Egosum leapt with all his being up into the air in an attempt to snatch the impertinent mote of light from the sky.

Mid flight, his body flickered one last time and he found himself floating in the water directly beside the brain enhancer. The return to normalcy shocked him slightly as he felt the control of his limb come back in full force.

He kicked through the water to speed away from the device and took in his surroundings.

The spawn that inhabited the pool with him were all hunkered down on the bottom like they were ready to sleep. The odd, darting tadpole was the first indication that they weren't hunkering down for the day. Scents in the water alerted him of some unseen event.

The thought stumped him. What could they be afraid of so deep in the eternal vernal pools?

He swam to the surface and perched himself up on the ledge. The sight stumped him.

Across the pools, large black birds with ferocious hooked beaks were spearing his fellow spawn and stashing them on spiked poles. Thick feathered arms and muscular clawed feet made them adept at the slaughter.

Hundreds of the monsters stood around the nearby area, butchering younglings by the thousands.

His brethren’s terror was a little more justified given the circumstances, but the undignified way they were going about it did nothing for their prestige.

He would need to do something about that.

Egosum saw one of the large black birds approach near his pool. If they were going to kill his people, he would take at least one of them out.

His newly developed legs paddled against the water as he dragged himself out and onto the ground below.

A wet plop sounded his attack. The bird flinched back at the noise, but quickly regained its composure as it saw the source.

“Oowa oowa!” The battle cry came out much less powerful than he would have hoped, but the intent was obvious.

The monster turned its head away at the provocation and hacked spit onto the ground

“Stupid frog frog. Poison poison riddled meat. Trash thing!” The bird spoke in clear common, flooring Egosum. The weird repetition did little to hamper his confusion at the show of intelligence.

Despite the new concern he felt, he had already steeled his resolve when he jumped the ledge. He would start the counteroffensive and receive a meritorious deed for it or he would die trying.

He attempted his first real jump to latch onto the monster's scaled leg.

It failed immediately as the dexterity he had in the ghost swamp was distinctly missing.

He landed on his back and quickly tried to right myself against the rough nature of gravity.

The bird monster rudely stomped on him, crushing his body to the ground but failing to kill him. An imprint of his figure was stamped into the muck that covered the swamp.

“Stupid stupid poison flesh is real real tough.” The bird grasped him with its dexterous talons and lifted him up to its arm.

‘Ah armed birds. What a witty double entendre. It's a shame no one else can enjoy it.’ Egosum failed to voice his thoughts as the monster prepared to rip his head off with its large and sharp taloned hands.

As the deadly hands crept closer with each passing moment, time slowed down for him. A bright light illuminated his surroundings causing wild thoughts to pour through his mind.

A surge of pride powered through him as he came to the only conclusion that made sense to him.

‘I am a magical prodigy. I manifested the glow of mana the first time I left the water.’ The bird took on a terrified look as it whipped its head up and back to the sky.

‘I will be your judge, jury, and executioner! Prepare for death!’

The wild thoughts amounted to nothing as his will failed to manifest, yet the glow persisted.

His ego deflated at his failure until he saw the true source of the false mana glow. A massive meteorite hung in the air above them, hurtling to earth at a slow crawl.

“*Squawk* Death star, death star. Flee from death death.” The birds all around him took to the sky. Many dropped their spiked skewers in place, leaving his dead brethren leaking onto the ground, while others fled with their prize.

It served the monsters right. They will know the fear of amphibious people. Egosum looked up to the massive rock in reverence.

Quetulopus, the great founder, must have summoned it to protect them from the intruders. The warm glow eased his aching heart as he watched it grow closer to the ground.

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

Heat started to radiate from the burning mass of floating stone.

Egosum’s skin rapidly dried in the air. He struggled to breath as the ground began to lose its moisture and crack.

A loud whooshing noise dominated the surrounding as the flock of birds disappeared into the distance. Any moment now, the meteorite would dissipate and leave the pools completely unharmed.

The only issue was, it didn’t.

The heat from the rock started to singe his nostrils and eyes as it kept increasing in intensity. Steam rose up from the pools near him, evaporating the precious commodity into the air.

“Oowa oowa.” His new and unused vocal cords failed him as he cursed in pain. His lungs wept as he struggled with each breath. It was time to flee.

His unwavering faith in Quetulopus began to shrivel up like his skin when exposed to heat. Kind of like how it was right in this moment.

Egosum scrambled along the ground as it rumbled with the meteor coming closer. Awkward swimming motions carried him across the dry and cracked surface. He didn’t even look forward as he fled in terror, instead opting to stare in abject horror at the floating death above.

A weightlessness overtook him as he stumbled into a drain. The waters that should have been rushing through the channels had been thoroughly dried to the point that they were nothing more than a slow trickle.

