Chapter 122: Dark Depths – Part 3

Chapter 122: Dark Depths – Part 3

The blue Mantis Leader grabs a Witch, and the large grasshopper makes a series of screeches, then the Leader starts running towards an empty tunnel, and the squad of bugs follow it.

Though we're all surprised at this sight, Yunia is completely speechless.

"You don't understand," she begins and backs off from the front line, then she takes off her helmet, and massages her elastic ears as she continues, "What I believe happened may not be what truly happened, but if it is, then it's completely unprecedented. If that lizard man altered the leader-type to make it gain a water affinity, then it means that the monsters are deliberately adapting to the situation, something truly unheard of!"

I scratch my horn in confusion and question, "I don't understand how monsters 'don't deliberately adapt to the situation.' What about the breeder-types? Don't they create settlements that mimic humanoids and then lay siege to our towns?"

She shakes her head gently. "They mimic, but they don't adapt... unless that leader-type was born with water affinity by chance... or if the color of its chitin doesn't have anything to do with water. It happens."

I hum in thought as I realize something, "Hm... so monsters only change due to chance? Like, natural selection?"

The girls aren't very clear on what I mean by "natural selection," so I give them a crash course in evolution as it happens on Earth.

Yunia hums and fondly recollects one of her lessons with Almaria, "Yes, that's... pretty much what happens. A new, random variant spawns once in a while, and the longer it lives, the higher the chance that more of its kind will spawn, either through normal reproduction or through the curse of the God of Destruction, which uses our collective consciousness to choose which monster should spawn where."

I narrow my eyes in thought as I don't fully get it yet, so Ciel kindly expands on it, "The knowledge of a new, dangerous variant quickly spreads among the hunters, and so, its presence increases in the local collective consciousness, making it more likely that it'll spawn nearby. And the more that monsters of a specific kind spawn, the further the knowledge of their existence spreads, creating a vicious cycle."

So, for monsters, it's not survival of the fittest, but the deadliest or most fearsome... No, it's survival of the most popular.

Yunia agrees with my assessment and calmly requests, "I want to find out more about that lizard man. The magic he used is completely unknown to me, and the fact that we have bugs and lizards interacting in their reproductive methods is also unprecedented. Leader and breeder-types can get different types of monsters to work together to attack humanoids, but they hardly ever interact as meaningfully as we've just seen."

I hum in thought. Her assumption neatly explains everything that's going on out of the norm, but we still lack an explanation for how the lizard man mage came to be.

Well, there's one pressing matter that we need to solve first. "If we want an explanation, we need to get past that Hydra first," I remind them.

"Kill it!" Aoi shouts in my soul space excitedly. She wants to know what Hydra tastes like.

I smile a bit guiltily as I dash her expectations, "That'll alert the bugs and the lizards, making it much harder for us to observe anything useful."

"A distraction, then," Alissa whispers thoughtfully as she stares intensely at the Hydra.

"Careful. I honestly think you could kill it by yourself," Ciel wryly warns her.

And Alissa is caught off-guard. "Oh... well, thanks," she mumbles

I keep it simple, "I'll leave a [Gate] coordinate at the tunnel behind us for you to retreat to, so just fire a few shots, and then rejoin me."

She nods diligently, and we separate. After I leave a coordinate deep in the tunnel we came from, I [Fly] up and hug the wall as I fly towards an unused tunnel on the opposite side from Alissa's position.

Once we're both ready, she dispels [Invisibility] and unleashes an [Arrow of Annihilation].

"GRUUUUU!" The three heads howl in rage as the fourth goes limp, now with a long hole that goes in through one of its eyes and deep into its brain, then the dead head falls on top of a few bugs, crushing them and making bug guts spill everywhere.

The fire imps screech like monkeys, then the Witches screech too a moment later, immediately raising a cacophony that gives us both headaches. A normal arrow follows as the Hydra moans in pain, but it only hits the cheek of one of the heads and reveals Alissa's position.

The three ferocious heads turn their fiery gaze towards her, then their mouths glow, and three large fireballs shoot out. Though one of the heads receives an arrow down its throat, it doesn't seem to care.

Alissa activates the [Rush] on her armor and dives behind a large mushroom tree, then the fireballs explode at the spot where she was standing just a second ago, leaving three pear-sized holes in the stone. Rather weak, but it would still have hurt a lot and damaged the armor if she had taken it on her chest.

