“What do you mean?” Egosum turned his attention to his friend as she took on a serious expression.
“Firstly, that whole human camp trashing felt really strange. I don’t know how to place it but something was wrong there. Then there was the little kid incident. He said he was going to tell us his suspicions later but he never did.” She ranted as the pair listened in.
“Hold on, we never even asked him about his thoughts. We should start with that.” Egosum tried calming her down only for her to slide right back in.
“I did and he said he needed more time to think. He has said that three times now. I don’t buy it. The last thing I was bothered by was that he wanted to leave you guys out in the woods. He was more worried about making it home than your safety.” She spoke in harsh whispers as he got closer and closer.
“I think that’s pretty smart. He could have just said we left and been done with it.” Cinera grunted in rebuilt.
“No, that doesn’t make it right. All I am saying is that we need to be a lot more careful when listening to him because we might not come out on top next time.”
Egosum nodded his head in thought before finally speaking up.
“Okay. I hear you. I will take your judgment into account next time we are out with him.”
“Thank you. That sounds like a great idea.” She shook her shoulders to straighten her sweater before excusing herself from the tent.
“Females. Am I right Coyotl?” He glanced at the frog who looked back with a look that conveyed more than words could have.
“It’s a joke. Sheesh. My bad. She is probably on to something though.” The pair sat in silence as the room slowly returned to normal as the last wisps of Qi dissipated away.
Sunset was only a few hours away and he had plenty of time to familiarize himself with his senses before the hunt started.
-
The small group trudged through the forest in silence. They avoided the large animals that roamed at night as they made their way to the lake to awaken the parasites.
When they were within a few dozen feet of the shore, the sounds of metal clanging together alerted them that something was wrong.
Egosum launched himself forward and was the first one to see the strange sight before him.
Enshrined in bright moonlight, a small group of humans were combating each other in a wild brawl. Six men clashed their weapons together in awkward jerks and pauses like puppets controlled by a child.
Their axes sent sparks flying as they repeatedly slammed into each other with impeccable aim. None of them had much damage to their armor despite the sorry look all of their instruments took on.
The rest of the group caught up and observed from the tree line, being careful not to expose themselves to the fighters.
The longer Egosum watched the fight, the more he became certain something was off.
He flicked his enhanced sight on and drank in the full picture. All of the humans were crawling with bright pink worms. They squirmed their way through the muscles and veins and into the hands gripping the weapons.
The bones were sitting only a few hops away from the skirmish, too close for the toad to approach without being spotted.
“What do we do about this?” Cinera spoke up from her hiding spot.
“We do nothing. This is a perfect reason to leave. How didn’t I notice their smell earlier!” Thunkar's voice slowly trailed off as he spoke more to himself than the group.
Egosum took the chance and hopped forward to the battle.
“What is he doing!?” The boy made a move to try and stop him before realizing it was far too late.
“Parasites?” His confident voice caused all of the humans to pause as they turned in sync to look at the intruder.
One by one, they raised their weapons and took a single step forward.
Egosum tensed his legs as he readied himself to pay for his mistake.
“Gotcha!” All of them spoke in unison as they dropped their weapons and fell to the ground clutching their stomachs.
“Very mature.” He felt his heart rate start to slow as the tension in the clearing dispersed.
“Ahahah. We are sorry. It is just so much fun to mess around. You only grow old if you let yourself after all.” The largest of the humans wiped away a bloody tear as they stood up to converse.
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“Care to explain what this is all about?” He motioned towards the fleshy bodies they now called hosts.
“Well, you didn’t seem to hold much regard for the humans just like your beastman friend over there so we thought ‘Hey, they are eating our eggs, why not throw a little foray their way?’ As you can see, it went pretty well. ” It motioned down to its body with a light giggle.
The rest of the group came out of the bushes as they realized the jig was up.
“So you killed some humans? I thought you focused on fish.” The toad hopped to the bones to poke at them. His fingers easily pushed through the outer layer and splintered them like fragile hay.
“Nothing wrong with a little diversification. Keeps us limber. Besides, we are still in some gills down there.” They all flickered their heads back to motion toward the lake. “These are just easy ways to help you guys out. Six big burly men camping out in the woods, who knows what could happen.”
Thunkar cringed at the jokes implication and chimed into the conversation.
“Can we get a move on? I smell something nearby that we can hunt.”
His attempt at derailing the conversation only lasted for a few minutes as the parasites began speaking in rough whispers.
