Seeing the swarm above me, I threw caution to the wind and raced towards the pod, praying that this creature inside was going to be of some help in the upcoming fight. That was when the first lava beam struck the ground in front of me, melting a portion of the walkway. Still, I did not stop, even as that beam was joined by several others, and the buzzing grew to a deafening crescendo. By some miracle, I managed to reach the pod before any of those projectiles got a hit on me. I swear my Serpentine Agility skill had better get an upgrade!.

  ?

  I stood in front of the pod and quickly realised I had no idea how to open it. Something I should have thought of before pissing off the mechanical insectoid swarm.

  ?

  “Xerapha was it?” I said awkwardly, “How do I get you out?”

  ?

  Words glowed in my vision as I felt the heavy vibrations of the insectoid critters landing.

  Quickly channel your magic into the pod. Like you're preparing to cast a spell.

  ?

  I never read anything so fast in my life as the swarm descended on me. I wasn’t quite sure I knew what I was doing, but I was in no position to start pondering. I just imagined the feeling that I got just as I cast a spell and focused it into my finger. I didn’t know if it was actually the mana coursing through me or if I was just imagining it, but thankfully, my efforts were rewarded by a loud snap as the pod cleaning burst open, a pale blue flower in the darkness. Then all hell broke loose.

  ?

  The dark, looming pit below me opened up into a sea of yellow eyes. Millions of eyes stared up at me and the swarm in the darkness. The collector lifted his hand, and the members of the swarm that had been swarming the landing attempted to return to him. Unfortunately for them. The feminine creature trapped in the pod had other plans. Her triops had fallen to her, revealing a creature both beautiful and terrifying. She had the upper body of a woman, except with four arms, two mantis-like, and appeared to be made of an obsidian-like material. Her face was angelic. Soft, harmonious features framed by long, flowing hair as white as snow. Her eyes were bright green and slit like a cat's. She had the most gentle smile that almost made me want to get closer to the illusion broken by a pair of vicious-looking protruding fangs. Her lower half was the truly terrifying part. I had no idea how she had even fit into the pod, as her lower half was thrice as long as I was, and was a weird mix of a centipede with all the legs and a lobster with the heavy armoured plates and vicious and bladed fan-like tail. She looked at the fleeing mechanical insects, and several instantly began to rust and leak a corrosive substance from their joints before collapsing into puddles.

  ?

  I stared in horror at the creature I had just unleashed. Her eyes turned to me, and my body forgot how to breathe. I stood there gasping for air, the world spinning. She gave me a little smile and a wink before breaking eye contact, causing air to rush into my lungs as I found myself collapsed on the floor. She then turned her attention to the collector. I turned to see his reaction to her release. I thought he’d be more terrified, but instead there was just this look of disappointment in his four-eyed face. Then he decided to go super creepy mode too, as an entire assembly of mechanical limbs erupted from his back, tearing through his patchwork cloak and revealing the grotesque form underneath. He was barely a living thing, with his upper torso, head, and arms the only organic parts. The rest of him was a mishmash of wires, gears and blades. He was hard to look at, with all his parts constantly in motion, taking on a myriad of forms before stretching out, engulfing the dragonfly and extra mechanical wings, and forming a proboscis-like mouth part that glowed with a familiar orange energy.

  ?

  My eyes widened as the sight spurred me to get to my feet. I was tempted to just make a run for it, but I would be damned if I had gotten involved in all this bullshit, clearly above my E rank business. So I did what I do best, something stupid!

  ?

  “Excuse me, umm, Miss Xerapha, I know this isn’t the best time, but um, about that power you promised….” My words cut off immediately as I felt the pressure of her gaze on me. It wasn’t as intense as before, but it still made me feel like I was trying to breathe underwater. When I dared to glance at her, however, she hadn’t even turned around, her attention fixed on the four-eyed psyborg monstrosity. She raised one of her normal human hands and brought it down like a flag at the races. Instantly, the many eyes of the darkness below us surged forward, the creatures that made it up now clear. At least one million triop-like monsters, twice as big as my guide, had been. My skin crawled as the horde of invertebrate monsters swarmed the platform.

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  ?

  The collector had also finished his transformation-merger with the mechanical dragonfly. Xerapha threw something small that had a metallic glint in my direction, and I caught it. Then all hell broke loose as the two armies of bugs clashed. The triop creatures leapt from the walls, creating rifts in the air, and jumped through them before reappearing and leaping onto metallic bugs. The mechanical bug swarm began to fight in earnest, firing waves of compressed lava and flying into the dark swarm with bladed appendages.

  ?

