Dan held his knife with both hands, his hands shaking, and his breathing staggered. He stared at his wife, Mary, and his two children. Knowing he had to be quiet or else he would put his family in danger, Dan covered his mouth with his hand.

Dan, his wife, and children are currently hiding in a random house they found in the middle of the desert. At first, they thought they were finally safe. They found a shelter that would protect them from the monsters, and the harsh temperature of the desert.

When they went inside the house, it was fine, except that the house was eerily empty even though there were signs that a family had lived here. Although it was weird, Dan wouldn't just pass away this opportunity because the house was empty, so they slept here for the night.

The night passed with no problems and the family of four ate some of the food in the refrigerator. The plan was to leave the next day since Dan knew that even though there was a lot of food in the house, it would run out sooner or later, but fate had other plans with Dan and his family.

A group of 3 people arrived at the house and asked to stay the night. The group of people were kind enough and didn't seem suspicious, but Dan wouldn't trust random strangers that he'd just met. Dan told them that they could stay the night, but that he would be leaving with his family soon as the food supply here would run out sooner or later.

The group decided to stay in the house and grabbed some food, not caring if they used up all their supply.

Dan, looking at the group of people stuffing their faces with food, shook his head and went to grab his family to leave. During the night, Dan had packed a backpack with non-perishable food, water, and a med-kit that he had found in the bathroom.

Once Dan and the family were ready to leave, they said their goodbyes to the group and left the house. Upon leaving the house, the family heard a scream from inside the house, causing them to rush back to see what happened.

When they went back into the house, they saw one of the stranger's corpse on the floor, cut in half. Standing above was a giant ant about as big as a desk.

Mary and the group of strangers screamed in terror when they saw the corpse and the giant ant above it. Dan looked around, trying to find out how the ant could've got in. He locked the door behind him when they left, and Dan was sure that he would've seen a giant ant walking around. As he was looking around, Dan noticed that the basement door was open.

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The ants had gotten in through the basement. Dan concluded that there was most likely a tunnel in the basement that he'd missed that led to the ant colony. If that was true, then Dan and his family had to get out of here as soon as possible before more ants come.

The giant ant turned towards the other two strangers and charged at them, clicking its big mandibles.

"Mary, we need to go," Dan told her as he grabbed her hand.

Mary nodded. As much as she knew it was wrong to leave the two strangers to die, it was better than her family dying, so they quickly left the house, but another ant appeared, forcing them back into the house.

They didn't have many options, so they went upstairs and barricaded themselves inside one of the rooms. As they hid in the room, they could hear the painful screams of the strangers downstairs as the ant killed them with no mercy.

===

Tai concentrated his Ki on his leg, jumping several meters to where he heard the shouting and screaming. As he landed, Tai used his Ki walking stick to not fall over. He enjoyed this feeling of jumping through the air. It was kind of like flying, just that he would fall eventually. Looking behind him, he was surprised as he saw Fenrir try to keep up with him.

Fenrir was trying his best to keep up with his master, panting as fast as he could, but he was slightly slower so he had no hope of keeping up with Tai, at least for now.

Dealing with the matter at hand, Tai arrived at the house. "Whoah didn't expect a house here."

Tai entered the house and noticed all the blood in the house, but the weird thing was, there was no corpse anywhere. "Hello! Is anyone there!"

Answering his call, a giant appeared from the stairs, standing in front of Tai. "Hmm, I'm guessing that you're the one that did this?" Tai asked as he pointed to the pools of blood on the floor.

The ant clicked its mandibles as it charged at Tai, releasing some pheromones to identify Tai as food. Responding to the ant's pheromones, other ants showed up, clicking their own mandibles as they looked at Tai.

"This will be a fun one," Tai exclaimed, concentrating his Ki all around his body.

You have learned a skill: Ki Aura

+1 status point

Ki Manipulation has leveled up

+1 status point

Ki Augmentation has leveled up

+1 status point

Augmenting his whole body took a lot of Ki, so Tai would need to end this quick to not become ant food.

The ants all attacked Tai in a perfectly synchronized attack. Thankfully, Tai reacted in time and jumped up. As he fell down, he punched one of the ant's head to the floor, its head exploding like a crushed watermelon.

An ant was about to bite Tai's waist when Fenrir jumped in and pounced on the ant, repeatedly biting it and helping his master.

"Thanks, Fenny." Tai started working on the rest of the ants, paying more attention to his surroundings.