The three bullet ant soldiers had never once left Sparrow’s sight as they lived out their first week in Immanu, and, to their credit, they were incredible at the basic chores the Worm Mages would typically spend the entire day working on.
They were just as quiet as Sparrow was when he’d first arrived—though that was owing more to their vicious paramandibles preventing them from talking more than anything else—and they were always wanted for nothing. They didn’t complain when they had to bunk with Minki on the second floor of the library. They didn’t complain when they were the only ones not served Boreus flesh during mealtime. Shovelling snow off the roofs was but a light exercise, hauling logs of crystal wood and sharpening them into defensive spikes to shore up the village’s defences were barely any struggle. It didn’t matter how wary the younger children were around them at all times; they always did exactly as Sparrow told them to do, stone-faced all the way through.
If they felt any pressure being in the heart of ‘enemy’ territory, just the three of them, they never showed it on their faces. It was the quiet, teeming confidence of knowing they could easily kill at least a third of the Worm Mages before going down themselves that kept them so calm—but, for their part, Sparrow had never seen them showing as much as a hint of hostility towards the Worm Mages.
He’d told them to never pull a trigger as long as they were in the village, so they never took out their rifles unless it was to beat down an invading Boreus with their bayonets.
He’d told them to not bare their gleaming black teeth at the younger children, so they always ate with their backs turned to everyone in the communal kitchens.
He’d told them to steer clear of the Worm Mages whenever possible, so they always put in an effort to carry out their daily chores in the shadows of the village.
It was a bit refreshing commanding soldiers as obedient and competent as they were. Only the great worms knew how much trouble he and Ninmah had whenever they had to coordinate the younger children during Boreus hunts. In comparison, the bullet ant soldiers were like if he’d cloned himself three times so he could work as a single four-body organism—the past week’s chores had gone nothing but swimmingly as a result, and, for his part, Sparrow felt a little… ‘creeped out’ as always.
Today was no different.
It was late in the afternoon. Almost twilight. The three of them were on hole digging duty alongside Hijo and the younger kids, and it’d be incredibly easy for them to cut a chunk of meat for themselves. With so much wrapped Boreus flesh being tossed around into holes and so much noise from the children chatting all around, even Sparrow wasn’t sure he could spot an attempt at stealing a chunk of Boreus flesh unless he were standing right in the soldiers’ faces; but they always strived to keep both hands on their shovel, digging holes faster than the children could haul meat over, making it readily apparent they had no intention of getting stronger themselves. They’d never tried. They’d never even looked envious of the children who got to eat Boreus flesh every single day, and that made him feel a little sick.
Minki, who was sitting next to him on the edge of the kitchen’s roof, tilted her head as she slanted her eyes at the extraordinarily quiet workers.
“... They are even more cooperative than the silver ant scouts,” she mumbled. “I… have not worked with bullet ant soldiers before, but are you people always this quiet? Even a silver ant scout would make a sour face if they were forced to do nothing but menial labour for eleven days straight.”
“We are anti-human living weapons,” he said plainly, watching Harpy carry two large chunks of meat over her shoulder, helping the hesitant Hijo out before the young girl could even ask for any. “We cannot talk. One of our tier two mutations is ‘Vicious Paramandibles’, which makes it so–”
“If you try to talk, your tongue gets shredded,” Minki finished, shaking her head slightly as though she just remembered. “What does that mutation even do, anyways? I do not see how the advantages outweigh the disadvantages. Are they not just sharper teeth for you to bite your way out of certain grapple holds?”
He pursed his lips. “No. It is difficult to explain.”
“Do you still have them, then? Even if you possess a worm system now?”
“No. The ‘Sclerite Jaw’ mutation has turned my teeth white,” he said, glancing at her lips, “and yours as well.”
“... Which means you can talk with your normal voice now, right?”
He probably could. He’d never tried, though—he’d started eating Boreus flesh again ever since the General’s letter reached him, and since they weren’t actively hunting Boreus outside anymore, he’d been eating more than usual for his daily meals to clear out the village’s frozen stock. As a result, he’d put in significantly more points into increasing his strain limit since his fight with Kuraku.
Now, he was nearing the strain limit of the youngest of the Worm Mages.
[// STATUS]
[Name: Sparrow, 'Human']
[Class: Worm]
[BloodVolume: 5.4/5.4 (100%), Strain: 284/4193 (6%)]
[Unallocated Points: 491]
[Strength: 9, Speed: 7, Dexterity: 12, Toughness: 7, Perceptivity: 8, StrainLimit: 4193]
[// MUTATION TREE]
[T1 | Wormhole Core]
[T2 | Vibrational Senses | Wormic Bones]
Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
[T3 | Segmented Setae | Rigid Annuli | Sclerite Jaw]
[T4 | Proliferating Septa | Salt Epidermis | Filtering Gills | Omnidirectional Ocelli] 450P
[T5 | Peristaltic Vibration | Rapid Reconstruction | Cryogenic Release | Inorganic Digestion | Distending Limbs] 1350P
Looking back on it, his growth the past five months was quite remarkable. His strain limit had gone from five hundred to four thousand; he had enough stamina to warp almost every single step in a normal, relaxing day. It was almost a shame the abilities of the worm system drained him so much, because if he could increase his strain limit to only one thousand and still function normally, he’d have three thousand points to freely allocate into his mutations and other attributes. He could easily have both his strength and speed levels in the low twenties, and that’d probably put him on par with the raw power of the weakest Swarm Mutant.
