Steel and Mana

The room we were gathering in was filled with stifled yawns, something that was inevitable and something that I was also joining in on. It was like a yawn-wave, going from left to right, doing repeated circles. I almost laughed, but instead it was just another yawn... Oops.

Currently, we floated high above the ground, hidden by the lowest part of the clouds, using them to make sure we were not detected by the bugs below, drifting just west of a hive-city that shouldn't exist. I mean... it really shouldn't. Fuck human-sized bugs. Fuck them from here to the other side of the mountains. If anything, their 'city' was just a tumor of wax that needed to be cleansed from this land. Thousands of those damned insects crawled across its surface like maggots on rot...

"Brr..."

"You are overthinking it," Luna muttered, but shivering just the same, probably visualizing the same image.

"Easy to say..." I chuckled, shaking my head.

Currently, I stood at a table, listening to Kustov, who quickly summarized everything to the others. At the same time, a flickering image was projected in the middle, pieced together from multiple others, taken by the Imaginary.

"We need a plan," I finally said after Kustov was finished, "I have one action in mind, but before doing anything, I want to hear your opinions."

"I say," Yuri was the first to speak, pulling up a chair with her legs wide, sitting down on it backwards, leaning over its backrest, "We hit it. Full power, using the main weapon. Burn the motherfuckers down and salt the earth after."

"That can cause a big issue," Pion warned her.

"I know," She leaned forward, pointing at the projection. "But it's what the weapon was made for. One clean shot... Vaporize the bastards, collapse the nest on the top of their heads. It would result in no drawn-out fighting, no risk, and neither of us would be sent to the ground. Done. Easy!"

"The fallout," Sasha cut in, "Think of that! We don't know the magical consequences of firing the weapon at such a nest. It might collapse, yes, but the backlash could be that it creates a chain reaction! It could contaminate the land for years to come. And this isn't just some deserted place. Think of the wind we all felt at the Khulmans' Wall. Its direction was coming from here! If we create a cloud of CC dust, that will be carried down, directly poisoning their shamans, killing them off..."

"But we don't even know if this nest has a mother beast... or if it has a core," Oleg added, stepping closer to the table.

"What if it survives?" Luna hummed, "What if something worse wakes up when we hit it?"

"Come on," Yuri gave her a flat look, "Then we finish the job. Don't we?"

"You're being reckless," Sasha argued, but it seems a sleepy Yuri was spicy indeed, shooting back an annoyed glance at her.

"And you're being timid."

"All right," I cut in before they started bickering properly, "Your positions are clear. Mikan?" I asked because she had been extremely quiet until now.

"Ah...? Hm?" She flinched, and she looked tired, fingers wrapped around a warm mug. Was she... sleeping with her eyes open? "Um... Yes... yes..." She muttered, blinking the sleepiness away, "We don't know what's inside. Or if it's alone, even... If we attack now, and we're wrong, they'll scatter, all across the east, and that may cause more trouble."

"Haaah..." Yuri let out a sharp breath. "So what, we go back? Just let them build up more? A bigger, better wave?"

"I didn't say that," Mikan muttered, taking a sip, "We just go back to bring enough firepower to finish them without letting them scatter or cause irreparable damage to the land."

Yeah... I had the same idea. I leaned over the table, my palms pressing against the metal, staring at the image before us, considering the opportunities. I could fire at them... But I have Sasha and Mikan onboard... What if... Ugh... Was this the same feeling the people were battling with before testing the very first nuclear bomb? Thinking they could ignite the atmosphere? Haaah...

"We're floating on top of the biggest insect nest I've ever seen," I muttered, "I refuse to believe that there is no 'queen' to such a beehive. There must be one, living down below. If we use the main weapon, it could be catastrophic..." With that, I made my decision, so I straightened up and paced slowly to the window, looking out at the black sky. The moon was probably up there, somewhere, beyond the thick snow clouds. "We can't use it."

"So..." Yuri frowned, "What then? Do we wait until morning? Let them build more? Use normal cannons?"

"No," I said, turning around. "We are going to bring reinforcements. I am willing to take the risk, so we are heading back to Markoth at full speed. We will bring the Excalibur, the Rook, the Eagle's Nest, and a good amount of artillery. And then... we burn the whole nest down. But..."

"My squad is ready." Pion said before I could continue, reading my mind.

"What?!" Seltana, who had been silent so far, flinched, unable to hold back her thoughts anymore. "You can't be serious, that would be a useless sacrifice of veteran troops."

"Sacrifice?" Both Pion and Oleg asked, looking at her, "It isn't." Pion continued, "We wouldn't battle; we would simply spread out and observe from a distance. We need to keep track of it, note any changes while you are getting the troops... And the artillery will require proper spotters in position by the time they arrive."

A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

"Staying here..." Seltana muttered, biting her lower lip, "Dangerous... Too dangerous..."

"It is." Oleg muttered, while I watched Pion, giving him a nod, "But as Avalonians, that doesn't mean we can't do it. Danger is part of the life of a soldier, after all."

...
....
......

Dropping down in the middle of the night made it a bit hard to gauge the distance between us and the snow, but nonetheless, we all landed perfectly. With coordination from my Sovereign, we spread out, surrounding the hive of these monsters and digging ourselves into the snow... Now all we had to do was to wait.

The moment the Camelot vanished into the clouds, we were alone in a way. For a moment, I thought about Matilda... my son... but it was them whom I was here for. The monsters had to be stopped... at all costs. Unlike at the Wall before, tonight there was no wind down here; it was surprisingly calm, all things considered. The only noise we could pick up on was made by the hive in the far distance, as the bugs kept moving constantly, in and out of their creepy little holes.

