The glow illuminated a scene that made everyone hold their breath. A huge chamber extended before them and moving throughout the chamber, dozens, no, hundreds of shadow stalkers awakened by the vibrations of the excavation.
"Shit," Roran whispered, his dog fully manifested beside him with the fur along its spine bristling. "It's the main hive of the area."
"Pull back," Shizu ordered Hikari, her voice low but urgent. "I'll seal this right now and we'll change direction…"
She couldn't finish her sentence. One of the shadow stalkers, apparently drawn by the firefly's light, had approached to investigate. Its sensory appendages stretched directly toward the small opening like probing fingers of mist. Before anyone could react, it began widening the hole, tearing at the edges.
"Look out!" Luna shouted.
Chaos erupted instantly. More shadow stalkers quickly joined the excavation efforts and began converging on the opening.
Shizu tried desperately to close the hole, her hands splayed against the earth, channeling her power, but it was already too late. Tons of tentacles scraped at the entrance with their tiny claws at the tips, widening the aperture with each passing second.
The sound of scraping filled the tunnel, a nightmarish scratching that sent chills down everyone's spines.
"I can't push them back!" Shizu let them know, her wolverine struggling to contain the invasion. "Prepare to fight!"
The first shadow stalker forced its way into the tunnel, its tentacles thrashing violently as it searched for prey.
Mako and her night ambusher were the first to attack. The beast's razor-sharp claws sliced cleanly through the shadow stalker, separating its upper mass from its tentacles in one fluid motion. Pale blue fluid splattered across the tunnel walls, glowing faintly in the dim light.
Roran's dog launched itself at another creature with valiant ferocity, its fangs sinking deep into the shadow stalker's upper mass. The creature emitted a high-pitched shriek that echoed through the tunnel as it twisted, desperately trying to reach its attacker with its remaining tentacles. The dog growled through its mouthful of writhing flesh, refusing to release its grip even as the shadow stalker's body convulsed beneath it.
"Trent, now!" Luna shouted while her wolf dispatched a third shadow stalker attempting to enter.
Trent didn't need to be told twice. His fire ant unleashed a concentrated burst of flas at the gap, effectively incinerating another creature and forcing those behind to temporarily retreat.
But their victory was short-lived. More shadow stalkers began crowding the entrance, drawn by the battle sounds and the death of their brethren.
"We can't hold them all back!" Maria exclaid, her armadillo creating an improvised barricade.
Maria's armadillo was finally pushed back and chaos erupted.
But…
In the midst of the chaos, Roran's dog suddenly lunged into the hole, pushing the shadow stalkers and disappearing into the swarm.
"Close it now!" Roran shouted. His connection to his beast allowed him to understand how miserable it was fighting in that mass of predators.
Inside the chamber, the shadow stalkers sward around the dog. The brave beast fought ferociously, tearing through tentacles and ripping apart translucent bodies, but there were simply too many. More tentacles wrapped around its limbs, its torso, its neck, dragging it inexorably deeper into the hive. With one last heart-wrenching howl, it vanished among the mass of shadow stalkers.
Roran staggered back, losing his beast temporarily made mana managent way harder.
With a roar of effort, Shizu channeled all her wolverine's energy. The earth around them began to tremble violently as enormous blocks of stone and mineral erged from the walls, converging to seal the opening. Her face contorted with strain, veins standing out on her forehead as she forced the earth to obey her will.
The resulting wall was impressive,at least three ters thick… but even through it, they could feel the furious impacts of shadow stalkers trying to break through.
"It won't hold forever," Shizu warned, sweat dripping from her brow and breath coming in ragged gasps. "We need to move. Now."
The group retreated in somber silence. The temporary loss of Roran's dog weighed heavily on them all, a stark reminder of the danger they faced.
"We'll change direction," Shizu decided after a mont, wiping her brow with the back of her hand. "East instead of north. It'll take longer, but we'll avoid this hive."
"More ti ans Han and Ren will be in danger longer," Liora protested.
"We can't help them if we're dead," Maria replied firmly, placing a steadying hand on Liora's shoulder.
