Chapter 541 War commences (1/2)
Well nards. I mean, even with a sword sticking in me and an angry Golgari in a fancy suit of armour staring hatefully into my eyes, all I can think of is the unwinding consequences of this action. How many ants, how many creatures, will suffer as a result? All so unnecessary! These freakin' morons!
Luckily for me, my fellow colony members are not quite as upset at the prospect of the oncoming conflict. The moment the armoured stone giant strikes me, the hundreds of ants, not to mention my pets, leap into action. Acid and spells, held at the ready during the standoff, are now let fly. The air is suddenly full of sizzling liquid, fireb.a.l.l.s and pheromones as the ants scream their war cries and rush headfirst into the conflict. Before I can even attempt to dislodge the blade from my carapace, Crinis has lashed the powerful Golgari warrior with a dozen limbs. A horrific grinding sound begins as she unsheathes her barbs and they begin to tear into his armour.
Tiny wastes no time and leaps into the thick of the fray, leading the ant charge, Invidia tagging along behind as every surface of the tunnel becomes a crawling ma.s.s of insect as they surge toward the enemy.
”FOR THE COLONY!”
”DESTROY THEM!”
”DEFEND THE ELDEST!”
The ants cry out relentlessly as they stream forward to battle, biting and chomping everything they can, utilising the group tactics that were drilled into them at the academy. The Golgari don't wait for death but instead spring forward like the trained professional warriors that they are. Against the swarming ants they deploy wide sweeping blades of sword light, trying to cut down as many of the onrus.h.i.+ng monsters as they can. The result is probably not as impressive as they'd hoped. Big bodied tier four soldiers in the front lines perform their duty and throw themselves in harm's way to protect their more vulnerable kin. Their thick carapace' absorb the strikes, large rents appearing in their bodies, but they don't stop pus.h.i.+ng forward.
The armoured Golgari and I remain locked in our own little world, each hardly moving. I can tell Crinis isn't having much luck breaking through that powerful armour, and I don't expect she will. The gear this guy is wearing puts him on another level and I don't think she'll be able to cut through to him at his current tier. I wonder what sort of ore someone this strong was able to secure for their skin? Something fancy no doubt, but surely not as strong as his armour.
[You killed a lot of your own people today,] I tell him.
[You're very confident for a bug,] he tells me. [Do you think we can't squash you as we please?]
[You've never seen anything like us before, rock-head. When you crawl back to your home, make sure you remember that this didn't have to happen!]
[CRINIS!]