Since they were starting to finish their Boreus flesh stock, he’d probably deposit his points henceforth into unlocking mutations or increasing his other attributes. His strain limit was good enough.
“... So?” Minki asked, and he snapped out of staring at his status screen. “Will we obey the General’s request for cooperation and exterminate the Boreus nest by ourselves? He did give us a one month time limit, and it has already been a week since we read his letter—we only have two weeks left.”
He cracked his neck, scowling unwittingly. “We were going to do that anyway. He has simply imposed a time limit on us that we may or may not be able to meet, which is what worries me.”
Minki looked at him, puzzled. “We will be fine against the Boreus nest. We have been preparing for it even before the Vice-general came.”
“Even if the Worm Mages are stronger and more capable now, I fear they may not be very useful against the Boreus nest,” he said. “It… will take more than just raw strength and ability to defeat the Boreus Mutant. The Worm Mages are hunt-ready, not combat-ready. They do not have the necessary training to storm the Boreus nest alongside the two of us–”
“Unless we give the three of them Boreus flesh, strengthen them, and cooperate with them like the General suggested.”
“...”
He was about to speak when the blackrock mountain to their left rumbled. He barely needed to turn to tell, with his vibrational senses, that a massive avalanche of snow was heading their way, about to wash across the western end of the village; they’d been happening more often recently. The avalanches started a week ago, only once at noon on the first day, but this was their third avalanche in the afternoon.
Neither Ninmah nor any of the elders had an explanation for why the mountains were periodically quaking and shedding colossal amounts of snow into the village, but Sparrow had an idea. It had to be the Forward Army’s fungus sporespike mortars again, constantly shelling in the far, far distance and releasing invisible poison into the sky with every shot. The General probably hadn’t been lying when he’d said, in his letter, that he was drawing thousands of Boreus’ attention every single day.
Regardless, neither he nor Minki warped away from where they sat atop the kitchen roof. The avalanche of snow wouldn’t reach them. They watched and listened as a tidal wave of snow rushed down the side of the mountain, trickled through the walls of spikes, rushed over the crystal-reinforced fences, and started pouring between the narrow streets of the village. The children loved standing on ground level and letting the avalanche wash them away—it wasn’t like they didn’t have skin tough enough to withstand the impact, anyways—so a few of them waved up at him cheerily as the snow swept them away from the kitchen, laughing all the way.
He waved back absentmindedly, and so did Minki.
It took about one whole minute for the avalanche to level out. The wave of snow reached about fifty metres deep into the village, but no more. As about a dozen children poked their heads out of the thick snow and grinned at each other, they warped up onto the roofs in an instant to begin the usual cleanup process: having spent most of their points in the past half a year on increasing their already tremendous strain limit, they could make several hundreds of wormholes per day, and that meant they could just draw wormholes underneath the snow to warp chunks of it away at a time. In about thirty minutes, they’d have warped all the snow away and returned the western end of the village to its usual cluttered look.
But then he started counting their heads.
Four, six, eight children on his left.
Ten, twelve, fourteen children on his right.
Today, there were supposed to be seventeen children on Boreus meat processing duty.
And just as he was about to grumble and climb onto his feet, the three bullet ant soldiers burst out of the thick snow right underneath his roof, holding the three missing children over their heads. The three children were the youngest of the young, and they choked, gasped, and coughed out mouthfuls of snow—no doubt they’d thought they could just play and wade around in the avalanche as it came, and they’d paid the price for it.
Were it not for the bullet ant soldiers covering for them and shielding them with their own bodies, they most likely would’ve spent about a minute or two longer buried in the snow, waiting for Sparrow and Minki to find them and dig them out.
“... Unless we give the three of them Boreus flesh, strengthen them, and cooperate with them like the General suggested,” he repeated quietly, watching as the bullet ant soldiers let the three children warp away and then climb out from their holes, patting snow off their coats. “It has been a week already. I do not believe they have any ulterior motives. They have not been given any hidden orders. I have searched inside their coats with my vibrational senses to check if they may have other letters only to be read after certain events, but nothing. They will exterminate the Boreus nest alongside us, and we will have to hurry.”
Minki sucked in a slow breath through her nose, releasing it as a sigh. “So… do we trust them to watch our backs? Even if they are bullet ant soldiers of your battalion?”
“Of course not,” he said plainly, rising to his feet. “Bullet ant soldiers have no need for trust.”
As Minki gave him a pointed look, he walked off the roof and landed on the thick snow, catching the bullet ant soldiers’ ears. They turned to stand at attention, all three of them saluting with their arms across their chest, but he wasn’t going to return anything of the sort—night was falling quickly and they needed to get this over with before dinner roll call.
He reached into his cloak and tossed each of them a small metal box, and their eyes narrowed the moment they caught his gifts out of the air; of all soldiers in the Hagi’Shar Forward Army, they’d be the ones who’d recognise the sharp jingle of hollow-point cartridges inside their boxes.
“... Fifty shots for each of us, all of them filled with crystal quartz that would shatter on impact instead of bullets that would kill,” he said, chambering his own rifle with snow he was scrounging up from the ground. “Ten minutes until dinner. Three of you against me. The battlefield is the entire village. If you can kill me before I can kill you, the three of you are strong enough to help us exterminate the Boreus before the end of the month.”