Boundless Evolution: The Summoning Beast

The Keeper Beetle loomed, a two‑meter tall brute whose hulking body blotted out the dim glow of the midden. Its chitin shimmered like stone, every plate locking together in an impenetrable fortress.

Blades rang uselessly, arrows clattered, shadows scraped in vain—their attacks found no purchase. Frustration boiled quickly.

Ash darted in with a snarl, feinting through the gloom.

SHHHK!

His claws scraped sparks across its armor, bouncing away. The strike left a faint line, but the beast only hissed, shaking off the scratch as though brushing aside an insect.

Tholn prowled like a wolf, his daggers snapping at seams.

CLANG!

Steel skittered off the plates, and though one blade nicked softer flesh between joints, ichor welled only briefly before the Keeper twisted, shrugging off the pain with a furious snap of its mandibles. Tholn growled in anger, more at its resilience than his own failure.

Above, Veyra's bowstring sang.

TWIP-TWIP-TWIP!

Arrows streaked toward eyes and joints. One grazed an inner plate, leaving a crack that glowed faintly in the light, but the Keeper reared, the shafts jutting uselessly from its carapace. It flinched, hissed, and then marched onward, unbroken.

Kalrek's voice rose over the chaos, sharp and insistent, "Forget scratching at it! I've got the right bomb—I'll make a rune that can crack that shell right now!"

The others shot him wary glances.

"Your bomb will alert the whole nest to us, Kalrek," Yvren muttered under his breath, staff braced as another blow rattled the chamber. Still, they pressed on with steel and shadow, each failed strike hammering home the futility.

BOOM!

The Keeper slammed its forelimbs down, bones and refuse crashing in avalanches.

Ash flickered into shadow, reappearing clear of the collapse.

Tholn was clipped and sent spinning.

THUD!

He struck the ground hard, forcing out a hiss, "Not done yet."

Veyra rained covering fire to give him space, her voice tight, "We can't keep this up!"

Kalrek snarled, shoving a glowing stone into view, "Alert the nest? Better that than dying here scratching at stone! Lead it to me, and I'll show it what a real bite looks like!"

At last, desperation broke their hesitation. They relented, eyes snapping to Ash, who gave a silent nod before turning toward Kalrek's glowing mark.

Kalrek etched a wide, glowing sigil into the floor, veins of blue light snaking outward like roots crawling to life.

His voice cracked as he bellowed, "Bring it here! Let's see if this thing likes my cooking!"

Ash's eyes narrowed, shadows bristling around him. He leapt, feinting and growling, each step deliberate as he and the group lured the Keeper closer.

The brute snapped and hissed, mandibles clashing, following him into the trap.

The beast's forelimbs thundered down again, smashing bones into dust, but Ash slid just beyond their reach, weaving the path straight over the rune Kalrek had carved.

"Now!" he barked, throwing himself sideways in a blur of shadow.

Kalrek's rune flared beneath the beast.

CRACK-CRACKLE!

Jagged veins of light surged upward, wrapping the monster's legs in a cage of power.

KABOOM!

The rune detonated, blasting shards of carapace skyward, the shockwave rattling the midden walls. The Keeper shrieked as a chunk of its shell split wide, exposing slick, vulnerable tissue. For the first time, it stumbled, ichor dripping in thick black ropes.

Ash coiled and leapt from a midden heap, shadows bristling.

HRRRAH!

He plunged down with fangs bared.

CRUNCH!

They sank deep into the soft wound, tearing free a gout of ichor.

SKREEEEE!

The Keeper convulsed, its cry rattling stone and marrow alike. It staggered back, thrashing wildly, but its strength was fading.

RUMMMBLE!

With a final shudder, it toppled, the cavern quaking under its weight. Dust sheeted the air, the stench of ichor thick as tar.

The group, battered, stood breathing ragged.

Huff… huff… thud… drip…

Ichor dripped from the corpse.

Kalrek laughed hollowly, throwing a glance at Ash. "Tastes worse, eh? I swear this one and the old guy was family. Guess I finally paid them back."

Tholn spat blood, forcing a grin, "Could've been worse."

Veyra whispered, shaken, "Do you think the whole nest knows about us now?"

"Good observation Veyra," Yvren brushed dust from his robes, voice grave, "Kalrek's blast echoed through these halls. If more are near, they'll know we're here. We need to be cautious."

The words fell like a verdict, driving them deeper into the dark.

Throughout the nest, the world shook, the sound of the explosion reverberating like thunder rolling through a thousand hollow throats.

The detonation's echo stretched through bone‑lined tunnels, carried on the marrow of the hive itself.

In the deepest parts of the nest, where roots twisted into cathedral arches of resin and bone, the shockwave arrived as a faint tremor.

The shockwave of Kalrek's detonation made roots quiver and stagnant pools slightly shiver with light ripples.

Beetles slumbering in alcoves stirred, antennae twitching as if roused by a bad dream. For a moment, the cavern was filled with their restless shifting—but one by one, they settled, dismissing the disturbance as nothing more than stone collapsing somewhere far above.

But not all were deceived.

In the center of the chamber, a shadow older and heavier than the rest shifted. The Tyrant‑like entity, dormant for centuries, opened its awareness. Stillness shattered as wings that had not moved in ages flexed with a razor whisper, like knives dragged across glass.

