Alongside Kaelyn, it had been the other eleven SBS troops that were sent in, but I had to wonder why they wouldn’t turn back at this juncture. There was no way to know where either tunnel led. Were they just too confident in themselves? Davies and his team asked us to wait whilst they checked the tunnels, but they didn’t need to go far. They waved us over to the left and shone their torches on the white x that had been marked on the wall. The way they knew it would be there made me realise that Davies had known his soldiers were going deeper in.
We continued like that, generally walking in silence but whispering in hushed tones when necessary. Davies, Jackson and Stevens were up front, my friends and I in the middle, with Sergeant Hill and Private Grant bringing up the rear.
Every so often, we would emerge into another open area, sometimes with three or four or five other openings, but after a while, I noticed that it was always the left tunnel we were following. Not that the tunnel itself veered left. It was hard to tell exactly where it was going but none of those tunnels were straight. They were like the London Underground, veering right at points and swerving left at others. The only thing I could tell was that we weren’t going through the soil to the other side. We were going down, each tunnel having a gradual slope, leading deeper in.
But after a couple of hours of descending, more disturbing signs began to appear. At first, it was just the odd animal bone, almost indifferently tossed aside like it had got stuck in something’s teeth and they’d flicked it out. But the further we walked, the more bones we saw until it was obvious there were whole animal carcasses, some covered in some sort of slime. Some of those animals looked much like the ones outside. Melted or dissolved, surrounded by a light green fluid that almost seemed to be bubbling, little clear domes appearing on the surface and popping as another one appeared elsewhere.
“Careful,” Davies said. “It’s some sort of acidic venom, the scientists said.”
I raised an eyebrow, though Davies couldn’t see it as he walked ahead. “Why would you let them continue on?” I asked. Davies didn’t break stride, though he was careful to stick to the middle of the tunnel, giving a wide berth to the pools of melted flesh around us. I did hear him sigh before he answered.
“They were just meant to scout – try to find out what we’re dealing with here. No combat. But something’s happened,” he glanced over his shoulder at me before turning back to the darkness ahead, the flashlights unable to penetrate more than a few metres. “You probably didn’t notice back there, but there was no mark on the wall at the previous tunnel.”
His words made me tense a little. “They didn’t come down here?”
“No, they did,” Davies replied. “But not of their own accord. Something’s forced them this way. Whatever it was, they should have followed their training. Continued taking the left tunnels, but I suspect they were in a hurry and didn’t get the chance to mark the entrance and exits. Hill’s doing that now.”
I glanced over my shoulder, Hill and Grant lost in the darkness but for their flashlights. Then I bumped into something ahead of me and I turned around to see Davies stumble and flash me a look of annoyance.
“Sorry,” I said. How was I supposed to know he had stopped? Davies, Jackson and Stevens had their flashlights illuminating the edges of the tunnel and I saw what they had discovered. Backpacks and radios. That wasn’t all.
Davies walked over to inspect the remains – a torso lying to the side of one of the backpacks, though the legs were nowhere to be seen. I had no idea who the soldier was. Even had I known him before, I certainly wouldn’t have been able to recognise him now. There was no face. Just a skull with a single eyeball and tongue hanging out of the mouth and the odd remnant of what used to be skin dotting its surface.
I gagged, the contents of the ready-meal I’d eaten outside the cave doing its best to escape but I held it down. It was a close-run thing whether it took more effort to keep from retching than using my mana constructs. Right behind my shoulder, the other three weren’t able to have the same resolve, running to the edge of the tunnel, crouching over and vomiting. Loudly. Dammit, it made it harder for me to not join in, but I held my nerve, though my throat burned as I forced the acid from my stomach back the way it had come. What I absolutely made sure to do was not look at the skull again, though the image had already seared itself into my mind.
Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.
A part of me wondered why Davies would bring us this way, knowing his team had not come of their own free will. Whatever it was that had forced them down here was clearly something that was beyond them. Eleven SBS troops. The best that Britain had to offer. And they had Kaelyn with them to boot. If they weren’t able to deal with it, then coming this way was nothing less than a bad idea. We should have turned back.
Then I felt a heavy feeling in my chest, a slight flush in my cheeks. What choice did Davies have? Leave his team and return to the entrance? Come back with more reinforcements. More heavy firepower. But would those soldiers survive. And alongside them was Kaelyn. Who had plunged into the charging bovines we had faced earlier to make sure we survived. Who hadn’t hesitated to go and defend Carmen and Charlotte back at the house with the wolves. What had I said to her back then? I couldn’t lose her. She was part of my group now. And my first thought was that we should have left her? That didn’t sit well with me.
