CHAPTER 153: WAR ZONE 4

The ground shook as the Broodmother fully emerged, its vast segmented body was dragged across the clearing with a sound like grinding stone.

Its abdomen pulsed in an abnormal manner, while translucent sacs revealed the movement of more spawn that were writhing within. Every twitch was threatened to unleash fresh waves of horror.

The swarm erupted in unison. Kelvin’s jaw clenched, as adrenaline was spiking through him. If we fall here, the villagers won’t even have time to scream before this hive devours them.

"Form a circle!" he barked....

Lyra leapt down from her perch, drawing her bow as she landed gracefully beside him. Darius, who was bloodied but unbroken, planted himself at Kelvin’s other side, with his hammer raised high.

Immediately, the swarm surged forward. Dozens of Chitter spawn threw themselves forward in a relentless tide, with their legs looking blur and mandibles snapping.

Kelvin met with them head-on, Xerion’s blade cleaved in a wide arcs and ichor sprayed like rain. Every swing cut down another, but more of them filled the gap instantly.

Lyra moved like a shadow at his side, her arrows were flying in rapid succession. Each shaft pierced the gaps in armor, dropping beasts mid-leap. Her precision kept them from being overwhelmed, yet she could feel her quiver growing lighter.

Darius became an unmovable wall, with his hammer he was crushing bodies with every strike. His roar echoed above the swarm’s screeches as he swung in brutal arcs, bones and shells that were shattering beneath his blows. But for every monster he felled, another claw raked across his armor, drawing fresh blood.

Then the Broodmother reared its head back and unleashed a piercing screech. The sound reverberated through the hollow, shaking loose leaves and sending a wave of primal terror through the swarm’s prey. Kelvin’s ears ranged, but he forced his focus.

From the Broodmother’s abdomen, fresh spawn poured out, they were smaller but faster, darting between the legs of their larger kin. They swarmed through Kelvin’s legs, snapping at his boots, while climbing up his armor. He cursed, slashing them away, but one sank its mandibles deep into his thigh. Pain flared within him.

"Kelvin!" Lyra shouted, loosing two arrows into the spawn clinging to him. He staggered, but remained standing, blood soaked his trousers.

The Broodmother advanced, each movement she took was shaking the ground. Acid dripped from its fangs, sizzling as it struck the earth, leaving smoking pits where the soil melted away.

Darius spat blood and growled, "That thing’s hide is thicker than a fortress wall. We will never pierce it with steel alone."

Kelvin slashed another spawn in half and barked, "Then we don’t aim for the armor. We cripple it, now take the legs!"

Lyra nodded sharply, already drawing arrows tipped with faint enchantments. She fired at the joints where the Broodmother’s monstrous legs connected to its body. The first shot glanced off. The second embedded itself shallowly. The third sank deep, sending the Broodmother screeching and staggering.

Kelvin seized the opening and charged forward. With a cry, he drove Xerion’s spirit-blade into the wounded joint, cleaving through the chitin until the leg collapsed under its own weight. The Broodmother roared, slamming its massive limb into the ground in fury and narrowly missing him.

But crippling one leg only enraged it further. The beast reared back and unleashed a torrent of green acid in a sweeping arc.

"Down!" Kelvin screamed.

They dove aside as the acid struck where they had stood, the ground hissed violently as it dissolved into sludge. A tree behind them melted in seconds, collapsing into the muck.

Lyra scrambled to her feet with her heart beating fast. If that touches us, we are done.

The swarm pressed harder, their queen’s rage drove them to panic. Kelvin slashed until his arms ached, but still the tide came. Darius fought with blood dripping from his brow, his hammer was growing slick with gore. Lyra’s arrows dwindled, each one loosed with deadly precision, but her quiver was nearly empty.

Then the Broodmother lunged. Its colossal mandibles snapped at Kelvin, who barely rolled aside in time. The jaws were clamped shut on empty air with a sound like grinding metal, splinters of stone flying from the impact.

Kelvin’s chest heaved. He could feel Xerion’s spirit pulsing within the blade, urging him onward. "We have to finish it now," he growled, more to himself than to the others.

