Chapter 58. Alf: Ant Farm_Dust: A Romantic Apocalyptic LitRPG Novel

Alf rolled onto his hands and knees and tried to push onto his feet, but his calf muscles seized up, sending him crashing back to the tunnel floor.

“My legs.” He rolled onto his back and tried to pull back on his right foot, but his forearms were cramping too. He needed water. Dehydration could be life threatening even without monsters around.

“Shhh…” Blix rolled him onto his back and went to work on his legs. “Did you hear that? I think it’s another centipede.” She pulled back on his foot, pounded his calf muscles with the hilt of her dagger. “We need to move. Now.”

“Okay…” He rolled back onto stomach. “Climb on.”

An elbow dug into his calf. Another into the back of his thigh. She climbed onto his back with all the gentleness of an enraged rhino. Not waiting for her to strap herself into the harness, he pushed onto his feet, pulling himself up with wall with his forearms.

A roar echoed through the tunnels. The centipede corpse behind them had already been halfway decomposed by the dust. It would barely slow the monster down. Alf stumbled away from it, trailing a hand against the abrasive stone to maintain his balance.

“Ewww…” Blix whined in his ear. “Your back is disgusting. The dust ate ate all those centipede bodies. Why didn’t it clean the monster guts off your back?”

“Shhh…” Alf broke into a lurching jog. The roar was getting closer. He needed to put some distance between him and all that monster bait.

He hadn’t gone more than a hundred yards before he came to an intersection. “Any ideas?” He stopped and leaned against the wall to catch his breath. The intersecting tunnel was a few feet narrower than the passage they were in, but he couldn’t decide whether that was a good thing or a bad thing.

“Left.” Blix’s voice rang with confidence. He was about to ask why, but she cut him off. “Wait. I need to mark our path.”

He looked back to see her scratching a mark into the wall with her dagger.

“Okay, go!”

He ran down the left passage and soon came to another intersection.

She scratched another mark on the wall. “Straight!”

A distant roar sounded behind them, pushing him to an even faster run. They came to four more intersections, and each time Blix confidently called out a direction.

“You’re… trying to take us lower?” he guessed.

“The road less traveled.”

“How… poetic.” He was panting now. The stitch in his side was starting to get a stitch in its side. He stopped at a branch tunnel that was much darker than the one the others. Stopping to let Blix leave another mark, he turned down the passage and pulled up short. Fifty yards ahead of them, the shadows writhed and turned like a ink-filled kaleidoscope.

He plodded to a stop and stared. “Do you see that?” He tried to blink the grit out of his eyes, but his tear ducts seemed to have dried up.

“Get a little closer?” Blix seemed just as perplexed as he.

He stepped cautiously forward. The roiling shadows glimmered with constantly moving crescents of reflected light.

“Ants,” Blix called out. “Turn back. Get out of here!”

Alf started to turn, but another roar sounded behind them. This one was definitely closer. He continued forward. He’d rather take his chances with a bunch of bugs than fight another centipede.

The shadows slowly resolved to a mass of crawling, doberman-sized ants. Constantly moving, too many to count, they swept towards him like an inky tide.

“What are you doing?” Blix shrieked. “There are too many of them.”

“We’ve got no choice. I won’t survive another centipede. Can’t dodge.”

A column of ants broke away from the swarm. Alf stopped and braced himself as they charged towards him, spreading out to overwhelm him with superior numbers.

Gripping his sword with both hands, he swung it like a baseball bat. The blade sliced the air without resistance. At first he though he’d missed, but the spray of burning liquid told him otherwise. A pair of bodies knocked him backwards as a series of dialogs appeared and faded in quick succession. Widening his stance to regain his balance, he swung again and again, each slice killing one or two or even three ants.

Pincers cut into his legs and torso. Acidic venom burned into his body, but he cast minor healing and kept swinging. Each kill gained him 32 points of EXP, and there were hundreds of them. If he could keep going a few more minutes, he’d be able to level up. His EXP was already over three thousand. Just a few more ants and…

A roar rattled the tunnel. The drum-roll clacks of hundreds of rock-piercing feet.

One second Alf was surrounded by ants, the next second they were all gone.

“Run!” Blix shouted. “Follow the ants.”

Alf tried to vault the wall of ant bodies surrounding him, but his arms gave out, sending him chest first into a half deflated abdomen. He belly squirmed and flopped and scooted, finally managing to clear the pile. By the time he was on his feet again, the centipede was almost on top of him.

A roar sent him stumbling down the tunnel towards a writing clump of ants trying to get through a hole at the base of the wall.

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“Go, go, go!” Blix called out. “It’s right behind us. Thirty yards. Twenty-five…”

Alf ran for the pile of frantic ants.

“Twenty. Fifteen!”

He wasn’t going to make it. He dove onto the pile, pushing and squirming to reach the dark crevice below. Stretching out an arm, he grabbed the back leg of the ant that was just disappearing into the hole. It pulled him forward in short halting jerks as his feet scrabbled spasmodically against the ground. He barely managed to get his head and shoulders into the crevice before his world exploded. The ant pulled free as pain radiated up his spine.

So close. He’d almost made it. At least he could rest now. He was so tired. Just a little rest. Soft, gentle darkness washed over him, interrupted only by Blix’s screams. She sounded so far away. He tried to tell her to go on without him, but his mouth was full gravel. His cheek scraped painfully across the floor. Why wouldn’t she leave him alone? Couldn’t she see he was trying to sleep?

His head jerked to the side as pain blossomed in his ear.

“Alf, wake up. You have to cast healing on yourself. Wake up!” The voice was soft and remote, like it came from the next room. “You are not leaving me alone here. Understand? Cast healing on yourself.” Another slap. “We haven’t even gone out yet. Don’t you want to know what I’m like in bed? Alf…” Her voice twisted into a sob. “Please… Cast healing on yourself.” More sobs. “Alf, listen to me.” Something shook him. “I’m bleeding. I need you to heal me.”

“Wha?” Swimming through the pain, he pushed himself onto his elbows.

“Jerk! Heal yourself first,” Blix screamed in his face. He’d never heard her this mad.

“What’s… wrong?”

“Heal yourself!”

“Fine.” He forced minor healing into his body. Then, just to make her happy, he cast major healing as well.

White hot electricity jolted through his body. How could Blix possibly say this felt good? The storm raged for what felt like an eternity before finally fading to numbness and pain. “There. Happy? Now tell me what’s wrong.”

Blix’s shriek stabbed through the darkness. The sounds of a struggle. A yelp of pain.

“Blix!” Alf tried to get his knees under him, but his legs refused to move. His back spasmed. The cramping tightened his shoulders and spread to his arms. “Blix!”