Chapter 287: The Hive Attack

The howling screech echoing from the mouth of Sector 4 wasn’t the sound of machinery or shifting wind. It was the synchronized shriek of a subterranean hive that had been disturbed for the first time in half a century.

The emerald light covering the warped stone entrance flared violently, casting sickly green shadows across the team. The rock beneath their boots trembled with rapid, rhythmic thuds, like dozens of heavy hammers striking the mountain from below.

"Defensive positions," Nicholas ordered, his voice cutting through the rising noise without a trace of panic.

"Julie, behind me," Selena said, drawing her sidearm with one hand and an area-flare cartridge with the other. She pushed Julie toward the narrowest part of the stone ledge, keeping her away from the yawning chasm.

Julie didn’t argue. Her knuckles were white around the handles of her stabilizer as she aimed the camera rig at the mouth of the mine, her teeth chattering while the audio meter on the display climbed into the red. "Audio levels are clipping! Whatever is coming up that hole has lungs the size of minivans!"

The ground in front of the rusted mine tracks bulged upward.

CRACK.

The solid granite split apart. Four massive, chitinous claws burst through the stone floor, spraying broken rock and wet mud across the entrance.

Lurching out of the fissure came the first beast.

It was an obsidian-scaled creature, easily nine feet long, with the strange shape of an armored badger mixed with a cave scorpion. Its thick, segmented shell was covered in jagged pieces of quartz and green crystal that pulsed with seismic energy. Instead of normal eyes, it had clusters of small, sensitive pits across its face. Below them, a wide jaw snapped open, revealing three rows of translucent, stone-like teeth that ground together with the sound of a rock crusher.

Behind it, three more creatures tore through the walls of the gorge, their crystalline shells scraping against the stone as they prepared to attack.

"Subterranean burrowers," Vixen said sharply, raising her hands as the air around her arms began to shimmer. "Their hides are strengthened with seismic Qi. They’re using the stone itself as armor!"

The lead beast launched itself from the cliff wall, its heavy claws reaching for Nicholas’s head.

Nicholas didn’t move back.

Plague Touch.

Pitch-black energy surged down Nicholas’s right arm, taking shape in the air until it became a heavy, seven-foot, double-edged spear made of dense, crystallized void alloy.

He didn’t wait for the beast to land. Nicholas stepped forward, planted the butt of the spear into the cracked ground, and angled the sharp tip upward into the creature’s path.

SHIK-CRUNCH!

The spear pierced through the softer flesh beneath the creature’s armored chin and straight through the top of its skull. Violet and green fluid splashed across the rock as its weight slammed against the spear shaft.

Nicholas twisted his wrists and sent a burst of Void energy through the weapon. The dark energy exploded inside the beast, destroying its insides before it could move.

Nicholas dissolved the spear back into mist and let the dead creature fall onto the mud.

"They aren’t solitary," Zero warned, stepping up beside Nicholas.

From the dark shaft of Sector 4, more than a dozen burrowers crawled down the walls and ceiling, filling the shattered rail beds. Their jaws clicked rapidly, creating a strange vibration that made the air itself seem to hum.

Two of the beasts lunged at Zero at the same time, their tails whipping forward with stone-tipped stingers.

Zero drew his sword in one smooth motion.

The purple gemstone in its guard blazed with brilliant silver-white light. Rather than meeting the creatures with raw strength, Zero pushed his purified Qi into the blade and released a crescent of compressed energy.

SHIIIING.

The silver wave sliced through the stingers, cut through the armored body of the first beast, and sent the second crashing thirty feet into the cavern wall.

"Push inside!" Nicholas shouted, glancing toward the cliffs. "Out here, they can attack us from all sides. In the tunnel, they’ll have less room to move."

"Moving!" Selena shouted, guiding Julie through the cavern entrance.

The team rushed into Sector 4, leaving the misty daylight behind as they disappeared into the underground darkness.

The interior was vast, with the ceiling stretching fifty feet overhead where the old mining supports had long since collapsed. Towering pillars of purple and emerald crystals had taken their place, filling the cavern with an eerie glow. The air was thick and hot, carrying the smell of sulphur, ozone, and wet iron.

As soon as they crossed the entrance, the ground beneath their boots began to churn.

