Reincarnated As A Plant Life

Chapter 272: Minecrawlers [XII]

Within a few minutes, most of the light runes had been extracted from the walls and laid at Lucius' feet. For some reason the furtong were working at an almost frantic rate, as if there was some sort of time limit to their task.

He wasn't complaining though. If they had found some kind of motivation to work harder, then that was good for them.

Once all the light runes had been collected, he began to explain his plan.

...

"Your wisdom knows no bounds, Lighted One," Pagan whispered under his breath once Lucius had finished explaining, his eyes staring at the ground in pure awe.

"It's really not that impressive," Lucius replied.

For the first time in a while he was reminded that the leaflings weren't really on the same level as humans in terms of creativity and ingenuity. Even after having explained the idea to Pagan a few times, he clearly couldn't fully comprehend why or how it worked.

Ursa however seemed to have a better understanding, though from the anectode he shared, it was clear that even this was merely due to past experience.

"So then are you ready?" he asked, to which Ursa and Pagan responded with a nod of their heads.

Lucius quickly packed some of the light runes into his knapsack and placed the remaining ones into the sack he had brought from the den, before handing it over to Pagan.

"Furtong, gather around, we are about to begin," he announced.

WIthin a few moments, the furtong were all lined up against the crystal-earth wall that separated this tunnel from the caverns.

"When I say go, all of you will try to tear it down at once," he announced, standing right behind them, ready to pounce through the moment the walls came down.

"Go," he shouted, and the furtong strained to tear the wall down. A few stress cracks began to develop on the outer surface, however, it did not amount to anything substantial.

"Again! Go!"

The furtong strained once more, and even more stress cracks began to develop.

"Aim at the spots where the cracks appeared! One more time, go!"

The stress cracks became longer and deeper, however the wall still stood. And now, several furtong were already on their knees, their breathing laboured from the strain.

"Come on, get up!" he shouted, though the furtong did not move. It seemed what ever motivation they had before was not enough to push through the fatigue.

"What will I tell your families once I make it out of here? That their brothers, fathers, and uncles couldn't escape because they forgot how to mould earth? That they were too incompetent to use the gifts they were blessed with at birth?" Lucius asked.

"Tell me. Did all your suffering and anger amount to just this?" he continued, a little annoyed.

"Just a moment ago I heard some of you claiming you would take seats on the new Forest Council. Some of you said you would be the new rulers, new kings... you spoke of the atrocities you would commit against the venari. Yet this is all you amount to?" he asked, breaking out into a sort of ugly laughter.

"If this is truly all you can do, then step aside. Your anger is luke warm, and you will never have your revenge. Your people were slaughtered and mistreated for generations, and it will continue till the end of time because their fathers and brothers were too weak to do anything," he finished, before walking towards the wall.

~Eh, what's this?~ Lucius thought to himself, hearing a rhythmic beat thumping from all around him.

After a few seconds of searching, he realized where it was coming from.

~Did I really rattle them up, that much?~ Lucius thought to himself, nearly breaking out into laughter at the absurdity of it all.

It seemed his enhanced senses were picking up their heartbeats... the angry thumps of a legion of mistreated creatures. Evidence that they were not just going to lie down and let some saviour work to save their brethren alone.

"I like the looks on your faces. If you want to prove me wrong, tear that wall down," he said, this time more calmly.

"Go!" he shouted after a few breaths, and a choir of grunting sounds rang out from the horde of furtong in front of him. They strained till their eyes went red from lack of oxygen, and srained even further than that, until a few of them collapsed.

Still, the expression on their faces did not soften, and Lucius wasn't going to let them quit after just this much.

"Come on! You lot are better than a simple crystal wall. Go!!" he shouted, and another chorus of grunting sounds rang out.

The walls began to rumble slightly, and the cracks on the crystal began to travel as if it were made of glass.

The furtong continued to push, sending the cracks deeper and further with every passing breath.

A few more seconds went by and-

The crystal wall shattered into millions of tiny shards. The air glittered with beautiful crystal snow, as the path ahead was revealed. Every single furtong had passed out from exhaustion, however, their job was complete.

Now it was Lucius's turn to prove himself.

"Ursa, Pagan, with me!" he shouted, before rushing into the cavern at an incredible speed.

He pulled one of the light runes out of his knapsack, and held it up in the air.

The venari guards within the cavern only froze in shock for less than a fraction of a second, beforey moving to deal with the threat in front of them.

"Cover your eyes," Lucius shouted, regarding Ursa. He now spoke in the bear-man's native tongue, meaning only he, Pagan and Ursa could understand it.

In the next few milli-seconds, he pumped energy through the runic circuits of the light rune, causing it to glow with blinding intensity. Much like a flashbang, it took the sight of everyone in the room, before exploding with a pop.

~Should've thought of this earlier,~ Lucius thought to himself in satisfaction, as he rushed towards the closest purple-runic in the room.

He grabbed the creature by the throat, before slamming it into the ground- its head bouncing off the floor from the force of it all.

Even as he was doing this, his tails lashed out to catch the other blinded enemies, sending them flying around the cavern like rag-dolls. One of the guards found itself on the bad side of lady luck, and was impaled into the stalactite on the ceiling.

"Use the barrier spell, that attack was magic-based!" one of the venari at the backlines shouted.

It was dressed in blue robes, and emitted an energy reading far above the purple tunics... on the same level as Lucius's current output.