"I don't, um. Shouldn't we just...maybe...escape?" said Hieu, his pale skin getting a little paler.

"Do you have anything to eat?" asked Mrs. Friedsman. "I'm starving. What they've been feeding us, it's...horrible."

Becky was saying 'of course', and she should have thought of that, and Mason’s neighbor and the other woman who was maybe forty were thanking her and fumbling for dried meat with shaking hands. Mason felt his patience getting thinner by the moment.

"We don't leave until this tree is safe," he said in a tone he hoped ended the discussion. "Now can you lead me to the leaders of these bugs, or not?"

"I...c-c-c" the young man's lip trembled a little as he stuttered, and Mason just blinked as he realized the guy was close to tears.

"If I could speak to you a moment, Patron?" Phuong was practically pacing beside them, and Mason put a hand to his face in frustration but nodded and followed the man a little ways away.

"I think the kid might be useless," Mason said. "We might as well just..."

"He's not useless," Phuong snapped, then calmed but still looked more agitated than Mason had ever seen him.

"OK, Phuong, let's clear this up. You know this kid or something? What am I missing?"

The swordsman's eyes flashed to his, then he looked down as his shoulders slumped a little.

"He's...my son."

Mason took a few beats to process that. He cleared his throat.

"I don't mean to sound insensitive. But he doesn't recognize you, so I'm guessing you wouldn't win Dad of the year. I'm also guessing there's more than a couple Hieu's in Vietnam, so what makes you so sure he's..."

"I've seen pictures," Phuong hissed, glancing around to make sure no on was listening as he let out a breath. "I've been giving his mother money for years. She sent me pictures. Postcards. It's him." Here Phuong paused and clenched his jaw. "He has a stutter. It gets worse when he's nervous. But he's a smart boy and did very well in school. He's not useless."

"OK," Mason said, fighting his own baggage of fatherly absenteeism. "I apologize. Do you want to talk to him? Maybe you can explain, tell him who you are, and we can..."

"Not now. Not…all that." Phuong's tone was as decisive as Mason's. "But, I'll talk to him. You can be a bit...intense. Just wait here. I'll find out where to go."

Mason walked over to Rebecca, his eyes and ears mostly focused on the cavern entrances, fully expecting more insects to come charging in to try and kill them at any moment. She gave him a look and clearly recognized his impatience, leaving the new civilians to stand beside him.

"I know this ain't exactly...ideal." Becky took Mason’s hand when he snorted. "But we're the only chance these folks got. They're people, and they need us. I'll keep 'em safe."

Mason shook his head. "You look after yourself, Phuong, and Seamus, in that order. If you've got time, you look after them."

"This ain't math class, Mason, I can't just..."

"It's not a game, either," Mason cut her off. "Your lives are worth fifty times theirs because you're players and powerful and that's just how it is. Who knows how many lives depend on us?"

Mason clenched his jaw, knowing he was still treating her special because she was, well, her. He lowered his voice.

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"This is like the army, Becky, and I'm giving you an order. Do your job and protect my players." He met her eyes. "Understood?"

She stood a little more rigidly, looking somewhere between turned on and pissed off. But then what the hell did Mason really know about women.

"Sir yes sir," she said, in a tone that matched, then walked back to the civilians.

"Women, eh?" Seamus said, apparently practically leering over Mason's shoulder. "Can't live with 'em, can't reason with 'em, can't..."

"Are we ready?" Mason called to Phuong, and the older man put a hand on Hieu’s shoulder and gestured at a tunnel.

"That way, Patron. There's some kind of hatchery. Lots of guards, then a lair. Hieu only saw the outside, but he says if there's leaders, they're in there."

Mason nodded, wishing Streak and Blake were with him, hoping both were surviving and maybe even thriving in their own challenges. But he had his own problems to deal with.

"Let's move," he said to the others, keeping his manner calm and matter of fact, though he couldn't help but be afraid for Becky and Phuong. Even if they just lost the civilians, he knew the loss would be hard. "Stay behind me. And stay sharp."

* * *

The bugs seemed to be avoiding them. Mason heard their chittering, their scampering feet, like roaches vanishing with the light. But the further Mason and the others went down the tunnel, the faster the things fled from their path. He would have preferred they tried to stop him.

His paranoia festered in the tense quiet. Was it possible Hieu (and maybe all the civilians they saved) were actually pawns of the rotten roots? Some kind of mind control that lingered? Maybe they were being led into a trap.

Of course they might be heading to a trap even if they hadn't been betrayed. Hundreds of the creatures might be grouping up to attack them from every direction at any moment. Or they might have a giant worm creature like the Devourer.

But then there was no tunnel like he'd seen before. These ones were big enough Mason didn't feel cramped, but still no more than enough space for two or three people (or insectoids) to stand side by side.

Tree roots grew through everything. Fortunately, they weren't corrupted like the others, just a complex part of the terrain. Most of them were slightly chewed, poking out from the walls or criss-crossing the ground, occasionally swarming with tiny bugs.

The whole place made Mason's skin crawl. Insects were of course just as normal as every other part of life, but their desecration of the great tree was something different.

Something...unnatural was at work here. Mason supposed he should have been curious to understand what had caused this behavior, but he wasn't sure he cared. Even if the insectoids were hapless victims, or pawns in some other creature's game, they had to be dealt with.

Finally their tunnel opened up, widening into another cavern that stunk again like death and corrupted life. Mason saw the dog-sized ants scurrying everywhere. They crawled all over the floor, the walls. There was several hundred at least. Most of them carrying what looked like...eggs.

"This should be the hatchery," Hieu whispered. "What's that movement? It looks like..."

Seamus entered the cavern and raised his light, and everyone but Mason shrieked or covered it as they saw the creatures crawling over everything.

"Seems like they're trying to save the eggs from us," Mason said. "Why wouldn't they defend them instead?"

"Perhaps they know they can't stop us," said Phuong. "They might be smarter than we think."

Mason frowned. "So if they knew they couldn't stop us, what would they do next?"

"In my country, we know this very well," said Phuong. "Hide. Set traps. Ambush."

"Yeah. That's what I was afraid of," Mason muttered, walking further into the room. The ground here felt...soft, almost spongy. He looked closer and clenched his teeth when he realized it reminded him of compost. The eggs were laying on a bed of rotten things, and Mason really didn't want to know what those things were.

He stopped when he heard the constant scampering sounds change, hushing the others as he tried to listen. Then he drew his Claws.

"They're coming," he said. "Becky and Phuong, back to the tunnel. Hold them there. Seamus at the entrance, civilians in between. Stay there if you want to live."

He sighed, not entirely sure if he should fight in the cavern or stand in the entrance to the tunnel with Seamus. But he suspected he could take whatever they threw at him. His eyes flicked over Duality of Strength and Transformation, and he decided it was time to do his level.

Transformation was already double upgraded and tier 2. It was time to work on Duality of Strength. He enhanced it without reservation, and watched the text flicker with ‘enhanced rate of improvement’.

If his enemies meant to wear him down, they were about to learn a very painful lesson. But he supposed you didn’t learn if you died.

He let the others take their positions, then stepped out into the center of the cavern as he rolled his neck and swung his blades. His heart was beating fast, but he wasn't sure anymore if it was fear, the urge to risk his life, or the urge to kill.

"Come on," he whispered, feeling a very inappropriate smile as the skittering turned into a stampede of clawed feet. "Show me what you've got."