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Translated By Arcane Translations
Translator: FusionX
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As the ants swarmed and filled the passage, Athena and Kayla immediately positioned themselves behind the skeleton, and I quickly cast a spell.
The black sphere that left my hand flew forward and collided with the ants at the very front.
Kwaaang!
A loud explosion was heard from inside the passage, and a thin cloud of dust rose.
Even though more than ten of them were instantly killed, the ants charged towards us as if nothing had happened, trampling over the corpses of their comrades.
Ttak.
The one at the very front seemed to be a soldier ant, judging by its huge jaws.
However, the skeleton nonchalantly leaped over its jaws and cut the boundary between its head and chest with its sword.
Then, it struck the jaws of another ant rushing towards it with its shield, and as the ant staggered, Kayla cut it down entirely.
Her sword was faintly coated with aura, seeming to be a measure to conserve mana.
‘Not using mana at all is the best, though.’
By targeting the joints, the ants could be dealt with even without aura.
However, Kayla had a mana heart, even if she couldn’t properly handle it yet, and above all, after going through two precious spirit medicines and body restructuring, her vessel itself boasted a tremendous size, so she could easily handle that level of mana consumption.
I didn’t say anything in particular.
‘Still, aura is definitely better.’
When I glanced at Athena, she was cutting down the Giant Ants in sync with the movements of the skeleton, which was recklessly fighting at the front without regard for its body, but her speed was far lacking.
It couldn’t be helped.
Kayla could just cut them down entirely if they got caught, but Athena had to accurately cut their joints, so there was bound to be a difference in speed.
Moreover, the differences in terrain and experience were also evident.
Kayla skillfully used her shield to block and strike the rushing ants, silencing them with minimal movements, while Athena, not using a shield, had to deal with attacks by focusing on evasion, so she inevitably used more space.
Such a method required not only senses and physical abilities but also a lot of experience, and Athena, lacking that abundant experience, moved quite inefficiently to the point where it was visible.
Furthermore, due to the terrain of the ant nest passage with limited space to use, Athena gradually got pushed back by the Giant Ants.
“Athena, use the skeleton! Use it as a shield!” Kayla advised Athena, seeming to have had a similar thought as me at that moment.
‘Using it instead of a shield…’
Indeed, it was not a bad idea.
If she attacked while positioned behind the skeleton, matching its movements, the battle would become easier.
The number of times she would have to evade would decrease, and with the skeleton blocking the front, there would be some secured space.
Instead, the burden on Kayla increased, but there was no need to worry about that.
‘She’s flying around.’
As if compensating for the memory of her inconvenient leg in the past, she was slaughtering far more Giant Ants than the skeleton and Athena combined.
Kwajik!
Actively utilizing her excellent leg strength that had been healed, in addition to aura, she even killed Giant Ants by directly trampling them with her mana-enhanced body and sturdy combat boots.
The corpses of the Giant Ants she had killed were scattered all around her.
‘I should support Athena.’
I also didn’t stay still.
Thanks to the activities of the three at the front, the front line stabilized, and I started pouring support where needed.
I used Deafness, which makes the target deaf, and Charm, which fascinates the target, in succession.
Both belonged to curses, and as expected of those with low magic resistance, they were easily affected.
‘Charm also uses pheromones, after all.’
At the 3rd Class level, it couldn’t be cast in a wide area and had to be cast on each individual, but when used on the ones bothering Athena, their aggression momentarily disappeared, and they even hindered their own comrades.
In my case, as a Warlock, Regeneration was a magic targeting the undead.
The skeleton, while acting as Athena’s shield, started to receive more and more injuries on its body, unlike before.
It was an unavoidable situation.
Due to the Giant Ants densely filling the surroundings, its initial active movements were restricted, and in such a situation, it also had to serve as Athena’s shield, so its body couldn’t remain intact.
Therefore, I had to support Athena and manage the skeleton at the same time.
-Kkiaaak!
Meanwhile, the specter was sticking to some Giant Ants and continuously draining their energy.
After a while.
The corpses of the Giant Ants were scattered throughout the passage.
We were able to easily claim victory in the first wave.
“This isn’t all of them, right?”
It was just the ones in the first room that had all come out.
The ant nest of the Giant Ants consisted of several rooms and passages.
The situation would be spreading quickly, and since we had killed all the ants here, the Giant Ants that heard the news would additionally rush out.
“It’s fortunate that we dealt with them quickly. If our speed was slow, additional forces might have arrived before we finished dealing with them.”
If that repeated several times, we would have to continue fighting without rest until all the ants were killed.
“For now, let’s enter further inside. It’s not good to face them here.”
The corpses of the Giant Ants filled the surroundings.
The once-wide passage was now half-blocked.
“It seems like we’ve killed nearly a hundred of them, right?” Athena remarked.
I nodded in agreement with her words.
“You did well. Keep it up.”
“If it weren’t for you, I would have been pushed back long ago. I wouldn’t have even dreamed of maintaining the front line. Thank you. I survived thanks to you.”
She wasn’t wrong.
If that had happened, Kayla would have been surrounded by the Giant Ants.
‘Well, Kayla would have still survived, though.’
The appearance she showed today looked several times stronger than when her leg wasn’t properly functioning in the past.
I newly realized the proportion the legs occupied in combat.
At this point, even if I went all-out, it would be impossible for me to defeat Kayla.
‘Even with the skeleton and specter.’
Well, if there are many corpses in the surrounding environment, there might be a slight possibility of me winning.