The strange hum grew louder. Four burrowers suddenly burst from the stone around Selena and Julie, their claws reaching out as they tried to drag them into the ground.

"Get back!" Selena fired two rounds into the sensory pits of the nearest creature, splashing green fluid across the tunnel floor, but the beast barely reacted. Its crystal-covered armor turned the bullets aside.

"I’ve got them!" Vixen called.

Vixen stepped between Selena and the lunging beasts and thrust both palms forward.

Spatial Warp.

The air in front of the monsters tore open, forming a horizontal rift. The two burrowers leapt straight into it and disappeared, only to tumble out of another rift thirty feet above a cluster of jagged crystal formations.

The creatures shrieked as they fell, crashing onto the sharp crystal spires below.

Without stopping, Vixen snapped her fingers. A massive piece of rock falling from the ceiling suddenly changed direction and dropped directly onto the head of the third beast, crushing it beneath the impact.

"Nice drop!" Julie yelled, quickly pointing her camera upward to catch the falling rock. "Chat, the spatial angles on this are unreal! We are five minutes into the dungeon and the body count is already—woah!"

A fourth burrower swung its heavy tail toward Julie, aiming to knock her off her feet.

Nicholas was already there.

Gravity Distortion.

Nicholas slammed his boot onto the cavern floor. A powerful gravity field spread around the beast.

Its tail struck the invisible field, and the force behind the attack was suddenly turned against it. The immense pressure forced the creature into the ground, its legs buckling as cracks spread across its crystal-covered shell.

Nicholas closed the distance almost instantly.

Plague Touch.

Black energy covered his right hand and hardened into a jagged, reverse-grip spike. Nicholas drove it through the center of the creature’s armored neck, killing it instantly.

He pulled the spike free and shook the green fluid from it as the weapon dissolved back into energy.

For a moment, the tunnel became quiet. Only the steady dripping of condensation from the crystals and Julie’s frantic breathing could be heard.

"Status," Nicholas said, turning toward the team.

"All clear back here," Selena replied, reloading her sidearm. "Containment cases are undamaged."

"My lens didn’t get scratched," Julie gasped, clutching the camera against her chest. "My heart stopped beating about two minutes ago, but the footage is pristine."

Zero walked past the dead beasts and stopped beside the edge of a steep shaft that descended deeper into the earth. The purple gemstone in his sword was humming at an even higher pitch now, sending faint ripples of light across the walls.

"The nest is deeper," Zero said, pointing down the sloping tunnel. "These were just the perimeter scouts. The main chamber is at the bottom of this fissure."

"Then we keep moving before more of them dig through the walls," Nicholas said.

He took the lead and started down into the dark, sloping passage.

High above, near the ruined entrance of Sector 4, dust from the battle slowly settled over the shattered tracks.

From the dark opening of a collapsed ventilation shaft thirty feet up the cliff face, the shadows shifted.

A solitary figure stepped onto a narrow rocky ledge and leaned against the cold stone as he struck a match.

Sniper took a slow, relaxed puff from his cigarette, exhaling gray smoke into the mountain mist as he watched the cavern entrance below.

"Well," Sniper said lazily into the microphone attached to his jacket, "the scary guy just made kebab out of four armored armadillos in under ten seconds. The path is officially cleared."

Beneath the rocky ledge, a puddle of pitch-black shadow spread across the cave floor.

Shadow rose from the darkness, her pale face expressionless as she looked at the trail of dead beasts left behind by the strike team.

"They’re heading down the primary shaft," Shadow murmured, her voice flat and monotone. "The swordsman is guiding them straight to the altar."

From behind a rusted mining cart, Hexi stepped out, clutching his bruised ribs with one hand. A cruel, feverish grin spread across his bandaged face as he looked at the severed shells and glowing green fluid covering the granite.

"Look at that..." Hexi whispered, his dark eyes filled with excitement. "They did all the dirty work for us. The tunnel is wide open."

He gestured toward the deep fissure with a hand surrounded by wisps of black miasma.

"Follow them close," Hexi hissed, stepping over the carcass of a crushed beast. "Let them fight the big one. The moment that emerald stone shows itself... it belongs to us."

[A/N: Guys! I need your help! We’re falling off the ranks! Whatever priv tier you can get to support would be greatly appreciated! ?? Please help]