“You know, there are some pretty interesting perks with eating sentient grey matter. We actually get some memories flickering through the connection every once and a while and, let me tell you what, these people were terrified constantly. Between the ambushes from wild animals, the attacks from beastmen, and the sheer isolation, they didn’t have a single reprieve.”
“You can see their memories? Is there anything else that would be of interest to us? Do they know anything of Quetulopus or any wetlands nearby? Anything like that?” He asked with a frantic tone as they walked.
“Um, they were just some low-level lumberjacks. They don’t know much beyond what trees to cut and where to drop them off to get paid.” The parasite rubbed its neck as it answered.
“Low level lumberjacks?! That isn’t possible. The hunters would have already won if that was the case.” Thunkar shouted out, causing the forest to still as his voice carried along.
“Another person with a relaxation problem. Well, regardless of what you say, we are certain that they are grunts. Memories don't lie and they got yelled at a lot by some merchant types. Hm, the fights they had with the beastmen were strange though. Pretty much just scaring the shit out of them every few days. Maybe a little poking but nothing too bad.” The boy bit his nails in thought as the bodies rambled.
The group fell into a relaxed gate as they finally came to their prey of choice.
“It’s right up ahead. It is an alpha blipper. Just one of them is pretty tough so expect a good fight. It won’t run off like the normal ones will.” The beastman stopped them as he pulled some foliage back and peered through the bushes.
A rat four times larger than Egosum sat nibbling on a large seed, a dozen hops in front of them.
“It won’t run, yes?” The parasite spoke in hushed tones and glanced at the boy. As soon as he shook his head, the six large hosts burst out of the clearing and rushed the creature with their weapons ready.
“Don’t cut it! Just stacks and blunt forces!” Egosum called out to the rushing group.
The first host raised its large axe high into the air as the rat turned to face the attacks.
It stood at two-thirds their height and was significantly chunkier.
The parasite brought the weapon down on its head with the flat smashing into it like a wrecking ball.
The creature was immediately stunned by the attack and stumbled to the ground. The five other parasites flanked it on all other sides. The most merciless beatdown any of the onlookers have seen took place as they stomped and kicked the creature for multiple minutes straight.
Their jerky motions did little to decrease the power of the blows and the blipper soon struggled to fight back in any way.
It turned motionless, signaling for the parasites to stop their attack.
“Wow. That was… impressive.” Egosum was the first to speak up as they had uncomfortable looks plastered on their faces.
“We appreciate that. The first battle in a body is usually pretty rough so I feel good about this one.” Before they could continue, Cinera spoke up.
“I think I saw its arm move.”
The bodies all turned around and gave it another minute of straight boots to the head. Blood poured from every orifice as they turned back to the group.
“Should be good now.”
Egosum hopped over and got a closer look at the destruction. He poked its leg and felt it move like it didn’t have a single bone inside.
“Wow. You beat this thing very thoroughly.”
They all stuck their chests out as they gave a cheeky salute.
“We tried.”
Thunkar came forward and bled the creature of whatever blood hadn’t been beaten out of it.
They were quickly able to pack up and head to their next and final prey of the night before the boy had too much to carry.
He took a few breaths of the air and nodded for them to follow.
As they walked through the forest a loud crack stole their attention. A tree limb came falling to the ground only a few paces away.
The group froze as they watched for the cause.
An eerie silence landed over them as the seconds ticked by. Every moment that passed left them waiting for something to happen.
“Guess it was nothing, huh?” The largest host spoke up.
A ferocious snarl shook the leaves around them as a large feline monster exploded out of the trees.
Pandemonium took hold as everyone present dodged the beast's first leap.
Its sickle-like claws cut through the air like a whip as it reached for one of the parasites.
It held up its axe and flew backward as it absorbed the blow, crashing into a tree and rolling to a hard stop in the soil.
Egosum gulped as he stared at the first large predator they had come across.
“A pantherus! Big, strong, and mean! Nothing magical about it! No chance of running!” The boy spoke up as he went on the defensive.
Cinera exploded the area around her in smoke as she obscured the beast's sight of the weaker physical combatants.
Egosum began to leak his aura before retracting it as he looked at his party members. The muck would certainly impact them way more than the beast that was ready to end them all.
The rest of the parasites prepared their weapons, ready to bludgeon it to death like the rat from earlier while the injured one sat motionless.
The enemies stared at each other as the pantherus began to encircle them, trying to find the weakest member to target.
“This is going to be rough.” Egosum purposefully lagged his turn to bait the creature to attack and watched from the side as its eyes shined in the moonlight with a murderous glint.
It jumped for the second time, straight at the toad's back.