Chapter 108 Mass Evolution (3)

CLANG

CLANG

CLANG

The bug that I had attacked would not sit still, every time that I would try to attack one of its weak points it would move slightly so that I would hit its hard carapace instead. Even when I tried to use illusions to confuse it on my location, its superior senses were able to pick up where I was.

Looking around I saw nothing but trees around us but I knew that wouldn't be the same for long. Bugs are known for being hive minded, meaning that at any point hundreds of others could appear and force me to retreat.

Gritting my teeth, I didn't really have many options. My claws could not pierce its carapace, I could not maneuver around the bug to get at its weak points. It seemed like I was out of options.

The only other option I had was fox fire, but that was one of my own weak points, something that I had never excelled at.

Whenever I had used foxfire it was weaker than even those under me. The fire that would usually burn trees as a baby came out as weak as a lighter, sure it could burn a couple twigs but I was not able to advance it much past that.

But still it was my only option left that I had, if my illusions and claws did not work then I would have to try something different.

While jumping around to dodge the bugs' attacks I reached my hand out and focused. To create my foxfire was as hard as it was for the other kitsunes to attempt to trick me with their illusions, sure maybe by a stroke of luck and lots of skill they could do it but it would take immense effort.

It was the same for me but with foxfire. The bugs' attacks rained down upon me even faster, as if it could sense the latent fire that I was trying to summon. My eyes narrowed at that, if my weak fire could cause panic to this bug, how weak was it to fire.

A spark, I felt a spark light up in my hand and the bug recoiled back in fear. 'Well, we're going to find out.' I thought to myself, seeing the weak foxfire that I had summoned in my hand.

Foxfire had a unique property, at least for me, it was sticky. Meaning that since I was immune to my own foxfire I could coat it on my claws.

That was exactly what I did, the foxfire sticking to my claws. I lunged at the big, who was now intently staring at me, its body shivering with fear at the sight of fire.

It was weird that these bugs were so weak to fire but I didn't have time to think of that properly, my claws were able to easily pierce the chitinous armor that protected the bug .

GAOO

A cry of pain was heard but other than that nothing happened. It seemed like the bug could feel pain from its shell being attacked but no other damage was felt by it.

BOOM

While I was thinking of how I would pierce even further into the bug to try and kill it, it burst into flames. It seemed like I was proven wrong as the whole reason that it was most likely screeching was that its body was up in flames.

Immediately I jumped back, however fireproof I was, it was only to my own fire not whatever had ignited in this bug.

…

Once the fire had died down I slowly approached it, making sure to dodge the flickering flames that came up every so often.

Eventually I reached the body, my head only reaching up to a quarter of its body's size.

I reached with my fingers to the body and it came out clean, like the blood had slipped off of my hand.

Looking down at the blood it was not red like I would expect, it was black.

I wanted to test a theory of mine, gathering the blood in my hands, I ignited some foxfire.

The blood in my hands burst into flames, burning my hand.

My eyes widened as I realized what had happened, the blood of the bugs was flammable, extremely so.

It seemed like the bug had known this and that was why it was so cautious of the fire that I had lit in it.

"I was right" I muttered out loud as I thought about how I would utilize this to my advantage.

It was likely that it was only the bugs that had this so it was best to reserve my foxfire for when I was fighting the bugs.

For the other creatures that I would inevitably fight I would need to find some weapon or at the very least make myself one.

Looking at the claws of the bug I had an idea, I had seen how the claws of the bug had allowed it to scale the trees by poking holes in it.

If I could fashion it into a weapon then it would be sufficiently sharp after some reinforcement.

…

The claws of the bug were impeded into its legs, to get to it I needed to shave off its foot and then pull it out from where it lay.

I went to work on that, pulling the small claws out. Well small compared to the bug, to me they were the size of a small dagger. The only thing was that it was only the tip that was sharp. The rest was super durable but had no edge to it.

The best way to utilize this was to make a sort of rapier or something out of it, a slashing weapon like a sword or something similar would not work.

I could even make a bow, these claws would be great for arrowheads and the wood and tendons of the bugs could make up the actual bow.

The only problem with that though was that I was not trained in using a bow.

However I didn't get long to decide what I was going to do as soon after I had dug out a sufficient amount of claws for whatever purpose I was going to use them for, more and more bugs were starting to lumber around me.

I could see them in the distance and no doubt they saw me, next to the dead body of their comrade.

SCREEE

The keening sound of their roar consumed my ears as they rushed at me, their limbs barrelling on the ground as they grew closer to me.