Jason opened his eyes, tiredly turned to his side.

‘...huh?’

JOLT!

Before registering what was in front of him, he jumped out of the bed, painfully landing on his butt.

“What the?” With furrowed brows, he peeked at his bed, seeing tiny insects crawling rapidly out of sight.

“Ants? No, those aren't…”

Jason squinted, rubbing his groggy eyes. The more he focused on the bugs, the more dumbfounded he felt.

“What the heck are those bugs?” Jason stood up, looking down at his feet to see if there were any more of those bugs trying to climb his leg. Thankfully, there weren't any bugs on the floor.

“Are they termites?” He didn’t know what termites looked like, he never really cared about them. What he was looking at weren't ants, so he assumed they were termites after hearing that they were quite similar in some ways.

“Damn, I need some bug spray,” Jason groaned, before going over to his bed. Then, he carefully lifted the bedsheets, and his eyes nearly bulged out of his sockets!

“DAMN! I really need bug spray!”

Seeing the thousands of the little bugs crawling out of the bedsheets, Jason felt his skin crawl. He rubbed his arms, and the thought of those bugs entering his body sent a chill up his spine.

“Fuck, maybe I need a flamethrower instead,” Jason mumbled, going around the bed to try and see where the bugs were going. When he got to the other side of the bed, a waterfall of the bugs were cascading down, before disappearing under his bed.

“Damn, they're living under me, fuck. Can I move places?”

Little did he know, today would be the first of his many encounters with the Swarm.

+++-+++-+++

‘What’s wrong with this apartment?!’ Jason cursed inwardly.

It's been a couple of days since he saw Helzar's Spawns, and since then, Helzar had been trying to kill Jason time and time again. Helzar feared Jason because the latter knew about the Spawns, while Jason was annoyed at the “termites” in his room.

‘They look kinda adorable though,’ Jason sighed. Whenever he saw the Spawns, he'd crouch down and watch as they scrambled about, hurrying to flee.

‘I didn't know termites can move so fast, the termites I saw online are slow and look different from these ones,’ Jason thought. He liked the thought of keeping the termites around as entertainment in his boring life, but he couldn't help but notice that the “termites” were always trying to attack him.

‘Do they have a vendetta against me? What did I even do?’ Jason sighed, watching as the final Spawn looked at him, before disappearing as it entered a small crack on the floor.

Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

“I don't know if I'm hallucinating or what, but that termite totally looked in my direction,” Jason blinked twice, trying to recall if he had any beer today.

‘Bullcrap, I don't even drink,’ Jason scoffed. ‘Are termites intelligent or something? I mean, I suppose they have a degree of intelligence, right?’

Intrigued by the world of insects before him, Jason went to surf the internet, only to stumble upon a nationwide alert.

[Giant Bees attacked the City of ***, citizens beware!]

[Mutated bees the size of a kitten attacked *** this afternoon, the local police force are investigating…]

“Giant bees?” Jason felt bewildered. Since when did the news include sci-fi stories? Nevertheless, he clicked on the web page to read the news article, as well as some photos posted on the website.

“Holy shit, is this real?” Jason muttered, feeling a bit… underwhelmed. He was an ordinary store clerk who likes to read books and watch online meme videos, a complete stagnant water in society.

‘Can’t they just shoot the bees with guns? What's the panic all about?’ Jason raised his brow. He read that the bees killed dozens of people, but was later on dealt with by the local police.

TING!

Before Jason could click off the news website, a notification popped up on his phone. Looking at his phone, Jason saw his friend Jarred texting him.

[Yo Jason, you saw the news today?]

“This guy's nosy as always,” Jason rolled his eyes. Jarred was a friend of his since highschool, and they've kept in touch even after Jarred went to college and he went to work.

[Jason: Yeah, giant bees?]

[Jarred: Yup. Wanna know something interesting?]

[Jason: What?]

[Jarred: Last night, I saw freaking ants!]

“Huh? The fuck did this dude inhale?” Jason chuckled, about to reply when Jarred sent another text.

[Jarred: The ants melted my potato laptop. They fucking. Melted. My laptop!]

[Jason: tf? you high bro?]

[Jarred: No seriously, look at this shit]

While holding his laughter, Jason saw his friend send a picture. Looking at the picture, he saw Jarred’s precious laptop, allegedly older than Jarred, trashed with numerous holes cutting through it.

[Jason: Did you finally buy a new laptop? r.i.p. potato laptop]

[Jarred: No dude. You gotta believe me, these ants are freakish man, I'll record them next time]

[Jason: Yeah sure, whatever bro]

Putting down his phone, Jason shivered. Standing up abruptly, he saw the Spawns climbing up his chair while carrying white eggs.

“These termites are at it again,” Jason scratched his head, when a ridiculous idea crossed his mind. Looking at the news today and recalling Jarred's gossip, he picked up a pen and paper and wrote down a few words.

“If they can read, then I'll be damned and let Jarred fuck my wife.”

Of course, Jason has been a single man since birth.

+++-+++-+++

Meanwhile, Helzar was filling up a pond with frustration.

‘Why is he so lucky?!’

On their first attempt, Helzar could accept getting unlucky and with Jason waking up at the nick of time. However, even after four days of trying to kill Jason, Helzar couldn't do so, and for ridiculous reasons at that!

One time, Jason was sleeping and accidentally knocked over a glass of water, waking himself up to a horde of Swarm! Then, he was on his phone when the Spawns were climbing his shirt. His phone suddenly died, and Jason saw his own reflection, with Spawns climbing near his collar!

After that, Helzar wished he could instantly kill Jason with one bite. Unfortunately, he has to kill Jason as silently and as swiftly as he could.

‘I need to kill him. At the moment, he thinks nothing of us, but when the time comes, he might leak my existence and put the Swarm in grave danger.’

Helzar isn't prepared to war with humans yet. His Swarm was continuously growing, but even still, he is incapable of killing alert humans.

‘What to do… The Spawns aren't fast enough to catch up to that human if he so much as walks away,’ Helzar felt depressed. Whilst trying to think of a solution, he was interrupted by Zhar.

‘Lord, the human is trying to communicate with us,’ Zhar reported.

‘The human is?’

Zhar was a Spawn that had been around ever since Helzar was captured in a test tube. Zhar knew how Chief tried communicating with the Swarm before, and Jason was trying to do the same.

‘What does the human want?’ Helzar clacked his mandibles together in anger. He was done with humans trying to manipulate him, treating him as some sort of unintelligent ape!

At Helzar's questioning, Zhar showed his memories to Helzar. Through Zhar's memories, Helzar saw the words “I'm not food” written on a piece of paper.

‘I recognize “food” and “not,” so is the human trying to stop me from eating him?’ Helzar scoffed. The only English words he knew were the two of the three words that Jason used. Helzar truly didn't know why Jason was so lucky.

‘I'm going to kill him. No, I'll eat him alive!’ Helzar declared, ordering Zhar to kill Jason successfully this time.

‘Bring one Motherbug with you and bury it under his damned skin! I want the Swarm to eat him from the inside out!’

However, Zhar would come back a few hours later, with the entire army of eight thousand Spawns carrying chunks of meat.

‘Did he just feed the Swarm?’

Helzar was so shocked he could give birth to a Motherbug twice.