I adjusted my Imaginary built into our helmet, making it screen the world better, making the lightless night a bit clearer. My hand automatically drifted towards the vials on my belt, as we would probably need to apply Blood Tattoos once or twice before our Sovereign returns with the reinforcements. Moving my eyes prompted the magic in my suit to immediately pick up on my will, something that was still a marvel to me whenever I thought about it. Even as we were scattered across a ten-kilometer circle, being far apart from each other, we could talk as if we stood in line.

"Thorken, status?" I murmured through the headset, unsure if it made any difference, but we were aware of the danger it posed. The bugs may pick up on how our suits worked... I am not one who understands magic as our Sovereign does, but the concept did make sense.

"Still, relatively speaking. The falling snow is a good blanket for it seems... And they haven't noticed us talking either." The captain below me answered, being my current second-in-command in this operation.

"Korr? What about on your end?" I radioed the one on the opposite end of me.

"All green," he replied, "We see no movement beyond the usual. Bugs are doing... bug things."

"Roger. I want reports coming through in fifteen-minute intervals."

Even now, I could see dozens of the damned things dragging some sort of frozen sludge across their walls, layering it in perfect hexagonal patterns. Were they... fixing something? Looked like it... But what? Did something attack them? Are the theories correct? Did the horde go west because they were chased away?

As I focused, my helmet reacted again. A faint outline of the hive blinked into focus, 'drawing' a red line around the shapes I could see, helping me visualize it all. At the highest point, their tallest tower stood a bit crooked, reminding me of a rag that was twisted hard to get the water out of it. Tsk... My gut turned involuntarily. Yes... I'd been on the front lines before. I'd played the role of a captured warrior when we went to save Lady Yuri. I have faced monsters, damned massive beasts before... And I would do so again without a heartbeat. But I hated bugs. Haaaah... Too bad I can't say no to the call of my duty. Heh...

Of course, as I feared, things turned out to be... more than we bargained for. All of it happened just before sunrise. The snow was falling heavily by then, covering the sky, the ground, and us. It was a good thing, as buried there, it concealed us even more than just standing out in the open. But then...

There was a deep, reverberating pulse cutting through the ground itself. It was like... a rumbling stomach of the earth. The ground shuddered beneath us. It was clearly not just me... everyone began reporting they were feeling it too.

"Eyes up!" I snapped, trying to determine if it was physical or magical. Were we discovered? Was this something that was released to see if we are here?

When it ended, another followed... And more, overlapping each other. The snow began to shake below and around us, lightly at first, then more and more violently as the coming layers kept clashing and overlapping each other. I dug my armored hands into the snow just to steady myself as the tremor spread like ripples in a pond. Then, while we were riding this unnatural force, the hive also quivered in the distance, making its structures shake in a strange resonance.

And then...

From the center of the ruined city, a massive figure broke the surface, throwing snow and rubble everywhere as its body rose to the skies.

At first, it looked like one of the towers was collapsing... And then it was smashed by the rising... whatever it was, the worm, crashing it back down on the city. It just kept going into the air, segment after segment, its form clearly armored, emerging from within the hive's center. It was, by all means, a massive, worm-like creature that erupted from underground, smashing pieces of the hive as it kept stretching higher... and higher...

"By the Sovereign..." someone whispered into the feed, bringing me back to reality.

"Sixty meters... and still rising," I muttered, awestruck but not in a good way. I was an Avalonian... I shouldn't be shocked, but I was. "And that's just the part we can see..."

The creature arched its bulky body in a writhing column of squirming muscle and glimmering carapace armor around its joints. Then we watched as its head unfurled like a grotesque flesh-flower, lined with black, wet petals tipped in needle-spikes. Teeth, I guess. Thousands of syringe-like teeth... With its mouth open wide, a new pulse rumbled across the wasteland, and I felt the vibration of its call in my ribs, making my innards shake.

The bugs went wild at once.

They rushed toward it from all sides, up on its body, and we saw hundreds of flyers, rising up like some apocalyptic cloud. They hovered above the creature's open mouth, then began dropping something into it.

"Zoom in!" I barked an order, scrambling to switch views, trying to see what they were doing.

"That looks like feeding..." Thorken echoed the same thoughts I had.

"Aye..." I nodded, watching it play out. However, regardless of the amount of CC they were feeding it, it was not enough. How could it be? It was way too big.

When there was nothing else to drop down into its maw, the monster shuddered. Its flesh twitched, giving me the feeling it wasn't satisfied. Its movements were accompanied by a low growl, like the rumblings of a volcano about to burst. With a swing, the thing bent backward and let out a guttural, echoing cry, and then it slammed its now closed head downward, thrashing another bug-built hive. Chunks of the wax structure flew through the air, raining down like debris, being flung so far out that they even reached us. Fuck...

And yet… watching it, the bugs didn't retreat. Maybe they couldn't. Just as it was done with that... tantrum, hundreds of the smaller ones rushed to the damaged section, already beginning to rebuild what their so-called 'mother,' I guess, had just destroyed.

"...It's not satisfied," Korr whispered, coming to the same conclusion.

"It is not..." I muttered, watching as it slowly got back down, making the ground shake once again.

It lasted for about half an hour before everything finally came to a standstill. I just didn't know... how deep its lair goes? How are we going to get... it... out?