Aoi snorts, unimpressed by the Hydra's power.

"I could take it with only my [Draconic Body]!" Hana brags and pokes my soul space because she actually wants to try it.

I wave Hana away and focus back on Alissa.

While the Hydra lacks in power, it makes up for it by blanketing the area with fireballs, quickly razing down the mushroom tree into nothing.

But Alissa has long left that cover.

"GRUUAAAH!" The Hydra roars again as another head falls to an [Arrow of Annihilation], but the first head has already disintegrated into sand, and two new necks are now growing at an impressive pace.

The Hydra suddenly gets distracted, and the two remaining heads look in different directions as they continue to shoot their fireballs, blanketing the bugs with their barrage.

More bug guts are thrown about into the air as they explode with disgusting sounds, and fire imps scamper about in fear, not of the fireballs, but of the wet flesh that could easily snuff out their short lives.

The Hydra suddenly freezes and stops its onslaught, then it stares at the damage it has caused with what seems to be fear and confusion. Alissa's combo of [Mesmerizing Butterflies] and [Daydreaming] was apparently super effective.

Then she whistles, and the Hydra turns its heads towards her.

"RAAAH!" The two heads roar in pain as a normal arrow takes out one of its eyes, but the unharmed head immediately lunges towards her as the monster's large body charges forward, trampling even more bugs.

Alissa retreats into the tunnel, and she's pursued by a few imps and bugs that spotted her, but then the Hydra growls and stops. It trains one pair of eyes on the tunnel she fled through while the last eye looks down at its feet, its lips raised in what seems to be a snarl of disgust.

The Ice Wraith attacks the bugs coming into the tunnel, giving Alissa more than enough time to cross through the [Gate] and rejoin me.

"Good work," I gently praise her and give her pats through [Bind].

"It was kind of fun," she whispers shyly as I recast [Invisibility] on her.

The bugs mostly ignore the commotion, so while the Hydra and the imps are still distracted, we have a clear path to fly further into the cave. I put the Holly on my shoulder and grab Alissa's hand, then we fly onwards.

The Wraith is technically impervious to the bugs' attacks, but the summon's ice sword is broken repeatedly as the monsters turn on it the moment it begins to reform, so I just unsummon the Wraith since it's not useful to us anymore.

We fly past the (what we assume to be) previous iguana man as he goes back to the Hydra. This time, he's without a cocoon, so perhaps he's going to check on what the commotion was all about.

"How do we know it's a 'he'? Female lizards don't have breasts and males keep their dicks sheathed," Roxanne asks the question that Lina was thinking but didn't have the courage to ask.

Alright... it goes back to check on the Hydra.

Roxanne smiles, pleased with herself.

Anyway, the "farm" continues on for a while as the cave gradually widens, but we don't see any more tunnels ahead of us, so perhaps the choke point that the Hydra guards is a deliberate design choice.

Then Yunia warns Sandoro that there's a leader-type likely hunting down the Thalantro.

We notice a group of imps having a fistfight for some reason while a number of them keep their tails near a deep puddle of boiling water. I think they're trying to dry out the cave by making the water evaporate, so they must be the reason why everything is so misty.

We also see a few imps widening a hole that provides access to lava and taking a "mud" bath in it.

The mist slowly starts to clear as we fly forward, then we notice that the cavern splits into two as a chasm intersects the "farmland."

I snort softly and shake my head, then we go silent again for a long moment.

The gnomes are taking too long to attack the nest.

There's nothing left for us to do but to wait, so I observe the rape with cold determination. I burn every detail of this horrific sight into my mind, then I pray.

I pray that I am never weak of mind again, that I never let my resolve falter, that my hand never hesitates.

I pray that I never forget this day, for I've learned the true price of failure.

I pray that my draconic fire never ceases to burn, for I need it to be able to face this world.

I pray that the Gods will always guide me when I need it, for I can't ever afford to become lost when so many are following me.

And the Gods answer by filling us with righteous fury.

We grunt and growl as we adjust to the sudden influx of energy that gushes into us.

"L-Lord Aoi?" Almaria stutters fearfully as she backs off from the angry dragon.

"We're called upon once more," Yunia sternly announces, then I summon everyone.

Our bodies may be tired, and our minds may be hazy, but, in an instant, we're all ready for one more battle, so we promptly begin the slaughter.

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