must have run out of time while I was too busy to notice.

"Shreddy, give them a door!"

'On it!'

As Shreddy did that, I opened as much of a tunnel as I could, but it wasn't long before I had to stop.

'My liege, I'm not certain how much more I can hold. The ground above us is heavy.' Leonidas warned, his voice straining.

"Alright, you can pull back a bit, we need you to able to hold it for a while."

'I'll do my best to serve you my liege.'

'Andrew! I'm finally through!' Shreddy informed.

"Alright everyone, here we go!"

Shreddy burst through the ceiling and the sound of battle became obvious.

I popped my head out of the hole. "Everyone! Down here!"

Some Fifskae were on the ground or being carried by others at this point, their only saving grace being the friendly Nemeses holding off the endless onslaught.

The remaining non-Nemeses dragged the injured into the hole, then jumped down themselves, followed finally by our Nemeses.

"Leonidas, I'm going to need you to hold that shut until we can pass!"

'It won't be long, but I will hold the line until all strength leaves me!

"Don't worry, I don't need long!" I turned to my clearly exhausted friends. "Polyu and Rahyu, I need you two to use [Gravity Shift] and [Photon Gaze] to solidify the walls as I create a tunnel with Hole Puncher!"

They were both too tired to speak, nodding instead.

The three of us made progress as quickly as we could, but without Leonidas, it was significantly slower.

'My liege, the creatures are on the verge of breaking through!'

"Everybody cram into the tunnel we've made, just make sure not to touch the walls, they're still going to be hot!"

Everyone packed into the tunnel as closely as they could.

"Polyu, you're on deck! Make sure the ceiling doesn't cascade on us!"

"You... got it..." She replied weakly.

I dismissed Leonidas' shield, causing the starfish to fall into the hole and be crushed by the falling dirt.

Everyone was left breathing heavily, but the starfish weren't on top of us anymore... well figuratively anyway

"Shreddy, please make some thin breathing tubes, but be discrete about it, everyone here needs a second to... well, breathe."

'You got it Andrew.'

We slowly made our way away from the starfish zone and made a wide enough tunnel area for everyone to stand comfortably.

"Sydui, the test subject?"

Sydui handed me a squirming bag that apparently she had put it in.

I'm not really sure why I hadn't thought of just putting it in a bag from the start.

I exposed some of the starfish's flesh, making sure not to let it see anything outside of the bag. "It's time to experiment!"