But the Broodmother was not finished either. It slammed its body down, crushing three of its own spawn in its fury. The impact sent shockwaves through the clearing, hurling Kelvin off his feet. His sword clattered away.

Darius lunged forward, smashing his hammer into the Broodmother’s leg to divert its attention. "Over here, you abomination!" he roared.

The beast turned, its mandibles dripping with venom, and lashed out. The blow struck Darius square in the chest, sending him flying into a boulder with bone-rattling force. He crumpled, blood pouring from his mouth.

"Darius!" Lyra screamed, loosing her final arrow directly into the Broodmother’s eye. The shaft buried itself deep, and the queen shrieked in agony, while staggering back.

Kelvin staggered to his feet, fury burning through his veins. He sprinted, seized Xerion’s blade, and poured every last ounce of spirit energy into it. The weapon blazed, humming with power.

He charged straight into the swarm, cutting through smaller spawn as he leapt onto the Broodmother’s back. Claws raked at him, mandibles snapped, but he climbed higher, dragging himself up until he reached the base of its skull.

With a primal roar, he drove Xerion down into the crack of its carapace, plunging the blade deep into the monster’s brain.

The Broodmother convulsed violently, shrieking so loud as the trees quaked. Its legs were thrashed, crushing its own spawn in waves of destruction. Acid was spewed wildly, burning into the earth.

Kelvin held on, twisting the blade deeper, until at last the beast gave a final shudder and collapsed, its massive body crashing into the clearing like a felled mountain.

The swarm faltered. Without their queen’s will, the remaining Chitter spawn scattered into the shadows that were vanishing into their burrows with frantic screeches.

Silence fell, which were broken only by the labored breaths of the three warriors.

Kelvin staggered down from the corpse, his body trembled while his thigh was bleeding freely. Lyra rushed to Darius, who was barely conscious, his chest armor was dented inward and ribs clearly broken.

"Stay with me," she whispered with her voice cracking. Darius coughed, with blood staining his lips, but he managed a faint grin. "Still breathing... takes more than that to break me."

Kelvin limped over, placing a hand on his comrade’s shoulder. "We are alive. That is what matters."

They stood there for a long moments, battered and bloodied, though surrounded by the ruin of the battle. The clearing reeked of acid and death, the Broodmother’s corpse sprawled across the ground like a monument to their struggle.

The forest was too quiet. But Kelvin could hear the crunch of his boots over the dead leaves, the rasp of his own breath was beneath his cloak, and the faint clatter of Lyra’s arrows shifted in her quiver.

Yet beyond that... there was nothing. No bird calls. No rustle of squirrels or night beasts. No sound but the three of them were moving forward.

He adjusted his grip on his blade. "This silence is not right." Lyra’s sharp eyes scanned the gloom between the twisted trees, her hand was resting lightly on her bow. "It is worse than silence," she muttered. "It feels like something is listening to us."

Darius, hulking in his iron-lined armor, gave a low grunt. "Let it listen. Whatever it is, we will cut it down." But his voice was with unease, the same tension that pressed on all of them like a suffocating fog.

The road to the zombie den had never been simple, but this stretch of forest was different. The trees grew close, gnarled, and bent as if it is recoiling from some ancient corruption.

Strange sigils had been carved into trunks centuries ago, their edges were faded but still faintly glowing in the dusk. And along the path, they had passed bones that are not scattered, but stacked in small heaps, almost ritualistic.

"Trap markers," Kelvin whispered, crouching briefly beside one pile. "I have seen something like this before. Ghouls mark their feeding grounds like this, so they know where not to hunt each other."

Lyra’s face was tightened as she said. "Then we are walking into their nest." Darius adjusted the great axe that slung across his shoulder. "Good, then save us the trouble of searching."

But none of them smiled. They pressed on, pace slower now, senses stretched thin.

It began with shadows moving where they should not. Lyra was the first to notice. She raised a hand sharply, and the others froze.

The ravine ahead narrowed, steep rocks were rising on either side, forcing them into a bottleneck. And at the edge of that shadowed pass, the undergrowth stirred.

Kelvin asked. "Rats?" But then he saw them with their gleaming eyes, too many and too high off the ground for rodents.