THE QUEEN OF ANTS
Alpha found another exit that wasn't filled with these bloody Mithrium ants. We quickly followed him, putting out my magical shield behind us as we ran. Ratatouille's Vortex Beast was gone by now, devoured by the ants and we had no plans to bring it with us. Ratatouille himself escaped into my soul realm to hide from the pesky ants.
Soon, we ran toward a previously unexplored exit which connected to the abandoned mine that we first came into and before long, we reached the entrance of the mine.
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"Oriese, what took you so long?" Agrilla shouted toward me near the entrance of the mine.
"Damnit, Agrilla, didn't I ask you to return to the camp outside?" I asked my friend.
"I was afraid you might get lost in there, so I waited here for you", he told me.
"Run, we must run from the mine and seal this bloody entrance for good", I told him, and we quickly ran toward the entrance.
Suddenly, Agrilla tripped and fell. He wasn't used to running in this dark and treacherous landscape.
"Damnit", I quickly went to pick Agrilla up.
"Arggghhhhhh"
To my shock and horror, Agrilla's chest was pierced through by a shining antenna. A Mithrium ant managed to get to him before me and pierced through his heart.
"No,…." I screamed as I cast a conjured beam toward ants that were swarming toward us.
But there was nothing that I could do to help Agrilla. He was already dead when the ant struck his heart.
Agrilla wasn't really my friend.
He was Oriese's friend. I took on the appearance of Oriese for the Temple of Solomon's mission. However, I've known Agrilla long enough to know that he wasn't a bad apple at heart even though he was a fellow bully.
In time, Agrilla may have a chance for redemption and a fruitful life ahead of him. But it all ended with this misadventure which I had a big hand in creating.
"Damnit, I'll kill all you bloody ants," I shouted at the ants and conjured my magic furiously.
"Sword of Nyx"
I wasn't thinking too rationally now as my projected sword beams fired upon anything that moves. Thousands of Mithrium ants were killed by my frenzy.
When I regained some sanity, I rushed out of the abandoned mine.
To my horror, our camp outside the mine was overrun by Mithrium ants that escaped into the surface.
"Damnit, I killed all the students", I regretted and complained to myself.
If I hadnt ventured into the annex mine to this harmless mine, I wouldn't have released the deadly ants into this world. These ants killed all the teachers and students in the camp before escaping into the wild.
"There are more ants coming out from the abandoned mine? What should we do?" Ratatouille told me and asked as he came out of his hideout in my soul realm.
"We must go back inside and destroy this infestation for good", I told Ratatouille as we went back into the mine, killing hundreds of those ants along the way.
When we were inside the entrance, I fired my projected sword beam into the top of the entrance, breaking the stones which covered the entrance entirely.
"This would prevent the ants from escaping into the surface", I told Ratatouille.
"This will also trap us inside this bloody mine", he told me.
"I will kill all those bloody ants, I swear, before I'll leave this stupid mine", I said to him.
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Alpha and Beta scouted ahead of me, scouring the mine for ways into the deeper mines, looking for the hive of the Mithrium ants. To our surprise, my Malevolent also helped themselves with the liquid Mithrium that was spilled by the killing of the ants.
My Malevolent could devour the liquid Mithrium and bring them into my soul realm.
"Holy Shyte, what the hell is this?" Ratatouille said to me suddenly.
-----
Upon entering the deep chamber, we found a vast space with walls adorned with luminescent ores of silver metals that bathed the area in a soft, otherworldly glow.
At the heart of the chamber, an enormous, intricately designed silver throne stood, raised on a platform of metallic veins.
This throne room was where the ant queen held her court, surrounded by her loyal subjects, each an ant of a shimmering metallic silver hue.
These ants were unlike any other, their exoskeletons reflecting the soft light like polished steel.
The ant queen herself was a sight to behold.
Larger than her subjects, she possessed an aura of regal power that radiated from her molten metal form. Her wings were made of shining metal, which dripped liquid metal into the chamber. Her eyes, a mesmerizing shade of iridescent blue, sparkled with intelligence and ancient wisdom.
Within the chamber, silver ant eggs rest in delicate, crystalline cradles, carefully tended to by worker ants. These eggs, when hatched, give birth to the dangerous and powerful metallic silver ants that guard the queen and her realm.
The walls of the chamber held secrets of the past, displaying ancient runes and enigmatic murals that told the story of the ant queen's lineage, a lineage dating back millenniums, woven into the very fabric of the mountain's existence.
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"That is the ant's queen", Ratatouille pointed out to me the obvious.
"Rawwrrrrrr"
The ant Queen discovered my presence and decided to get rid of me. She sent her ant fighters toward me. These ant fighters weren't the metallic ants that we faced with earlier. Those were the workers, and these were the soldiers.
"Damn, damn, damn", I complained to myself.
The soldier ants charged toward me brandishing their limbs like sharp swords or knives. These ants were proficient with their limb weapons, spinning them around like master blades men practicing their sword dance.
"Shields of Quiescent"
I quickly conjured a formation of shields before me that blocked the charging soldier ants. But there were many of these soldier ants in the chamber of the ant queen and my shield couldn't block everyone.
"Damnit, if I didn't lose my magical hands, they will become useful to me now", I complained to myself.
[Previously, Spellmaster, the Minister of Magic in my kingdom of Nyx, crafted magic tattoos on my body which allowed me to summon additional magical limbs that could cast spells for me while I fight.
These magical hands would become invaluable here in this fight with the swarm of ants. Unfortunately, I lost those magic tattoos.
When I was carrying the magic of the Dark Angel, my body was vulnerable to the malevolence of its powers and magic. Those powers would kill me before the Dark Angel's soul could be revived in my soul.
Spellmaster, redesigned my tattoos to contain those dark forces leaving me without my magical hands. But that also kept me alive. I didn't complain about it.]
Ratatouille was useless in a fight against a swarm of ants, so he returned to my soul realm to hide. I don't blame him for not helping me. In fact, I preferred it this way because now I don't have to worry about protecting him.
However, I was useless against the swarm of ant soldiers myself.
"Arrggghhhhh"
Suddenly, one of the soldier ants breached through my formation of shields and reached me, biting my shoulder with its chelicerae.
To my shock, my shoulder started to become numb, and I quickly lost the use of my right arm and hands. The soldier ant was poisonous, and it immobilized my right arm with its poisonous bite.
Suddenly, more soldier ants rushed in to finish me.
"Is this my end?" I asked myself as the murderous ants were about to kill me.
"No, I will not die to you bloody ants", I screamed at the ants that were swarming me.
"There are too many of them, we can't fight", Ratatouille told me in my mind.
"To survive this, I can only fight", I replied to him.
"Sword of Nyx"
I conjured a powerful projected beam shaped as a sword toward the ant soldiers that rushed toward me. Some of them were killed by the powerful beam but not all of them. The soldier ants were much tougher than the worker ants.
Before long, the ants surrounded me again.
My projected beam could only fire into one direction while I became vulnerable from the other directions. The ants on the other hand, came from all directions and there were more of them pouring out from the Queen's ant to fight me.
A group of soldier ants rushed to me from behind and I couldn't turn around quickly enough to stop them with my projected beam.
"This really is my end", I told myself as I awaited death at the hands of the bloody ants.
This was an unexpected ending for me.
I always thought that death may come for me in a glorious and epic battle. This was not the way for me to die. This wasn't a good way to die, at the hands of pests.
Suddenly, someone appeared before me.