Records of Rebirth

Chapter 74 - Unexpected Attack

The creature had the bulbous body of a seal, with many sharp tails like those of a squid. It had no face, only a circular salivating maw which housed many reams of needle-like teeth that it had used to chew through the chasm ceiling. 

The only redeeming feature it had, giving its nightmarish appearance, was that it was hopelessly blind. 

As I watched, it hurled itself through the opening, falling from the fractured ceiling into open air. With nothing to hang on to, its scaly tentacles flailed around like whips, stabbing everything in sight as they tried to hang on.

I barely avoided getting impaled and swiftly launched myself out of the way, just as its tentacles lodged themselves into the walls above me.

But the other wasps around were not so lucky, many of the egg wasps flying were skewered instantly by the monster's attack, the numerous membrane covered clutches they carried sent flying in a cascade of eggs from above.

Messy yolk mixed with purple blood rained down on the wasps below, in the aftermath of an unexpected attack.

My abdomen bled from a scrape left behind by the monster's tentacles but I knew I'd avoided the worst of it. 

The creature was now suspended in a secured position in the air by its tentacles. But that wasn't the end of it, suddenly there were buzzing sounds erupting everywhere. 

Wasps flew out from all over the hive in a chaotic manner with several host creatures in pursuit. 

A horribly injured humongous centipede slithered out from one tunnel across to the next, grabbing and crushing every wasp in its path with poison filled mandibles.

Tunnels collapsed as more monsters burst forth to climb all over the walls.

The tentacled monster near me did not cease its attacks. Once it had taken out every wasp in its vicinity - its tentacles dislodged and it plunged rapidly to secure itself to a new position below, before resuming its chaotic attacks once more.

Creatures appeared all over in the most unexpected ways, taking the wasps by surprise. They seemed to have settled within a pacified state so familiar with normalcy, they never expected an attack from inside. 

This complacency now made them scattered and confused when facing an immediate threat. The wasps were unable to rally together quickly and that made matters much worse for them. 

The attacking creatures, although not fighting in unison, all shared a common enemy and they immediately targeted the Larvae hosts moving around in a frenzy.

Unlike normal creatures, the Larvae hosts moved slower due to not being used to controlling the hosts' bodies yet and were easily identified. 

As I watched, two Larvae hosts in the form of spiders got skewered by the legs of the roaming centipede as it travelled across tunnels, before moving below to kill more Larvae hosts. And soon there were barely any left. 

More creatures poured out from the new cavities created in the walls. And once the tentacled creature descended below, it too punched in more openings leading to the collapse of whole sections. And like an infestation, creatures poured out from everywhere. 

The wasps even with their numerous numbers, found it difficult to keep up with the onslaught of creatures and the fights only got fiercer. 

Amidst the chaotic sea of monsters and wasps, I saw the centipede and tentacled monsters wrecking the most havoc, either through the number of wasps they killed or through the tunnels they collapsed. Egg wasps escaped upwards to safety, leaving the builder wasps behind in the tunnels and the few hunter wasps around to fight for their safety.

It was chaos in its truest form and I was very pleased to watch it unfold much more spectacularly than I envisioned.

But just then, a low rumbling that sounded like growls along with other noises pulled my attention back to the broken ceiling. I immediately flew away from the opening just as huge maws filled with fangs darted out of the ceiling.

From the very hole the tentacled monster had come from earlier, more monsters began to stream out. They looked like wolf dogs with matted, spotted fur, heads and mouths far too large for their bodies with rows of exceptionally sharp fangs. 

Five in total jumped out of the opening, each one making a swipe at me, before free falling towards the ground with pitiful whines. I watched their plight, unsure if any would survive the fall. 

Some were lucky enough to knock into wasps on the way down, breaking their fall and escape death while others were not. And I, distracted, was unable to see another freefalling monster before it grabbed onto my wasp, pulling me down along with it.

It was a creature I could only describe as a gargoyle, with the face of a diseased rat and dirty membranous wings filled with veins I could see through. I tried to shove it off me but its sudden embrace flung me off course and we began spiralling down to the hive. 

I fought off the creature that latched onto me. Our combined weight was proving too much for my wings and we went into a freefall in the matter of seconds. As I looked down, the bottom of the hive rushed up at me and I panicked as I wondered if we would survive the fall.

But then I noticed a giant ape-like creature below us that was pummelling everything in its path into bloody mush and I realised things could be much worse.

Regrettably, we were headed right for it.

I immediately began to struggle harder and finally threw the gargoyle off of me. It fell straight down into the path of the furious giant ape and was obliterated in an instant, while I desperately struggled to gain some height and distance.

I finally stopped my freefall and by then, the giant ape already turned its attention towards a new contender, the centipede. I regained control of my flight and hoisted myself out of their chaotic path and watched as a squadron of hunting wasps appeared before the two creatures. 

The ape grabbed a wasp out of the air and hurled it towards the squadron, clearing a bunch of them in one straight shot. But with their numbers advantage, more wasps arrived to replace them. They gathered around the giant ape and began to sting it from several directions. 

The centipede who tried to attack them from the ground was unable to land a hit and was gradually pushed back as it was no match to the hunter wasp's speed. Both monsters were now stung several times and had begun to get sluggish. 

I didn't like where this was going - slow monsters were much easier to kill. It could not go on like this. So without much thought, I flew towards the attacking squadron of hunter wasps.

Once behind them, I began to target the wasps one by one. They were fully focused on the two large creatures and were not expecting to be attacked by one of their own so none were wary as I approached. 

One thing I'd noticed from appraising the wasp I'd killed, was that it did not have a resistance to paralysis, as they were always the ones administering the paralysis on other creatures. So when I stung them, I hoped the hunter wasps were the same so I could use this weakness to my advantage. 

While the ape and centipede could withstand the paralysis, after building up a resistance from getting stung repeatedly, it was a first for the wasps and so, they began to drop like flies after getting stung by me, much to my delight. 

With each successful sneak attack, a wasp would fall leaving the centipede enough time to impale it with its many legs. The fallen wasps were soon overwhelmed in a stabbing series of gore. And soon there was a pile of dead wasps on the ground. The situation completely reversed while my presence was barely noticed. 

But in victory, another squadron of hunter wasps arrived out of a tunnel, stinging the creatures they came across before flying out of range. However, a huge shadow fell over them and a red crested bat monster surged out to tackle the wasps out of the air, knocking two down into the mouth a vicious crocodilian monster with armoured skin. 

It was enormous, and had so many puncture scars on its back, it needed all the wasps fighting together to subdue it, yet it did not back down an inch. Refusing to submit, it deftly climbed over the walls while snatching the wasps from mid-air to crush within its jaws. 

I saw the remnants of those dog-like beasts teaming up to attack a hunter wasp they seized out of the air. Another wasp was flung away by the giant ape and I swerved to avoid it in flight. 

The bottom of the hive was too chaotic with battles constantly breaking out everywhere so I looked towards the top. I knew it was better to gain some distance away from the battle before the larger monsters reached me.

The walls were collapsing rapidly due to their chaotic movements and it seemed only rising up to a stable height would be safe, so I left the monsters to their fight.

Unfortunately when I rose higher, I collided head on with a new squadron of wasps, fresh from the tunnels.