Chapter 51: Encampment no more

*Time remaining: 276 days, 14 hours, 26 minutes, 49 seconds.

The Elite launches its prehensile tail at me, the pincers on it grinding together like teeth. I duck under it and scratch the monster’s carapace with my claws.

Bindweed wraps around the Cave crawler’s legs but it snaps the vines apart with its mandibles effortlessly while the pincers on its butt keep me occupied. Stamina leaks into my claws, golden sap beading on the surface of my skin.

I lunge forward, pushing its mandibles away with one hand and scoring a hit with my claw. Bindweed screeches over the insect’s skin sending sparks flying. The force echoes through my arm in waves of painful numbness. I actually lost a few health points from that.

The Elite doesn’t let up and charges at me like a raging bull. Flexibility takes over my body and I twist out of the way, the mandibles missing me by inches. Once more I grab onto them and slide under the monster, hitting its vulnerable belly.

Stamina evaporates out of my claws forcing me to push even more of the precious points into them, The metal-like skin parts for my claws and Cave crawler’s insides are revealed and sag through the wound, splashing onto my face.

The prehensile tail lowers under the creature, slinking over the ground and readies itself to fling me out under the monster. My scream blasts out of my throat, giving me the spare second I need, digging my claws fully into valuable insides, slashing at them, and killing the monster.

*Congratulations. You have slain [Steel chitin Cave crawler] lvl 19/20 (G). 11.23 Event points awarded.

The now-dead monster topples over, crushing me with its weight. Futelly, I try to crawl out under the creature that must weigh at least a ton if not more. (G) grade Cave crawlers can get big, and this Elite brought size to a whole new level.

Cobalt pushes the monster away, allowing me to stand up. “Well done, Mandrake Green,” she says. “You have reached level 18 with this kill. You require only two more levels before you can evolve.”

“Yeah. Just two more to go. Got a few skill levels from that fight too,” I say looking at a system window. My eyes turn to a group of Cave crawlers off in the distance, peeling the very last parts of grass off the ground. “Mind if we head that way? I want to try to get another level today.”

She follows my gaze and shakes her head, “I am afraid that might be one step too far. We are already at the border Sairal set up.”

I suck at the inside of my cheek, “It’s only a couple hundred metres away. Besides, We are seeing fewer Elites around the bastion.”

“They have caught on that this zone is dangerous,” Cobalt says, glee dripping off the words.

“Exactly, we need to head further out if we want any good targets,”

She sighs, “Mandrake Green, look at your hands.” My fingers twitch. Blood drips out of the badly bruised bindweed. “We will come back tomorrow and hope that new Elites and hunting groups have arrived. Our skills need practice too, remember? Furthermore, you should spend more time building the walls. You have been slacking.”

“I haven’t,” I scoff. “I can’t put up more walls, I’ve reached the limit.” I turn around and stare at the bastion a kilometre or two away.

“Reached the limit? I’m certain that you have some skill points remaining,” she says.

“No, it isn’t that. If I build any more, I can’t keep up with the Stamina the walls require to stay healthy. I need to evolve if we want to get any further.” I turn back to the group of Cave crawlers scuttling about, not knowing that they will die soon.

“I see. However, we should still turn back. You do not have the resources to fight another Elite at this moment.”

My eyes flick to the window that perpetually hangs open in the corner of my eye. Barely half my pool of Stamina remains, and I still need to feed the walls today. My health isn’t great either. The damage to my claws and a few grazing blows from the Elite took it down to about seventy per cent.

“...Fine. But I get the first two tomorrow.”

She nods and we head back to camp. Mud and the insect’s insides cling to my skin. I manage to scrub the worst off with my hands, but I still need a bath after this. Cobalt isn’t looking much better, her fists green, pieces of brain stuck between her fingers.

“You are frustrated,” she says halfway back.

“I only need two more levels. I’m so close to a new evolution that will bring some much-needed relief. The Event has been grinding us down slowly. I think it’s time we all get a break. My evolution, if I get a good option, will be that. I just need more time.”

