SPENDING MY RETIREMENT IN A GAME

Chapter 934 The Ants and the Worm

The ballistae were activated and massive pillars were shot, just as they had been for a while now. The soldiers reloaded the oversized bolt onto the weapon, just in time. Sky's storytelling was finished, and the 'Fortress in the Mist' changed away from the defensive mode over to the offensive mode.

With that, all the weapons were much, much more powerful than before. The bolt was shot, and all the ants were cut through as though they were made of loose snow. Upon hitting the ground, it exploded and shattered into hundreds of pieces. Up until here, there wasn't much of a different to before. But there was something different about this bolt. It had been hollowed-out, filled with small grains of metal dust which burrowed into the bodies of as many of the ants nearby as possible. Even more than just the ones that were injured; almost anything in sight was hit by at least a handful of those grains. And not just the ants, but also the walls and ground of the surrounding area.

And then, from there, it was Sal's turn. Using the threads that he had shot out earlier, he syphoned a particular sort of magic forward. Lightning magic. Almost faster than Eisen could see, the bright bolt shot through the threads, burning them as they it travelled on, and soon hit the wall. Carried over from each grain of metal to the next, the entire section of ants was hit almost immediately.

This wasn't an attack meant to kill, though. Rather, it was an attack meant to weaken. That way, Sal was able to make the electricity spread out as far as possible, allowing for the next part of Bree's plan to hit perfectly.

The weakened carapaces were soon affected by the thin fog of Caria's spores, pushing in through the thin cracks. Practically from insde of their bodies, mushrooms sprouted, not just damaging, but outright killing each and every one of the remaining monsters, while further blocking the path of the remaining ones that were flooding in.

This was a cycle that was repeated as much as possible, again and again. This way, the weaker worker ants could be killed before they approached the wall, while the soldier ants could be taken out by the elites that Eisen and Brody had brought here.

Before long, the colony of ants was actually starting to thin out quite a bit. They were starting to win against this part of the boss fight. However, even so, it seemed as though there was still something they needed to take out. Something that they left up to Brody.

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Brody landed on the ground in one of the larger caves. It was actually a couple times bigger than the cave at the entrance, just as Bree had suggested it was. He looked around at the traces of monsters on the ground nearby. Some of them were from those ants, while the other traces were from what was clearly a worm burrowing through the walls, creating many of these adjacent tunnels. With his eyes closed, Brody pushed his hand onto the ground.

A pulse of internal energy flowed into the ground. Soon, a pulse was returned back to him. It was like an echo. As this occured, the ground started to shake. Or rather, it was vibrating at a particular frequency. Pulling back his fist, Brody struck at the ground, and it shattered into pieces as if the rock was made of glass in some way.

A deep hole was created that Brody fell into, but the vibrations that he had created initially were spread out further into the area. It wasn't the kind of thing that Bree did where he was able to see what was going on around here, but that wasn't even really needed. What Brody was trying to do was catch a worm, not find a worm.

There was a very simple trick to catching worms. Plenty of worms reacted to vibrations, and came out when they noticed that the ground above them was shaking in a particular way. This would make them think that it was raining, and the worms would surface. Brody didn't know what kind of worm he was dealing with here exactly, but it was at least worth a try. There was nothing to lose, at least.

And before long, Brody actually noticed something. The vibrations continued. But these vibrations didn't come from him, but rather the thing shooting straight at him. With a grin on his face, Brody jumped up into the air, watching as the massive worm shot out of the ground. It was larger than the biggest train he had ever seen. Its massive, spiralling maw of sword-like teeth would be enough to swallow Eisen in his giant form in a single bite.

"Hah. So this dungeon does have at least a little to offer, huh?" he grinned broadly, pulling out his new sword from his sheath. He had been trying to save this until now, and was instead just using his fists. That was enough for the monsters that he had to face up until this boss room, after all. With a proper weapon, especially one this powerful, fighting them would have been even more boring than it already turned out to be.

Brody held the cursed weapon tightly in his hand, letting his internal energy flow into it to further strengthen the blade. He then kicked at the air and created a small shock that catapulted him away, out of the trajectory of the worm. Twisting his body around, he slashed into the side of the worm's body while descending down onto the ground. But soon, even this oh so sharp blade got stuck in the worm's insanely rigid form. So, Brody just pushed his foot into its side and kicked himself further down. That did it, and he was able to eat least reach the ground in a single go. Brody sighed annoyed, staring up at the monster.

"Fucking bitch, why does your blood have to stink so much? Disgusting worms," he clicked his tongue, swinging the sword to the side to remove the splatter of blood off the metal edge, "What kind of boring as shot monster is this?"

The worm bored into the ground with a smooth motion, as if it were swimming through water. It left behind a trail of its dark, disgusting blood, so it was easy for Brody to track. Brody jumped down into the hole, and though the tunnel that the worm haphazardly dug out was starting to collapse, he was able to outrun the falling stones.

"You think you can get away from me? Hah, I cut through a living mountain, you little brat," practically showing off his tusks with his grin, Brody let his energy flow into the edge of his sword. With a smooth motion, he cut through the space in front of him. And for a moment, it really was like he cut through the 'space', and not the 'rock'. As if catching up to what just happened, the stones of the tunnel completely shattered apart, and the worm came to a halt. It was used to travelling through solid stone, but right now, Brody had turned the area around it into what was effectively sand or gravel. That wasn't nearly as easy for it to get through.

Moving over from the cut, he moved into a stab, forcing a deep hole in the worm's body that tore it completely in half. As the smaller side of its remaining body started wriggling on its own, the half with that deep maw continued digging through the rock, even if a lot slower. Just in case, Brody properly destroyed the smaller part of the worm's body before chasing after the rest.

After a while of chasing after it, Brody heard a message from Eisen.

"There might be another powerful monster down here. Some kind of ant queen. Can you find her?" the old man asked, and Brody didn't even hesitate for a second to reply to that.

"I'm way ahead of you," he said, watching as the ground gave in below him. The worm, chased to this place, was falling from the ceiling, right into a massive cave. In its center sat another mass of flesh. It was like a huge, pulsating bubble that was spitting out small eggs. After just a few seconds, those eggs turned into ant monsters that began to ran into what Brody assumed to be Eisen and the others' direction. Attached to that pulsating bubble was a tiny body, barely larger than that of the workers.

All the monsters in a dungeon were connected somehow. They didn't act like separate entities, but rather, a single large creature. Which was why he figured that this boss monster would flee to a place with powerful reinforcements if pushed into a corner. And here it was!

Brody cut through the worm's remaining body with a vew moves, slicing it into dozens of chunks, before landing right on the bubble that was the ant queen's abdomen. With a broad grin, Brody stabbed into the bubble, cutting off the faucet for more ant monsters.

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