《Bugs》Chapter 12
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Leaving the baby queen in the hive to sleep I made sure no one saw me coming out of the portal before walking out of the alleyway and walking on my way.
I then look at the menu and find a new tag named ‘Companions’. I opened it and found ‘Nameless Queen’ on it.
I blinked several times then opened ‘Pets’ and found the thousands of bugs.
“So she is a cut above the rest huh. Maybe other bugs will become like this.” I mutter to myself.
Anyway it’s not like I could do anything about it so instead I was going to enjoy my freedom of finally leaving this town.
I thought a bit and then noticed how I would be able to get much better food for the bugs. I noticed how even with so much rat meat the bugs I had weren’t really growing much beyond what I saw. It probably means the limit of rotting rat meat is what I have seen. Even the Vampiric Mosquito was a result of using humans instead of rat meat.
I raced towards the gate and with great pleasure I was able to pass the barrier I first hit when I had first arrived in this city.
Outside was a city of tents where people were shouting for parties and craftsmen classes were shouting to sell their goods.
I avoid them all and start walking towards the fields.
Before I broke through the crowd I noticed a wooden board everyone was standing next to.
On top I saw “NOTICE BOARD” written in big bold letters.
Considering what I know about RPG games a notice board is where small tasks and quests are placed normally commissioned by the city guard, lord or king.
Walking over I push my way to the front and see the posters. [Rabbit invasion] [Wolf Scourge] [Bear herd] [Buying meat]
All these were the names of each quest. Kill a certain number of each animal or gather the meat of one kind of animal.
I put my hand on the rabbit mission to see the details.
Quest:
Rabbit Invasion
With the drop in hunters and advance of human plantations the rabbit homes decreased and they have moved into the farmer plantations and have begun to eat the crops. Immediate subjection of rabbits needed. Will pay 3 silver for every 30 rabbits killed.
Difficulty:
E
Reward:
3 silver coins
Objective:
Kill Rabbits 0/30
Rabbits
Level 8-12 vermin that eat crops but are too quick or strong because they move in groups of 3-5 and when attacked they enter a frenzy.
“What the fuck!? Rabid rabbits! Still the level range clearly shows that it was meant for people that were at a higher level. Even the difficulty would suggest a party quest.” I thought to myself.
A grin appeared on my face.
I accepted the quest and looked at the meat gathering one.
Quest:
Buying Meat
Meat has been in short supply recently and prices are high. I am willing to buy any meat you can bring me. If you bring the carcass back as well I am willing to pay extra. I will take any animal available. The minimum I would accept is 10 chucks of meat that are dropped by animals any less, don’t come.
Price:
Rabbit meat: 30c
Wild Dog meat: 50c
Wolf meat: 1s
Difficulty:
F
Reward:
Depends on the size of the turned in catch.
Objective:
Bring at least 10 chunks of meat to Butcher: 0/10
This was a simple mission and from it I got a hint that shows the body doesn’t disappear after being killed so the body itself must be a drop that can be processed for extra materials or used for other purposes like for a necromancer to call it from the dead.
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With these two quests accepted I leave the board and the tent area without looking at any of the party requests.
I opened the minimap and found an area that was marked as a rabbit area but all the farm plantations were marked as such so I just walked around.
It didn’t take long for me to spot a small group of 3 rabbits. Above all their heads was ‘Rabbit Level 8’. I wonder how I should do this since they would probably have lots of agility and if they see me they would attack. I don’t want to damage them too much and damage their hide which I want as a drop.
I call out the worker Lightning Striders and tell them to start buzzing around the rabbits. They looked over at the sound of the fluttering bugs but besides getting a bit irritated with the sound they turned back to eating the crops.
I slowly release a few more slowly setting up the trap.
When I had 30 flying around or near the rabbits I summoned 4 Vampiric Mosquitos and the queen.
Their wing beats were silent like the wind so it was impossible to notice them in the noisy circle of lightning striders.
To make it worse with a thought the striders formed into three groups and came from above and hit the back of the three rabbits and let out their discharge and stunned them.
With one hand gesture the 6 mosquitos split in two groups while the queen heads to one rabbit herself.
With them stunned the 5 bloodsuckers gripped the fur near the neck and extending their long stinger they stuck it deep in the neck and started to suck them dry. The queen had the quickest suction as her stick-like abdomen turned round and became swollen with blood.
The rabbits weren’t quiet while this happened and they began thrashing but the grip of the bugs were too strong to make them let go from a weakening beast like rabbits.
Also as shocking as it sounds the HP of the rabbits went down at a scary pace as their blood was sucked out. They have 50 hp but in 1 minute the queen sucked her prey dry and dead making her body swell to half the size of the rabbit that was about the size of a medium sized dog.
You have killed a rabbit.
30 exp
1 rabbit hide
1 chunk of meat
I smiled. I have always gotten some exp from the bugs killing. I don’t know how much I would get if I killed the rabbit by myself but it seems as the master of the bugs I would get a lot of experience by letting them kill for me while I control them.
The other two rabbits were the same but the experience I got was 10 instead which meant that I got more from the queen since there were less beings that attacked.
I recalled the mosquitos and let them rest and digest the blood. The queen is a recently appeared breed and unlike the previous forms she laid eggs so the blood she gathers would go into preparing the eggs.