She hums thoughtfully, though I know she is holding something back. “We have time in spades.”

“No we don’t,” I snap. “I need to evolve, practice skills, train the guardians and fight the never-ending flow of bugs. The walls need to be raised…there isn’t enough time. ” My fists clench, blood dripping out from my skin, “We keep pushing but they push back every day. We’re barely 25 days into the Event and I’m s-”

Her antennae twitch in exasperation. “This is war. Green. There are no breaks. There is no free time. There is only survival. We fight to live another day. We fight so that in the future we might have peace.” She looks at me and softens a touch. “It will get easier. You will evolve soon, I am steadily gaining skill levels, and Sairal has been creating his weapons.” She pats me on the shoulder.

But will it be enough?

Cobalt pats me on the shoulder once more, though, I see through it. She knows I’m starting to break. Slowly. We don’t know what the humans are doing. We don’t even know what’s going on in the Depths. Sairal isn’t able to get any information now that he has been cut off from the root network. For all we know, the Zulissian troops are taking down cities in the inner and central forest by the dozen.

I climb up the walls, part with Cobalt and begin the long arduous process, of revitalizing the battlements with my Stamina. My muscles stiffen as the energy leaves my body through the skill. The rest of the day is spent focusing on Energising Breath, pulling the air deep into my lungs, draining the energy out of the air and giving it to the walls.

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My mind blanks out, simply focused on the process. When the sun dips beneath the Horizon and the walls are still not fully fed, I’m forced to pull a bit on the stocks of Stamina that I built up with Solar Synthesis.

I crash down near Sairal’s tree, not registering anything he says to me and fall asleep on the spot, dreaming of Cave crawlers being torn apart by bindweed vines.

***

The next day, Cobalt and I can’t find any new Elites around the bastion. “I have been thinking,” she says. “ A long time ago back on Homeworld, I took risks when I came of age. I pushed deeper into the Homeheart than was advised, and I learned more thanks to those ventures. It gave me certain advantages later on. Mandrake Green, do the advantages outweigh the risks?” she asks already knowing my answer.

“Yes. Every skill level matters. Let’s go,” I say, beginning to jog. “Maybe we can find something that even you will have some trouble with.”

“Perhaps,” she agrees.

We pass the area where we were yesterday, the oddly coloured mud the only reminder that the Elite fell here. Everything else has been dragged back towards the nests underground to create more of them.

Beyond the borders Sairal set up the Cave crawlers are abundant. We stumble upon the first Elite not even 10 minutes later. It was some fire-spewing bug, that didn’t deserve being called an ‘Elite’. Though, I did get some good skill levels out of it.

Cobalt killed the next one and we started to rotate, taking small breaks as we pushed away further from the bastion. Now that we are beyond the borders, why stop there? Sairal will scold us anyway when we return. So why not continue to press further until I get those last two levels?

Soon enough, the bastion only is a dot on the horizon. Two Elites ambush us, bursting out of the ground. Cobalt made quick work of them. She froze them with her mist, ripping frozen limbs off their bodies.

She dusts off her hands and scans the surroundings. “We are getting close to something. A cave entrance most likely.”

“What do you want to do? Take a peek and see if they still have outposts?” I ask. Now that the forest is gone, it should be easy to find any large groups of Cave crawlers, especially groups as large as an outpost would be. However, even in large masses, they blend in seamlessly.

“Yes. It should be easy for you to gain the last remaining two levels there, even with your higher requirement of experience.”

We move on, scanning for any colourful Cave crawlers that might lead us there.

“Why don’t you use your map of the Depths to find an entrance they crowd around?” I ask.

“The entrances have changed or vanished. I suspect that the dryads that evacuated filled up the cavern mouths before they left,” she says with a scowl on her face.

Sairal once told me that the dryads allowed cave entrances to the Depths all throughout Luxia to let the monsters trickle into the forest. If they blocked all the entrances, the monsters would build up in the caves, killing each other and growing stronger until they burst through the ground somewhere in the forest in a tidal wave. So it would be better for them to trickle out of the cave entrances, getting killed by the forest creatures as they come. But now that everything is dead…I guess they decided that letting it boil over was the lesser of the two evils.

