Drip-Fed

Path of Responsibility 7 – A Wall

“That’s a problem,” Korith squeaked.

Just three corners past the reaches of their training area, the party was presented with a hurdle.

The room before them was quite large and yet its floor was hardly visible. Dozens, if not a few hundred, of Lanaan insects were skittering about, moving beside and across each other. In addition to those on the floor, there were several more using bridges made from hardened chitin, connecting openings in the curved ceiling that went into various brood chambers. Here and there, a Lanaan insect could be seen carrying a larva or pupa in its mandibles.

All such tunnels were death traps. The larvae were dangerous in their own way, capable of launching sticky silk threads, and guarded by elite insects. There was no point in facing them besides the challenge itself and even then it should only be done in controlled circumstances. The guidebook was quite clear on all of this.

The sole true way to advance lay in a peculiar segment of the wall. The chitin there was thin enough that the ambient glow of the walls shone through it, revealing a corridor behind it. The issue was that it was on the other side of where the group currently laid low – and it also looked solid.

“Any other ways forward?” Aclysia asked.

“None,” Apexus assured. He had been scouting the environment in

Apexus, with all of his bulk, landed in front of the hole. He forced himself into the gap. Had he been a regular human, he would have been stuck. Even while liquifying his muscles and dislocating his bones, he had to relinquish his wings. The green feathers fell to the ground, sheared off by the edge of the broken chitin.

Once on the other side, Apexus grabbed the edge of the hole. Reysha joined him, her demon arm pulsing with black veins as they tore the opening open further. Korith turned just as the teeming horde behind her came upon her. An edge of her armour got stuck on the hole. An insect got her by the foot. Apexus and Reysha grabbed her by the shoulder and yanked her through.

Korith let out a pained hiss, scales tearing off her skin as they got caught under the teeth and mandibles of the insect. She hit the stone ground on the other side hard, armour clattering. Adrenaline pounded through her system, muting the pain. She was back on her bloody foot within moments.

The Lanaan insects poured through the gap with frightful coordination. One or two at a time was a pace the four of them could handle well. Rippling Palms, strikes and swipes by weapons destroyed the monsters as they made it to the other side, clogging up the way for the creatures that followed. The hole got smaller and smaller by the second. The last insect only made it halfway through, before the gap became too narrow for the abdomen to follow the midsection. The closing wall cut the monster in half.

“Let me look at that!” Aclysia insisted, putting Korith on the floor. The kobold blinked, only realizing just how bad the state of her leg was. The tendon stood out, white, among frayed skin and muscle. She tilted her head back, avoiding looking at it, instead concentrating on the soothing warmth of the healing spell.

Apexus and Reysha gave each other the once over at the same time. The rogue had a number of small scrapes, but by and large she was unharmed. Apexus was visibly thinner, his muscles and bulk diminished from the amount of mass he had burned. Besides the loss of his wings, there was no injury on him and there was plenty of food on this side of the wall to make up for it.

The healing light ebbed away. Aclysia inspected her party member’s foot from a few angles. The previously injured spots were starkly visible, gaps of pink flesh between red scales. “Ohhh, that feels so weird,” Korith lamented, when she felt the air brush over the spots. “Sensitive in the bad way…”

“I know the feeling,” Reysha said.

“Since when do you have scales?” Korith asked.

“I once dropped a hammer on my toe and the nail fell off.” The redhead wiggled the foot that had been affected. “I imagine that’s similar.”

“Unpleasant imagery,” Aclysia mumbled and got up. “I may be able to aid you with regrowing the scales once we rest for the evening.”

“Or we could pull the rest out so I don’t step on one in the bathroom,” Reysha suggested.

“It was one time!” Korith squeaked.

“It cut my foot!”

“Stop having such weak feet!”

“Girl, I used to have weak feet, before half of my life consisted of walking! Now I got soles like sandstone.”

“They’re not that bad,” Apexus denied.

Reysha made a tossing gesture. “Definitely not dainty lady feet.”

“Before we get stuck bantering in place, shall we advance?” Aclysia gestured down the corridor.