Chapter 210: The Swamp Strikes

Bubbles rose to the surface in slow, deliberate clusters, and they popped against the oily surface with wet, heavy sounds that echoed across the still water.

Then the surface began to roil.

Tera darted back, her heart staggering against her ribs so hard that she could feel it in her teeth.

[NO!]

[DO NOT MOVE TOO QUICKLY, HOST!]

[Sudden movement will trigger a predatory response!]

[Back away SLOWLY—]

’YOU PIECE OF SHIT! YOU TOLD ME TO MOVE IMMEDIATELY—’

The water exploded.

A massive shape erupted from the swamp with a sharp, and it shot towards Tera.

It happened so fast that Tera’s life genuinely flashed before her eyes. Her childhood, her first apartment, her brother’s face, Xavi’s golden eyes, Ermin, her cubs, Calis, and the last thing she had eaten.

’No! No! No!’

Her hand came up on pure instinct, a pathetic reflex to shield her face from something her body knew she couldn’t stop.

A thick, massive wad of slimy flesh slammed into her raised hand and wrapped around it.

The pain was immediate.

It seared through her whole arm like she had plunged it into boiling oil. It was terrible. Tera could barely see what had happened in that split second. She did not notice the slime coating the tongue latched to her arm. Neither did she notice how the slime was corrosive and eating at her skin.

Then the forceful pull came.

The tongue, Tera realised with nauseating clarity, was attached to something enormous beneath the water. The tongue gave a sharp lurch, lifting Tera clean off the ground.

[HOST!]

[!Activating Emergency Protocol!]

[Hijacking Host’s body... initiating...]

Tera’s mind went blank with terror, and then, in the fraction of a second before the system could fully take over her body, a deeper instinct took over her.

She opened the portal.

It sliced directly across the stretched tongue. The razor-thin slice of dimensional space sheared through the thick flesh and vibrated.

The tension on her arm vanished instantly as the severed tongue separated from its source.

[?|!(0?0)!|?]

The corrupted beast bellowed, and the water spluttered and thrashed as it raged.

But as Tera fell back to the ground, the portal she had used to cut the tongue vanished, and in the same heartbeat, she ripped open a second one directly beneath her.

She fell through the portal and landed hard on hard ground.

She was in the forest near the settlement.

The impact from the fall drove the air from her lungs, and for one horrible second, she couldn’t breathe. Then the pain in her hand caught up with the rest of her body, and she screamed.

The sound that came out of her was raw and animal and so loud it echoed through the trees.

A thick slab of severed purple flesh was still wrapped around her arm. It was writhing and moving the same way a decapitated snake still struggled.

The slime kept burning her skin.

"GET IT OFF! GET IT OFF GET IT OFF—"

[DEPLOYING COUNTERMEASURE!]

A sharp, crackling jolt of electricity surged through Tera’s forearm as the system put out a low voltage. Every muscle in her hand seized, her fingers snapped open involuntarily, and the chunk of tongue fell away from her skin and hit the ground with a wet, heavy slap.

It lay dead.

Black blood oozed from the severed end, mixing with the purple slime, and where the fluids touched the earth, the ground hissed. Grass blackened and curled, soil smoked, and a small patch of moss dissolved entirely, leaving bare, scorched dirt.

The pain in Tera’s hand was excruciating. Tears streamed down her face as her breathing came in sharp, ragged gasps that she couldn’t control.

She could barely feel her arm.

[Host, HAND IN THERE]

[.·°?(?□?)?°·.]

Tera was shaking. Angry welts were all over her arm.

’Fuck fuck fuck fuck—’

[Host’s hand has sustained chemical burns!]

[The corrosive agent is still active on Host’s skin!]

[HOST NEEDS TO RINSE IMMEDIATELY!]

But Tera could barely get up. Within seconds, beasts were already rushing in her direction, drawn by her scream.

Yara reached Tera first, alarmed and already in tears before she got to Tera.

"TERA! What happened?! Why are you—"

Yara reached for Tera’s hand, and the moment her fingers touched the residual slime on Tera’s skin, the female screamed and yanked her own hand back, screaming.

"DON’T TOUCH ME!" Tera shouted through her tears.

The severed tongue was still twitching on the forest floor, its purple flesh pulsing weakly as the black blood continued to seep and burn the earth around it. Several beasts who had been approaching it recoiled at the sight of the smoking ground.

Xavi, Ermin, and Calis rushed through.

Xavi and Ermin especially had first sensed Tera’s distress through the bond before hearing the scream, which had kicked them into gear, alarming them.

Their horror had heightened when they found Tera on the ground.

Xavi rushed towards her while another beast tended to Yara.

Xavi and Ermin dropped to their knees beside Tera, about to carry her when she yelled for water.

"I need it now! Wash this off. It hurts!"

Xavi didn’t hesitate. He grabbed a water skin from the nearest beast, uncapped it, and poured it over Tera’s arm.

The water hit the raw, burned skin, and Tera hissed so sharply, with fresh tears coming through.

Xavi poured the entire skin over her arm.

It wasn’t enough.

"More!" He barked at Ermin, who was already moving. He snatched a second water skin from a clan member who had been standing frozen with shock, and then a third from another. He dropped down beside Xavi and poured them over Tera’s arm one after the other, rinsing and rinsing while the burning residue washed away in thin trails.

"Yara—rinse her hands too—please—" Tera’s broken words didn’t go unheard as someone rushed to do the same.

The pain was dizzying. Each splash of water eased the searing heat by a fraction, but the throbbing beneath was deep and relentless.

Calis was stiffened in place.

The sight of Tera on the ground in such a state made something seize in his chest so violently that his stride faltered.

He wanted to drop to his knees beside her. He wanted to take her hand and examine the damage and hold her until the shaking stopped.

But Ermin and Xavi were already there, and he didn’t know what else to do.

What could he do to ease her pain?!