Then, from further back the way we had just walked came a sound that echoed through the tunnel. A clattering, like the sound of stone falling down the side of a rockface. Or pebbles and rocks from the structure around us being dislodged and rattling against the walls. Everyone turned their flashlights in that direction but it hardly made a dent in the cavernous darkness.
[Fireball]
The ball of flame appeared before me, Hill and Grant moving to the side as I pushed it away in the direction of the noise. As it travelled through, reflecting from the sides of the tunnel, we heard a skittering and more pebbles falling to the floor. And then we saw it, the fireball illuminating the massive bulk that hung to the ceiling taking up half the size of the tunnel.
Two massive pincers – large enough to crush the bulls outside – shielded its eyes, as the fireball passed by its yellow carapace, reflecting from the shiny brown armour that covered each segment of its body. Eight armoured legs hooked into the ceiling above, pebbles scattering against the walls with every little shift of its body. And right there at the end was the curved tail, arching towards the ground, the bulbous tip glistening with light-green venom that dripped to the ground and where it landed, the dirt would part with a sizzle.
It was obvious just from looking at it that this was the creature that had caused the carnage outside. It dwarfed us in size, each segment of its leg the same height as a grown man. No wonder the troopers had run further in. No wonder the trooper here had no legs, most likely caught between one of those pincers.
I threw out another couple of fireballs, one a few seconds after the first, just to do my best to keep an eye on the beast as I shuffled backwards. “Don’t make sudden movements and move slowly backwards until I tell you guys to run,” I whispered. The others didn’t need to be told as they had begun to back away already. As the first fireball passed by again, the scorpion once again covered its eyes with its pincers, but it hadn’t moved. Yet.
As I walked backwards as slowly as possible, I created a mana construct, similar to the one I had used on Carmen, but instead of waiting for the scorpions movement, after tagging it with an anchor point, I stretched the thread out myself, pulling the second anchor point towards me until it was around an inch from where I stood. Then I made the anchor point as large as I could, a large ball as wide as I was tall.
The scorpion was definitely stronger than the bovines, but how strong wasn’t something I could tell. Maybe that would come with time or maybe that was something I could get the scientists to figure out. All I did know is that I felt this creature would take a lot more mana to control than even the cows earlier. It was a good thing I had had that meal now, otherwise I think I could have already collapsed. As it was, I wasn’t feeling it at all.
I continued walking backwards as I poured mana into the anchor on my end, creating the time loop that I needed. I channelled and channelled, hoping it would be enough to keep it occupied for us to at least put a considerable distance between us, but before I had even filled the ball halfway, with the second fireball was passing by the scorpion, it made its move, its legs skittering across the ceiling with a speed that belied its size.
“Run,” I screamed, taking my own advice as I continued pouring mana into the ball. I stopped running when I figured I had put enough distance between the scorpion and myself and turned back to it. The anchor was almost full, but the scorpion was almost upon it. “Find the rest. I’ll hold it here for as long as I can.”
“I’ll stay with you,” Carmen said.
I was about to object, thinking it would be safer if she ran with the others. But who was I kidding? The best hope we had of getting out of these tunnels was to kill this damn thing. And she was the strongest of the others. She was stronger than me now according to the System ranks.
“Fine, but the rest of you go. Charlotte, they might need healing and Kian – you need to protect her.”
They didn’t argue, and within moments, Carmen and I were alone, her flashlight illuminating the darkness ahead as the ends of the scorpions pincer snapped, a sound like metal smacking against metal echoing through the tunnel. And then I could see the mana draining from the anchor point, and although I couldn’t see it in the dark, I knew the scorpion was being pulled back.
“Well, babe,” I said. “Just you and me. Against that.”
To my surprise, she leaned in and kissed me on the cheek.
“Time to see how strong we are,” she said.
Varus Thorne was building houses when the world ended.
"Power is a path paved in sorrow. His began with blood and screams."
- ? Slow-burn, weak-to-overpowered evolution
- ? A Star Wars–inspired space opera setting
- ? A father's journey through pain and purpose
- ? Real LitRPG progression—earned, not handed
- ? No harem. No fluff. All fire.