The Brutalorg took its time trampling about as if it had something personal against Rosedale. Every crashing sound of a house crumbling was written large on the villagers’ faces, full of despair and agony.
What the hell was it doing and why? Houses weren’t edible. Would it return to finish us off? There’d be nothing I could do about it if it did. Unless it decided to wait until midnight, and perhaps in that case we'd have a fighting chance. Though I had my doubts. I had a suspicion that the eldritch eyeball horror had something to do with it.
“In all my years, I’d never seen it up close,” Darya said. “I heard rumors and tales, but this? This is crazy.”
It took another half hour until all the noise had finally quieted down. The tension and anxiety in the fort was palpable. Couples huddled together, a few wept, thinking for sure that it was their home that was now a pile of rubble.
Finally, after what sounded like the crashing through the palisade on the other side of the village, the noise quieted down to the chittering of mandibles, and occasional flutter of insect wings as a flier buzzed right over the fort. The sudden disruption had everyone ducking heads and cursing, even though we had a robust roof over our heads. Then the burrowers arrived.
They’d pop up like moles out of the ground, sending dirt flying. Probing tendrils followed after, seeking to grab and pull down anything in range. Thankfully, they were blind and reacted mostly to vibration and noise. This meant they were more likely to stir up trouble among the other bugs and not under the fort.
This left the horde of the grunts staring us down from a distance. They were like moths drawn to the flame, yet they wouldn't approach any closer. It changed as the night wore on and more firewood was needed to be added to the pyre. A door on the inside of the fort was opened, and a couple of brave fellas dashed out. They grabbed a log and piled it upon the burning pyre.
At the sight of fresh meat, the bugs hopped and screeched. Fire and light be damned, two of the bugs charged forward. One didn’t make it far before plunging down into the spiked pit trap. It flailed around, screeching loud.
The second bug lucked out and missed the traps. It circled about the place if it was blinded by the light. It bumped from one support beam to the next like a ball in a pinball machine. Finally, it veered away, and on its way out plunged into a trap just like the other. Their deaths were slow and painful, judging by the long, and drawn out screeching. However, it brought on smiles, and especially to the children. The pits were perfectly sized, showing the villagers’ experience. Not too big so as to not waste time digging them, and not too small so the bugs wouldn’t fit.
The villagers made a game out of it. The brave ones would taunt the bugs by jumping down to the ground, to shout and dance about. Out of hunger or boredom, a few crazy bugs would peel off for a chance to pounce the courageous fella. Yet, the closer to the pyre they got, the more disoriented they became.
All the vibrations got the burrowers’ attention. They’d emerge seconds too late, lashing out with tendrils, maws wide open full of pink flesh and sharp teeth -- a perfect target for an arrow. While a brave chap scrambled back up into the fort, Darya and others waited to unleash a volley of arrows right to the back of its throat.
All the burrowing up by the bugs created a trench on the inside, and around the pyre. At the same time, the number of burrowers had diminished down to a few, and even those had arrows stuck in their bleeding mouths.
This went on for hours until midnight arrived and the dozens of pits were full of victims. The villagers were managing the bugs quite well, and I had decided not to waste the power crystal charges by shooting without [Measured Savagery.]
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The seconds ticked by and midnight struck, and I itched to see the carnage I could unleash with my new ivory wands. Like some kind of a hellish, on steroids version of Cinderella, my body bulged out with muscles. I must have grown a whole hand-length in height. My horns glowed like lava, illuminating the ceiling above in a pool of orange and red. The villagers’ reaction was the best part, like they discovered a demon in their midst. Many stepped back. A few angled their hands to the hilts of their swords. Children hid behind their parents.
“It’s alright, there’s nothing to worry about,” Darya tried to placate the anxious villagers.
I gave them my most menacing face, and spoke in a serious tone. “Unless you’re a bug.”
I didn’t know what came over me to scare them that way, but [Measured Savagery] had put me in a wicked mood. It also didn’t help when I put my hands on the wands, causing a wave of fright to roll through the watchful crowd. I turned away and had to duck my head to look out of the slit and see the bugs arrayed before us. They had us perfectly surrounded, which was great. It meant I could shoot in any direction I wanted. I stuck the weighty ivory wands out and thumbed the power crystals. They hummed, and vibrated with power. The villagers watched, frozen in anticipation of what would happen.
The whine intensified to a peak, and two bursts of crimson bolts shot out with thundering echoes. They flew the short distance from the fort to the frontline in a wide fan, and exploded with a quick succession of resounding booms. Bugs splattered on impact, experience gained messages rushed past. It was a glorious sight to see. With a grin on my face, I shot again and again, lighting the night in red, painting the area in the color of bug innards.
The villagers’ anxious looks turned to smiles at the sight of the carnage. Minutes later, they were cheering me on, pointing out targets for me to destroy. A crowd of adoring fans gathered and moved with me. I steadily went around the fort blasting new bugs in every direction while letting others feast on the remains.
The villagers didn’t rely on pit traps alone to kill the bugs, and I wasn’t the only one doing the killing. Darya didn’t waste any time. With her new quiver that replenished her arrows magically, she shot at them without end, only resting when her muscles grew tired. Ivy couldn’t keep up with our slaughter as she was limited by her mana -- a fact that made Darya grin with satisfaction anytime she continued to shoot with her bow while Ivy needed to rest for an hour or more.
I lost count of how many I killed very quickly, but the hollowed out remains were piling up in a wide ring around the fort. I kept killing and leveling until I ran out of power crystals, then I borrowed six more from Darya. I also scrapped the power crystals from my two other Ardent wands, and from the two wands meant for the kids.
This was a fantastic opportunity to get a lot of experience and wealth all at the same time. Each bug had four golden eyes, or close to one gold coin worth of pure gold per bug. Aside from the gold and experience were the random loot drops. Beams of light shone bright from dozens of items in a circle under the remains, but I couldn’t see what they were from afar. I needed to wait until morning to see.
I wasn’t worried about theft because Darya mentioned that only party members could pick up the items, which only included Darya and Ivy. There was little point in inviting anyone else into the group. Gregor had explained that party experience sharing boiled down to how much contribution a party member provided for the kill. Doing nothing meant getting zero, but buffing, debuffing or healing was also taken into account sometimes. Supposedly the gods had nothing better to do than to judge the millions of incidents of monsters dying in the dungeons and the outside world. I had my doubts. To me, this felt like the work of artificial intelligence.
Gregor also said that buffing and debuffing skills were exceedingly rare and expensive to buy. Nobody in the village had anything more than a few offensive spells, which was supposedly the norm. Healing spells were likewise rare. Amelia staying back in a village instead of moving up to a town or a city to make better use of her magic was highly unusual.
By the time [Measured Savagery] had worn off, I had killed hundreds of the bugs, and gained a total of five levels. Outside the fort, a multitude of lights from the loot beckoned me, and I was very eager to see what it was. Unfortunately, I needed to wait until morning.