♢♢♢♢
The shadows were growing longer outside as Zhao stood at the edge of the gathering encampnt, his brow furrowed in concentration. His owl manifested, the markings along his eyes glowing with subtle intensity as he extended his senses outward, scanning the terrain before him.
Ren's group should have returned by now.
It wasn't just that they were late. The boy's thoroughness and attention to detail made quick expeditions almost impossible. What concerned him was the pattern of returning. Every other ti had followed a similar tiline… this deviation spelled trouble.
"Professor," one of the assistants approached, sensing his tension. "Patinder's group?"
Zhao nodded, his decision already made. "Maintain the periter. No students leave camp until I return. And prepare the ergency protocols, just in case."
The assistant shifted nervously, glancing at the darkening sky. "Sir, night's approaching. The shadow stalkers will…"
"I'm well aware," Zhao cut her off, his voice revealing no uncertainty. "That's precisely why I'm going now."
He signaled to his most trusted auxiliary, a stern-faced man whose hawk beast had given him wings and good eyes too. "Kenji, you're in charge until I return."
Without waiting for a response, Zhao set out toward the shadow stalker cave where Ren's group had headed earlier that day. His owl fully manifested, its ghostly form spreading wings that rged with his arms, enhancing his vision and allowing him to cover ground with unnatural speed.
The cave entrance lood before him within minutes, a dark mouth in the hillside that seed to exhale cool air against his skin. The sentinel was missing—the male shadow stalker that had guarded this entrance was nowhere to be seen, which ant soone had eliminated it. Ren, most likely, just as he had done with the first one.
'They should still be in there, then,' he thought, cautiously entering the cave.
The interior was surprisingly quiet. Too quiet.
Shadow stalker colonies, especially as darkness approached, should be buzzing with energy as females prepared to wake for their nightly hunting. Instead, the tunnel stretched before him in eerie silence, the mana crystals embedded in the walls providing just enough illumination to navigate by.
His owl's enhanced vision penetrated the gloom, revealing details that would remain hidden to normal sight. Scuff marks on the floor indicated recent footprints, and the subtle patterns of disturbed dust spoke of organized movent. Ren's group had indeed passed this way.
As Zhao advanced deeper, the silence gradually gave way to distant sounds, faint hisses and chittering that raised the hairs on the back of his neck.
They had disturbed the colony.
A movent caught his attention: a female shadow stalker gliding past a side tunnel, completely ignoring his presence. Another followed, then another. All heading deeper into the cave system, moving with purpose rather than the random patterns of normal hunting behavior.
"They're being called," Zhao murmured to himself. Shadow stalkers only exhibited this behavior in two situations: when defending against a large-scale threat or when responding to the discovery of significant prey.
Neither option boded well for Ren's group.
Zhao followed the creatures through the labyrinth, maintaining a careful distance. His owl allowed him to move like a phantom through the tunnels, his footsteps barely disturbing the air.
The females continued their purposeful journey downward, their numbers increasing with each joining tunnel until dozens flowed through the passageways like a macabre river of translucent flesh and writhing tentacles.
The main problem ca into view, and Zhao paused at its periphery, assessing the situation. Hundreds of shadow stalkers sward across the cavern floor and walls. But what drew his attention was the stone, mineral, and crystal barriers positioned at opposite ends of the chamber.
'So they had sealed the exits and were trapped.'
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About 200 ters underground, Julius advanced with the fluid certainty of soone who commands the elent surrounding him.
His earth wolverine maintained a constant flow of perception through the ground, allowing him to detect movents and vibrations across a considerable radius.
Sothing didn't add up, though.
Since beginning his patrol after the worm incident, he had noticed strange patterns in the behavior of subterranean creatures. At tis, they seed to beco agitated as if responding to an invisible threat, moving in waves of panic that spread across different levels.
But when he arrived at the location, inexplicably, everything cald again.
"It's as if sothing is frightening them," he murmured to himself, his wolverine's essence rged with his skin in subtle ripples, enhancing his connection to the earth around him. "But when I approach to investigate..."
Nothing. That was the most disconcerting part.
Like it ? Give it a power stone！
┻━┻ ︵ヽ(`Д´)ﾉ︵ ┻━┻ - It's free and you help a lot
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Thank you so much for reading!
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