The revitalizing waters moistened his skin and cooled him down. He flopped forward in a bid to flee from the approaching apocalypse.

The water rose around him as he kicked ahead.

‘I am going to be completely obliterated soon enough.’ The intense heat fought with the moistening waters at his back.

In the distance, a dip in the gutter stole his attention. The closest thing to salvation drew him in.

He dragged himself forward with labored thrashes.

With each kick pushing him closer and closer, the gutter contained little more than a constant drip now, leaving him a withered mess as he crested the side.

The dip in the gutter turned out to be the water outlet for his section of vernal pools. His nearly lifeless body fell motionless to the side of the gutter.

‘This can not be how the magnificent Egosum dies.’ He refused to believe it. The ground rumbled as the heat reached a crescendo.

An ear splitting echo blasted across the land as he lay splayed on the ground. A tremor sent the remaining water in the ponds splashing out into the gutters. The hot water rushed through the funnels leading to the drain he laid over. The rushing rapids washed him into the drain.

The impossibly hot liquid still managed to soothe his chapped skin. The rushing and boiling water pulled him deep into the darkness below him.

Seconds later, intense cracking noises and rapid explosions closed off all the light he could see about him as he was flushed down the drain.

The intense elements and rough waters forced him to struggle to remain conscious. A light curve in the pipe sent him slamming into the side.

The blunt force coaxed him to sleep for the second time today.

-

He opened his eyes to the darkness surrounding him. His limp body slowly came to as the cool water around him soothed his sore skin. He felt as if he had been tenderized for hours on end.

Strange dangling lights covered the ceiling of the new place he found himself in. Egosum clawed his way over some muddy rocks he felt below him, allowing him a perch in the dimly lit area.

His eyes slowly adjusted to the low light conditions as he finally took in his surroundings. An underwater river lay before him. The cool water came in from various locations on the walls and farther up the flow of water.

They coalesced in the chamber he found himself in and led farther down the tube like a funnel.

The lights above hung from the roof like luminescent water droplets frozen in time.

The rocks he woke up on dominated the sides of the water, offering him a path to travel and a reprieve from the forces of nature.

The flow of water was the only source of noise present, leaving him trapped with his own thoughts.

‘I survived an apocalypse and now I'm stuck in some dank dark tunnel, out of sight and civilization. The place he had called home had to have been obliterated by the immense meteorite that came crashing down at the heart of their metropolis.

The heat that nearly ended him must have torched his brethren in the pools, covering the landscape in a fine ash that blanketed the now barren wasteland. It was a massacre. Millions had died in that single event.

‘Was it an attack? Who could possibly do that? Quetulopus would never allow our entire existence to be wiped off the map by one little rock.’ The stone cast a shadow the width of a hundred vernal pools and carried with it enough energy to cook anything in its presence alive.

‘How had I survived?’ He sat the useless thought aside and decided to do something about his current situation. He was starving from the moment he woke up and without the adults to throw food at him or any of the infrastructure he relied on, he would need to hunt for himself.

At his size, the only real option were small bugs but the cave he found himself in seemed devoid of life. He used his stubby legs to travel along the muddy rocks.

The trekking found nothing of value on the land despite the considerable distances he covered. Random splashes and swishes in the water would startle him from time to time, giving him plenty of practice with his jumps. He hopped around a bend in the cave and froze.

A long white creature laid before him. It stood eye level with him, but on stick thin legs and a body ten times lankier than him. The place where eyes normally sat was devoid of anything recognizable. He was lost in his thoughts when the thing started to advance forward, stumbling with each step it took.

The longer he looked, the more familiar it seemed. Once the thing was only one hop away from Egosum, everything clicked into place. The weird white monster was some form of quadrupedal salamander. While it was quite strange looking, it didn’t change the fact that it was one of his kin. His brother in arms.

“Oowa oowa. Ugh. Uh. Ah. I think- ah- I got it. That is a weird trick. Strange usage of my modified vocal cords, but the genetic alterations really help with it. Yes, well hello brother. I am ever so glad to meet you.”

The stumbling creature took a few more steps forward, closing the gap more and more with each second.

“Hello? Can you hear me?” Egosum shuffled back a small distance as it came closer and closer when it finally reached him and opened its mouth to take a deep inhale of the frozen figure in front of him.

“You are a little close there you know?” The thing in front of him took in a few more breaths without responding. “Ah. Are you perhaps mute? Or maybe you do not understand Common?"

"Perhaps Hopity, Urkai, or Elvish?” He inched back more to speak with the seemingly dimwitted creature in front of him.

It followed his movement forward but took action instead of just stuffing his face. It launched forward with surprising agility and tried to engulf Egosum with its gaping mouth.