“What do you think?” Frank asked as they stared at the ominous mound.

“I’m thinking you collapse it and suffocate them. Then we fight whatever comes out” Petra said.

“I don’t, some of these swarm type monsters have bronze rank queens, are we sure this is something we can handle?” Chase asked.

Seras raised a hand “What even its an iron venom ant anyway?”

“It’s basically a swarm of ant like monsters that can dissolve iron with their acids.” Petra explained.

“Okay, what’s an ant?” Serras asked.

Chase looked over “Do you not have ants of your world?”

“If we did they’re long gone.”

“That’s actually a shame, they’re really cool creatures, at least the non-monster kind. They make the huge colonies underground and collect seeds. I’m not usually a bug fan but ants-”

Seras held up a hand to stop him “Hold on, did you say bug?”

“Um yeah.”

Seras summoned something out of her pocket space. “This here is a whole keg of gun powder and little lead balls. I light it, Petra throws it, and we take shelter behind an earth shield.”

“You just want to blew them up!” Chase asked incredulously.

“This is literally the only way you get my help on this one. Otherwise I’m not going anywhere near the bugs that can dissolve metal.”

“You realize that we’re just as vulnerable to a metal melting acid right?” Petra asked.

Seras crossed her arms. “Uh huh, cool story, but unless we’re blowing them till kingdom come I’m not getting near that hill.”

“You rode into battle against Ostryx, you can’t tell me this is where you draw the line.”

“I would rather fight a hundred Ostryx than deal with a colony of monster bugs.” Seras said stubbornly.

Petra sighed “Alright, do you think it’ll be enough?”

“If not I also have magical napalm I bought off an alchemist.”

“I know I’m going to regret this, but what’s Napalm?” Rohan asked.

“It’s a sticky and highly flammable jelly. It sticks to skin really well and was often used on my world for-”

Rohan held up a hand “I don’t want to know.” He said quickly.

“Actually, I’m little curious.” Frank said.

Rohan wheeled on him “Then you and her can go out of earshot, I don’t want to know anything about how this napalm stuff was used. I still have nightmare of this ‘nook’ thing.”

Garrette nodded his head in agreement.

“Anyway, are we burning the bugs or not?” Seras asked.

They all exchanged looks. “Worth a shot. At the worst we’ll draw them out.” Petra said summoning up her armor and shaping an earthen bunker for them.

The rest settled in and began their preparations.

Seras then lit the fuse at watched the fire sparkle down the wick.

“One; synergistic impact.” She began to count.

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“Um shouldn’t you be tossing that.” Frank asked nervously

“Two; sustainable diversity” she continued counting, using dumb corpo buzz words to keep her counts slow.

“This thing, it wont kill us right?” Chase asked.

“Three; lateral expansion push.”

“that’s getting really low.” Chase said, his voice going up an octive.

“Four disposable labor contractors.”

“She’s going to kill us!”

Just as they began to look around for an exit the wick got down to the right length and Seras tossed it.

“You guys really need to put more trust in me.” Seras chided as she was smirking mischievously.

BOOM!

Dirt roared up from where the keg had fallen, and the pinging sound of lead balls hitting ng their bunker made everyone except Seras drop to the ground.

She peered outside and saw the first monster bug poke its head out. Some of its many creepy legs had been blown off and it was stumbling about woozily.

Just for good measure Seras summoned a thin glass bottle full of a purple jelly, lit the cloth on top, and tossed it at the bug.

Purple fire engulfed the mound, and she heard the monster screech.

With the fire burning over the top Seras decided that when it came to bugs there was no such thing as too much fire. She threw another jar.

Several more screeches joined the first.

Seras honestly expected the explosions and fire to clear out the whole nest. But as she was learning modern weapons did not match up well to magical monsters.

Ten meters from where the mound had been the ground burst upwards and the aura of a bronze rank monster descended on them.

Still burning, and pissed off, was the bronze rank ant queen. It spit a stream of acid at their bunker as several other burning bugs crawled out behind their queen.

They all bolted from the cover. Spreading out instinctually. The Queen spit more acid at them, but they had moved just out of range.

“Seras! Support me” Petra roared as she stepped up to the Queen, stone walls rising up to block the acid. “You four take on the small fry.”

That was all the warning they got before Petra charged forward.

The iron ranked ants went to either side of the earth walls while the queen continued to spit acid at the stone walls, quickly breaking them down to slag. Petra swung her hammer low and a boulder shot up and into the Queen. The rock hit the monster in the weird pincer jaw and got the queen’s attention.

Seras stood behind Petra, making sure her aura power was covering the queen and holding up her rifle ready to fire the moment an opening appeared.