It would be about 20% at best.
I newly realized how lucky I was to have obtained Kayla.
Perhaps Kayla might achieve even greater things than Athena.
Of course, Athena was also growing at a frightening rate, and I still had one spirit medicine left for her, so it was too early to judge.
‘Even in the recent battle, her growth was visible.’
The problem was that Kayla’s growth was also visible to that extent.
As a result, it was a happy thing for me that my two companions were growing together.
It was also close to me being the one who made them that way.
We crossed over the corpses of the Giant Ants and entered further into the ant nest.
“What’s this? Ugh, that’s…”
“It seems to have been a food storage room,” Kayla responded coldly to Athena’s startled reaction.
The ones here were probably the ones that had just been annihilated by us.
“Wow… They didn’t seem that strong… They’re not ordinary. There are even orcs.”
“They were probably wanderers. Even decent orc tribes don’t fight with Giant Ants.”
They tend to avoid each other.
“Hmm… there are also humans…”
It was a gruesome sight, they were half-eaten.
A very painful expression remained on some, as if they had been torn apart alive until just before death.
There were also other monsters, plants, and beasts.
This place was empty, so we were wandering through the passages in search of another room.
Drrr.
The ant nest started resonating again.
The party naturally took their positions, and the hunting pattern was the same as the previous battle.
The problem was that the approaching number was far too large compared to before.
‘It seems the news has reached all the way to the bottom.’
The thing we had been concerned about happened.
The ones that rushed in at first were probably just trying to buy time, but the ones that came afterwards didn’t come in several rounds but all at once, so we couldn’t secure any rest time.
“Conserve your stamina!” I shouted.
They seemed to have grasped the situation as well, acting a bit more calmly instead of answering with their voices.
Most of the ants that had rushed in were worker ants, and it seemed that a considerable number of soldier ants had been deployed in the first room.
‘And we swept them all away.’
Therefore, the battle itself became easier than before.
Especially Athena, perhaps thanks to her experience of coordinating with the skeleton just now, showed a noticeably improved performance, and thanks to that, instead of paying attention to Athena, I could pour magic into the places where additional ants had gathered.
However, their numbers were too great.
‘It has already exceeded a hundred.’
It was enough to feel the passage narrowing.
Athena’s breathing was gradually becoming labored.
She seemed a bit flustered by the unexpected numbers.
In my heart, I wanted to extract energy from the specter, which was flying around and happily draining the energy of the Giant Ants, and give it to Athena.
Skak, kwajik!
As a result, Kayla’s burden increased, and noticing the situation, Kayla started to move more flashily.
Chwaaak!
Athena hastily retreated, and fortunately, she was able to avoid a direct hit.
It was thanks to the skeleton blocking most of it.
“Acid…!”
Although I had expected it to be there, I had let my guard down when it didn’t appear in the first wave.
If long-range support is added in this situation, it becomes troublesome.
Therefore, I quickly said,
“Move slowly, while retreating!”
Chwak! Chwaaak!
In the meantime, acid poured out from behind, and some of it splattered on their own comrades as well.
However, the Giant Ants showed no particular reaction, as if they had resistance to it.
Our space to move was already decreasing due to their corpses.
If long-range attacks were added in this situation, it would be difficult for Athena to endure.
Actually, it could be said that she had done a very good job even coming this far.
If it were an ordinary low-ranking mercenary, they might have already collapsed due to failure in stamina control or had their mentality shattered and ran away long ago.
Indeed, I felt that Athena had grown tremendously.
‘Were far from the entrance.’
The most feasible place was the food storage room.
‘The inside is relatively spacious, after all.’
It would become a dead end, but in the end, it was either them dying or us dying, one of the two.
I started preparing magic again.
‘One isn’t enough.’
Currently, the most effective spell that would work was Dark Bolt.
It could instantly kill more than ten Giant Ants and create a momentary gap using that.
However, one spell wasn’t enough to give the vanguard sufficient leeway.
‘Then…’
Should I use it more than twice?
No, there was an even better way.
The magical energy I had was barely enough, but it wasn’t impossible.
My circles rotated rapidly.
I extracted a considerable amount of magical energy and transferred it to the staff.
The dragon heart attached to the head of the staff began to vibrate, emitting a dark light as it devoured my magical energy.
As the magical energy was amplified and spread into the air, it was soon arranged according to my will, first forming one magic.
Kwaaang!
A Dark Bolt with a slightly stronger power than before was fired due to the additional magical energy.
It exploded in the middle of the Giant Ants, creating a fairly large space, and then I arranged the remaining magical energy to form two more spells.
A few of the dead Giant Ants rose up in a bizarre manner, restoring their damaged bodies through regeneration magic.
I squeezed out the magical energy I had and spread it into the air once more, and soon two more spells were activated.
Unlike before, as the level had increased, I could create two individuals as zombies with a single Animate Dead, and thanks to the power of the staff, the number of zombies rising with a single Animate Dead was three.
Moreover, I used Animate Dead twice, so the total number of undead ants that rose was six.
In addition, I regenerated some of their bodies through regeneration magic, so I had almost no magical energy left.
“For now, retreat. Fall back to the food storage room,” I instructed, holding my throbbing head.
Following my instructions, Kayla and Athena immediately started to retreat, and the skeleton, along with the created undead ants, bought a bit more time before starting to fall back.
The specter seemed a bit regretful, but as soon as I retreated, it started following me.
Originally, I wouldn’t have made Giant Ants into undead as it was inefficient, but the situation had changed.
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