The Nest

Caxon and Silver made quick work of the nearby ants however there seemed to be an endless amount of them.

Following the flow of the ants the pair made their way towards what should be the ant's nest. After killing nearly 20 ants he then heard Amon's voice in his head.

'Young master I have found the entrance of the ant's nest, if you continue moving forward and take a slight left you should run into me.'

'Good job, make sure you stop anymore ants from leaving the nest, I will go back and collect the antennas. Silver take care of any of the stragglers and then meet up with Amon.'

The group all had their orders and they quickly moved to carry them out. Silver was able to take care of the few ants that Amon had missed while searching for the entrance to the ants' nest.

Caxon found 23 ants and collect all 46 antennas and stored them in his backpack. Luckily the backpack was large and he only needed the tips of the antennas as prove or else he would definitely run out of room before he collected everything he needed for the mission.

After he finished collecting the antennas he finally made his way to meet up with Amon. He soon saw a large pile of dirt with a big hole facing a steep diagonal angle down.

As he looked down hole it was pitch black, although he couldn't see them, he could hear the legs of many ants skittering around the tunnels in front of him.

"Well, that's ominous."

Caxon made a make shift torch before he lit in on fire to provide light in the tunnels. Although he didn't love the idea there was nothing he could do so he simply had to walk into the ant's nest.

As he walked down the tunnel he followed the biggest main tunnel he had entered but he soon past smaller tunnels on the side. He also stopped using perfect mimicry and revealed his true strength of a rank 6 since there shouldn't be any humans in these tunnels. Even though the focus he needed for this skill had gone down tremendously it was still a distraction he didn't need right now.

Caxon looked down the small tunnels he could see the light of his torch reflecting off of the eyes of ants down the tunnels. The ants seemed to fear the fire and backed away from it. He didn't not like that he was now in the heart of the enemy's territory, but if he went down the side tunnels the ants would just continue to retreat and he would then still be deep inside the nest except he may get lost on the way.

'Young master if we continue following this tunnel, we will soon reach the queen in a large chamber with many eggs, she is a powerful class 1 beast and seems to be close to becoming a class 2. There are also 5 weaker class 1 ants protecting the chamber and their queen. It seems like the queen has noticed our presence as she has started to make weird movements and seems to be fearful of us.'

It was at this moment that he heard a loud screech from the bottom of the tunnel. The tunnel was suddenly filed with more screeches. Then the sound of hundreds of ant legs running across the ground combined with the screeching coming from all directions made the tunnel deafeningly loud.

Caxon quickly took a look around and surveyed his surroundings. He could hear ants coming from above and below them in the main tunnel, he also saw that they had one of the smaller tunnels connecting directly to their right.

'Amon handle anything that comes from behind us, Silver you take care of the small tunnel right there I will deal with anything in front of us. Amon if the queen or the other class one ants start making a move tell me.'

He quickly made a plan as he heard the ants getting louder and louder, he knew soon they would be upon him and his followers. He stuck the torch into the ground in the middle of his group as he put both hands on his sword.

The first thing Caxon saw was the fire from the torch reflecting off of a large number of eyes from further down the tunnel. He could see that the ants did not just crawl on the ground but up the sides and even from the top of the tunnel. Luckily the tunnel was not wide enough for many to fit at the same time and it seemed like only 3 or 4 ants could fit down the tunnel at once.

The first ant to run up tried to bite him with its mandibles but Caxon simply thrust his sword into the ants now defenseless face. He was able to take out a few ants like this, however the rest of them seemed to learn as the kept their mandibles shut and simply tried to use them as a bludgeon while defending themselves.

Caxon could hear both Amon and Silver fighting their own battles but he was too busy to think about their fights and had to trust that they would be ok. Of course, he was not worried about Amon since he wouldn't be able to handle anything that old man couldn't but he was nervous that Silver might be overwhelmed. Even if he could bring Silver back their battle formation would be crushed and if he was surrounded in these tunnels he would definitely not make it out.

Caxon was able to handle the ants relatively well as he tried not to lose too much ground against them, but when he looked forward and saw the large amount still waiting in the tunnels for their chance to attack him, he grew concerned.

He started thinking of another way he could use his strength to better handle this fight. He could try to trip the ants with his earth element but with 6 legs he was doubtful of this usefulness, any wall he could build with his current mana and understanding would be weak and completely drain him, plus these ants lived by making tunnels so that was obviously a poor choice.

He didn't have the mana to make an offensive air or water attack that would do significant harm to these ants, and lastly the ants seemed to ignore the torch and these ants didn't look flammable so even if he created a the biggest fire he could it would not solve the problem.

It was then that Caxon remembered when Amon had taught him about infusing his mana into his weapon.

Although he had never tried this before he had very good control of his mana and he was able to use this technique successfully while in the heat of battle.

Caxon's sword soon illuminated the tunnel in a faint golden glow. He could feel his mana draining but the speed was not detrimental. He quickly sent a slash towards the nearest ant to see the effects of this improved sword, the ant protected itself with its mandibles just like all the other ants had before. This time instead of his sword being blocked the ant was instantly killed.

He wanted to conserve as much mana as he could which meant ending this mana sword technique as soon as he could. Think of this Caxon rushed towards the tunnel full of ants as he cut them apart quickly moving down the tunnel.

'Amon grab the torch and follow we are moving further down; Silver stay between me and Amon and if we stop near another side cave make sure to guard it.'

As he pushed forwards he made sure to relay his orders to the other fighters without stopping his attack.