While Petra was slowly chipping away at the queen from a couple meters out the men had split into teams of two. Frank and Chase used their elemental special attacks and manipulating powers to keep the iron ranked ants at bay while they cast several attacks in rapid succession.

Rohan and Garrette had taken the other monsters on Petra’s right. But whereas Chase and Frank both had both had attacks and area control, Rohan only had a bow he could fire really fast, and Garette could only heal the acid wounds. So while Seras still kept an eye on Petra’s fight with the queen Seras was also firing into the crowd of monsters advancing on Rohan.

She lined up a shot, pulled the trigger, and watched as the monsters eye exploded into goo. The shot didn’t kill the monster, but it was greatly wounded. And the attack had let numerous instances of Seras’ [Enfeeblement] affliction to take hold.

She swiveled her rifle around, opened the trap for the next bullet, slid in her next bullet, and slid the bolt back into place. “Petra, give an opening!” Seras shouted.

Without pause Petra swung her hammer into the Queen and knocked it several feet back, giving Seras a clear shot.

BANG!

PING!

The bullet bounced off the monster’s tough exoskeleton. And ricocheted into the nearby dirt.

“Fuck!” Seras cursed as she opened the trap and slid in the next bullet. The monster was too tough for her bullet the pierce. Seras wished she had made some armor piercing bullets, but she had been unable to harden the bullet or create the metal jacket required for… reinforcing the bullet.

Seras got a crazy idea.

Ability [Structural reinforcement]

Uses mana to reinforce any metallic construct from physical blows. Can enhance non-metal magical constructs for a higher mana cost.

It was metal, and if she applied the same to her rifle then maybe…

Seras didn’t give herself any time to second guess her decision. she extended her magical sense and let her mana flow from her fingers. Blue circuit like lines crawled across the metal of the rifle, and she felt the power extend to the bullet as well.

“Petra, again!” Seras shouted, and Petra obliged.

In an attack similar to the first Petra knocked the ant back and Seras lined up her shot. Just for good measure she extended her other ability [control bullet] and marked the queens head.

She pulled the trigger and…

“SREECH!” the queen let out a sound like ripping metal as a part of her head carapace broke up.

Ability [Aura of Ruin] has inflicted multiple instances of [Enfeeblement]

Bronze ranked Iron venom Ant Queen has resisted 11/13 instances of [Enfeeblement]

Seras smirked as her makeshift armor piercing bullet did its job.

Petra didn’t hesitate to capitalize on the opening. She charged up a special attack [mountain splitter] and swung her hammer high overhead in a move that left her open to attack. The opening didn’t matter, the queen has too distracted with spitting acid at Seras to see the death blow coming.

The hammer landed on the exact spot Seras had cracked and used the weakness to break through the monster’s skull, or whatever the bug equivalent was.

Seras didn’t have time to celebrate as she needed to leap up and away from the stream of acid coming her way.

With the Queen dead the other monsters lost a part of the cohesion, they no longer attacked in coordinated strikes, and two even attacked each other. Without the queen commanding them it seemed the iron ranked monsters were much less dangerous.

And with Petra freed up she was able to join in on Rohan’s fight.

Seras never found a chance to fire her gun as the battle was quickly finished up.

Seras stepped forward to start helping out with the looting rituals, but a pop up stopped her in her tracks.

Ability [Structural reinforcement] has reached iron 3 00%

She felt the essence ability surge with power, and without conscious though Seras clamped down on the power. She felt the power within her struggle and buck, but she didn’t falter.

Essence progression had been forcefully stopped.

Ability [Structural reinforcement] has reached iron 2 105%

“Oh that is not a pleasant feeling.” Seras muttered. It was like she was holding in a sneeze, but the feeling did not go away.

Seras could feel that with just a thought she’d be able to let go and let the power properly advance, but she wasn’t sure if that was the right choice. She could only advance so many abilities before she was pushing up against the limit of what her soul could take, and Seras needed to be careful with what she chose.

“Are you alright?” Petra asked. “I can feel something weird in your aura.”

“I’m fine” Seras lied. “Just holding off an essence advancement.”

Petra quirked an eyebrow. “Is that safe?”

Seras shrugged “No idea, but I’ve got no other choice.”

“Alright, whats with that face your making?”

“Holding back the advancement feels like holding in a sneeze, or the need to itch, but like cranked up to eleven.”

“That sounds awful.”

“Yup. I’m going to go meditate, see if that helps.” Seras said as she stepped away from the battlefield.

She sat on a rock and began to run through the breathing exercises Dustin had taught her.