Elites swarm towards us and I deal with them. I’m not rewarded with any levels. The evolution I picked warned me that I needed more experience. I don’t think I understood how much more experience would be needed. For a normal (G) grade monster, an Elite of the same level would probably be enough.

For me? I need a good five or six, preferably stronger than I am. At least it’s good for racking up Event points. Might need to look at the store soon if I have any spare time.

“There.” Cobalt points to another patch of brown mud.

I follow her finger, not seeing whatever she is pointing to until I realise that the mud is moving. Thousand and thousands of Cave crawlers flow around a cavern entrance. A trail of soldiers hauls the biomass they found on the surface back to the nests for their queens while another line of fresh soldiers streams out of the depths.

It brings me some satisfaction that a good two-thirds of the corpses they haul back are dead cave crawlers. It seems like there are still other forest creatures around somewhere.

“Are you thinking what I am thinking?” I ask Cobalt, feeling a grin spread on my face.

“Yes. Do you want to take on the Elites, or take care of the weaklings?” she asks, mist starting to wrap around her limbs.

“The weaklings,” I say while checking my resources. “My skills are better suited to killing them in droves. Maybe if I get enough of them, the experience will push me to the next level.”

We spend a few minutes prepping. I lengthen my claws and add a few inches of height to my body. I’m tempted to lengthen my arms for a longer reach, though, if I change things too much a wrongness spreads over me and my sense of balance vanishes.

“Done?” I ask her. The mist she keeps around her is now tightly wrapped around her body like a suit of armour.

“Yes,” She replies.

We sprint towards the Cave crawlers and smash into the outpost with the force of a wrecking ball. I’m slowed down as hundreds of lower grades crowd around me, but Cobalt continues bulldozing her way deeper into the camp.

My skills activate and the bugs are splattered apart, limbs torn from bodies or cut to ribbons. They don’t let up and I don’t back down.

Bindweed mauls them to death, a dozen green snakes writhing on the ground, hungrily wrapping around prey until the insects are killed.

I follow in Cobalt’s wake at a steady pace, slowly finding stronger Cave crawlers in the mix. Soon enough, (G) grades appear and give me an actual challenge. I’m forced to focus on them as they walk over the weaker insects like they aren’t even there.

I reach an equilibrium with my skills, expending as much stamina as I regenerate. Stray shards of ice fly through the air from the centre of the camp. One, the size of a mini-fridge, lands on a Cave crawler right next to me. She needs to watch out with those things!

An Elite with air magic hurdles through the air. It is pinned down and shredded by my vines when it gets too close to the ground.

Time blurs and I’m standing in an empty camp, Cobalt strolling towards me, a behemoth of a Cave crawler laying on its side, body partly covered with ice, behind her.

We proceed to head into the cave, and she freezes the entrance shut, the ice reflecting us like a mirror. That should probably take them a day or two to get through.

A job well done, we head back to the bastion, preparing for the scolding we will receive. I didn’t get a single level from it, but I can sense that I’m close to the next one.

There is a roar to our left and something else than a Cave crawler dashes over the ground towards us. The monster’s mouth is stretched open almost unnaturally. It takes me a second to decipher whatever is heading barreling towards us at the speed of a car. Cobalt has her fists already raised, a cloak of mist wrapped around her.

I push her back, “That one is mine. I have some unfinished business with it.”

The monster in question is the Chimaera’s tail that got away from me last time. However, the monster has changed quite a bit. Instead of being a tail on a greater whole, it now has been augmented itself.

A good two metres down its length it has a set of gazelle legs, rippling unnaturally with muscles, topped off not by hooves but by talons as if the monster wasn’t weird enough. The snake, everything above the legs raised into the air, open mouth, grins at me with its two sets of eyes.

[Chimera’s vestiges] lvl 1/40 (F)

The monster looks almost funny with how its legs kick off the dirt, sending it bounding our way. Who the fuck gave a snake legs?