  I was not stupid. As soon as I got a hold of the thing Xerapha threw my way, I pocketed it without looking and made a run for it, heading back across the severely damaged walkway, doing my best to avoid the brawling combatants that fell around me and the occasional lava beam or glob of acid hurled about. I was almost across with only a meter to go when The Collector and Xerapha got into it. The Mechanical titan fired a lava blast that engulfed the entire platform. Thick globules of the stuff were landing on the walkway behind me and melting it away. I thought Xerapha was dead, but then I noticed the purple glow within the lava. As I reached the mouth of the walkway, a huge rift opened across the chasm, and from it emerged an Entomophobe's worst nightmare. I made the mistake of looking through that rift, and beyond it was a world of black glass spires, and as far as the eye could see, countless triop-like creatures of all shapes and sizes. Some were huge armoured things, bigger than any creature I had ever seen, that scuttled on thousands of legs. Others soared through a sky filled with brown dust clouds.

  The lava beam from the collector looked so small as it fell through the portal. Xerapha herself was unharmed, and her humanoid parts were covered in a black carapace armour. In one of her human-looking hands, she held a black lance that crackled with black lightning. She leapt for the collector just as he dove for her, and that was my queue to get the hell out of dodge. I started to run, and I raced up the dark spiralling path. Unfortunately, I wasn’t alone. I heard a buzzing sound which caused me to turn around just in time to see two of the giant mechanical beetle dudes, both with big ass swords, coming after me.

  ?

  I didn’t even attempt to stand my ground and fight. I ran! One of those dudes had been bad enough, but two of them with fully functional boosters were not a fight I was ready for. The silver lining was that the spiralling path was quite narrow, preventing them from fully utilising those boosters. This let me gain a nice lead on the creatures. I really hoped that the door I had come through was still there. I reached the chamber where I had entered, and my heart sank as I saw just a plain wall where I had hoped the door would be. A moment later, the two beetle boys flew into the room.

  ?

  I was almost about to give up when the singular pod in the room caught my attention. I saw the two beetles gearing up to cut me down and shrugged. If you've got two powerful godlike entities battling it out, what was one more? I mean, the world was probably doomed either way. I raced across the room using an Earthen Spike spell to propel me up and over the blue rings that surrounded the pod to land right at the top. I heard a crash as my Earthen Spikes were crushed by one of the charging beetles, the other one appearing right above me, sword raised. I didn’t stop to think, I channelled mana through my feet and straight into the pod, causing it to erupt with a blast of steam, which sent both me and my would-be attacker flying back.

  ?

  I grogily got to my feet, noting that neither of the beetles was even the slightest bit damaged, but thankfully, their attention wasn’t on me; it was on something else. The sapphire blue form of the huge reptilian creature emerged from the pod. He was no longer in a meditative position; instead, he stood tall, rolled his shoulders, and looked… directly at me.

  ?

  “Ho, cousin!” The big fella said, his voice reverberating throughout the chamber. “I thank you for releasing me. Now, if you’d be so kind as to point me in the direction of our jailer.”

  ?

  I stood there like a pleb, understanding his words even if the language wasn’t familiar. It took me a moment before I could reply. A moment, the beetles were not willing to wait as one charged the other, Bakanda, and me. I reacted too slowly, and I knew it. The beetle closed the gap, and I watched in slow motion as the blade began to fall even as I started channelling to use my Beastial Empowerment.

  ?

  The blade never fell as the one that had been targeting Bakanda came hurtling into the one about to slice me in half, itself having been ripped apart. The two slammed into each other with enough force that they were crumpled on impact. My eyes were wide with shock at how easily this guy had crushed not one but two of these guys. Faster than I could even react!

  ?

  “Little Cousin, don’t worry about the bugs, just point me in the right direction, and I’ll take care of everything,” Bakanda said in his deep voice.

  ?

  “Umm, about that…The Collector is currently engaging another progenitor called Xerapha. You don’t happen to…” I was cut off as the huge lizard man flashed towards me too fast for me to follow. One moment, he was standing in the centre of the room; the next, he was right in front of me. His amethyst eyes bore into me for a whole minute, making me squirm in my skin.

  ?

  “Hmm, you need to leave and get as far as you can.” He said in a deadpan tone. I was about to answer when he raised a palm to shush me “There are now three A Ranks in a zone created for E & D ranks. What do you think those who created the monster system we use will do?”

  ?

  His statement left me with so many questions, but realisation dawned on me. I nodded at the big lizard man, then noticed the conspicuous lack of doors.

  ?

  “Umm, just one thing, where’s the door?”