'What is going on up there?' it pondered, feeling the slight shaking.

Its consciousness uncoiled, sliding upward like roots forcing their way through stone, reaching, spreading, testing the world above.

Each tendril of thought slithered higher, tasting the air, the marrow, the rhythm of the hive.

And there—like a scar on smooth flesh—it sensed something alien. A jagged pulse of aether, sharp and defiant, radiating from the Midden.

Intruders.

"Foreign," the entity growled into the marrow of the stone, its voice like gravel ground beneath iron, "Audacious."

It pressed harder, probing, pushing its weight against the rock and roots. For a heartbeat it brushed the essence of the intruders, tasting them. Their aether quivered beneath its focus, as though a claw hovered over their throats.

Then, abruptly, the reading vanished—snuffed out as if it had never been. Hidden. Concealed.

The silence stretched.

Then came laughter, low and grinding, rolling through the cavern until the pools rippled and the roots creaked in chorus, "Oh… they even know how to hide. Clever prey."

The chuckle dragged long, fading into a hiss, "But prey nonetheless."

Mandibles clashed with a deafening CLACK‑CLACK!

The sound boomed like war drums across the hive, jolting lesser beetles awake. Thousands of eyes flickered open in the dark, reflecting pale fire.

The entity's claws raked deep gouges into the resin floor, furrows glowing faintly with leaking aether as it spoke again, voice rumbling like a commandment carved into the bones of the world: "Rise. Hunt. We have intruders. Tear them from the dark."

A ripple passed outward, not through stone, but through the marrow‑song that bound the hive. Irresistible. In every hollow and alcove, beetles uncoiled, their carapaces scraping against the walls. Mandibles clicked in unison, the sound swelling from whispers to a roar.

Click… click‑click… CLICK‑CLICK‑CLICK!

The chorus thundered as columns of beetles poured upward, eyes blazing, legs striking sparks from stone.

Summoned by a will vast and merciless, they surged toward the Midden, a tide of chitin and hunger.

In the upper middle levels of the Nest, chaos stirred. The explosion's echo had reached even here, rattling the marrow of the hive and setting entire chambers quivering.

At first came silence, broken only by the soft tremor of shifting roots as they processed what had just happened.

Then, one by one, soldier beetles raised their heads in unison. Their antennae vibrated with a sharp, metallic hum, tasting the disturbance that had traveled through the hive's living walls.

CLACK-CLACK!

Mandibles snapped open and shut, the sound spreading like a chain reaction.

Carapaces scraped harshly as ranks shifted in their alcoves, dark bodies sliding free from resin sockets where they had lain dormant.

The air thickened with movement.

Formations assembled with eerie precision, rows aligning shoulder to shoulder, their steps synchronizing into a relentless march.

THUD-THUD-THUD!

The weight of their advance thundered through the tunnels like the beating of a monstrous heart.

The passages themselves seemed to vibrate, dust and resin falling in rivulets as the army of chitin pressed upward.

They were driven not by thought, but by a command woven into their marrow: intercept, annihilate, cleanse the Midden of intruders.

Meanwhile, the party had just descended from the upper levels into the upper middle passages of the Nest, the walls tightening around them like a throat.

Each step felt swallowed by the hive's marrow‑pulse, a rhythm older and heavier than their own heartbeats. Resin glistened like sweat on the stone, condensation dripping in threads down roots that hung like ribs.

Torchlight flickered against wet surfaces, giving the unsettling impression that the walls themselves were alive—breathing, flexing, sweating.

Tap‑tap… tap… TAP.The echoes of their footsteps multiplied, layering until it seemed as though a company marched with them, unseen yet inescapable. The air was heavy, hot and sour with rot. Each breath dragged damp mold across their tongues. Overhead, droplets of ichor fell with soft inevitability

Drip… drip… splat...

"Perfect..."

It was Kalrek who broke the oppressive silence, his voice a little too loud for comfort.

Every so often, he pulled a stone from his pouch, etched a quick rune with his tool, and pressed it into the wall.

Sparks spat and hissed before the glow dimmed, the rune lying dormant. He grinned crookedly as if pleased with himself.

Veyra frowned, whispering sharply, "What are you doing? You're leaving marks behind us. We're supposed to be ghosts in these tunnels."

"Part of the grand plan, sweetheart," Kalrek tilted his head, smirk widening, though sweat streaked his brow, "One day they'll write songs about this brilliance. You'll thank me later."

Tholn's ears twitched as he bared his teeth. His voice came low and edged like a growl, "Yvren cloaked our aether signatures. You carving runes everywhere is defeating the purpose. You'll get us killed."

"It's fine. The aether in these beauties stays dormant until I activate them," Kalrek waved dismissively, pressing another stone into resin with a flourish, "Like sleeping wolves waiting for a whistle. No one will sniff them out."

Yvren's eyes narrowed, staff still in hand, "And what exactly are they?"

Kalrek chuckled under his breath, his tone equal parts nostalgia and mischief, "Back when I used to play hide‑the‑treasure, I couldn't be bothered to dig it back up. So I used stones like these. Problem was, they usually blew the treasure to bits instead. I didn't win much… but the looks on their faces were priceless."

"You plan to explode us?" Ash's voice sliced the hush, low and incredulous, staff tightening in his hand as he stared at Kalrek.