I walked over and saw that there were no drops but looking at the inventory I saw all the drops. Three chunks of meat and 1 hide. The other two rabbits didn’t drop hides.
I return my gaze to the rabbits. They were completely dried of blood. It made me suddenly realize something.
“Didn’t they just bleed the meat. Wouldn’t that make the meat and pelt high quality if I process it properly?” I mutter and identify the rabbits.
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Rabbit corpse (High quality)
A rabbit corpse that has had all its blood drained from its body. There is no visible damage to meat or hide which would result in high quality goods being gathered.
Can be processed for more goods.
A grin not too different from the time I had gone deranged appeared on my face.
“Looks like money won’t be a problem from now on.” I muttered as I looked around and saw a group of five rabbits.
I pick up the three rabbits and put them in my inventory.
I move over towards the new group. Then I let out 50 lightning striders to irritate the rabbits then call out 100 blood suckers. I tell them not to poison the rabbits. After they were close enough the striders attacked and paralyzed them and 20 blood suckers from the 100 split up and held onto the rabbits and began sucking them dry.
With their small size even with 20 they couldn’t all drain the rabbits but with the sacrifice of several lightning striders they all escaped full of blood. I called some mosquitos to finish them off. Only 3 of them dropped meat but there was also a rabbit's foot that was an item I could turn into a lucky accessory as well as rabbit ears and another rabbit hide.
Unlike before the corpses were medium quality when using Blood suckers.
“Hm… strange. Maybe the poison still dripped out even though it doesn’t say it is poisoned. It would be bad to use these to get money so I will use them to breed more blood suckers.” I say and drop the five bodies into the blood sucker habit.
I had the smart ones breed into them since I need smart ones at the moment.
With six meat already and 8 rabbits killed I was moving really quick.
It was at that moment that I realized I was really strong when I looked as a party fought the rabbits.
They moved with some coordination and was punishing the poor man that was the tank from all sides.
One jumped from behind and kicked the man on the side of the head. At the same time two rabbits ram the shield making him almost fall. While he was distracted three rabbits rushed to the people in the back which was a mage and an archer.
The archer shot randomly as the rabbits dodged nimbly.
The mage was more useful as he used earth magic so he used [Quake] which is a beginner level spell that causes the ground to shake and makes it hard to stand.
The Warrior moved and slashed one from behind on the head causing a fatal hit almost killing the rabbit.
The gore in it was a bit harsh. Bone bits and lots of blood showed up and I could easily see the discomfort on the face of the party seeing such a bloody display.
They freeze up because of that and the mage and archer are assaulted by the rabbits that jump on them and start clawing them until they flash and die. All that was left was the warrior that was beat black and blue until he also died.
“Am I overpowered or did I get lucky?” I muttered.
The rabbits look at the dead comrade and then let out a screech of rage before running away.
“I’m rather glad I’m not a front liner but if I was in a party I wouldn’t be using a large number of bugs and maybe one or two large ones.” I mutter.
I summon the Lightning striders and have them circle the rabbits again while I walk over to the dead rabbit. It was horrible quality and wouldn’t be worth shit. I dropped it for the bugs' food since it was still a stronger animal.
I then called out 12 mosquitos and started another assault that landed me 4 meat, one from each, 1 hide, a rabbit’s foot and a rabbit's tail.
“There, 10 rabbit meat. Got the minimum meat plus the bodies. These four are already beaten and hurt and won’t work well to sell whole.”
With that mutter they drop into my hive and I pull out a mana potion and drink it to recover my mana.
I noticed how the mosquito queen had begun to lay the eggs. There was one strange egg connected to my hive mind. The feeling was the same as the queen which meant a new queen Vampiric Mosquito.
The time was 1 day before hatching.
I had lots of time before more of them hatch. I also felt that the queen wouldn’t die so early unlike the other bugs. The term queen seems to have more meaning than I know but I think they work as the best breeders. The queen spider I have seen to only lay 1 egg and that is her own replacement. The queen takes only the smartest and strongest of its kind to mate with. I think the mosquito queen would be like a bee instead of a spider.
Well what was important is that after laying the eggs she could suck more blood again. Oh right, in terms of level she was 13 before but now is 17 which means it had a significant rise.
Since she was ready for another round I found a group of five rabbits which were shockingly all level 12. They looked old, big and strong.
The oldest and largest was on the lookout and spotted me from very far.
I knew this guy was a cut above the rest. His eyes were alert unlike the rest of the rabbits and his ears were flipping all around and he was smelling the air for danger. Sadly for him I had sent the Striders before he noticed me so it wouldn’t look like a coincidence I was there.
The noise annoyed the elder rabbit and as it turned and screeched at the bugs all the others rained down at its companions.
They all let out sounds of pain and made the elder turn to look at them alert but in doing so it made the group behind him attack and stun him.
They ran away as the Vampiric Mosquitos latched on. The queen took the alert elder on her own. With her rise in level her stats have risen as well as well as her size making her a bit bigger now.
The sudden arrival of a large bug then was rapidly expanding with his own blood and weighing down on the rabbit made him rage. Like a bull it began to thrash around as did the other rabbits.
None of them thought to help each other to swat away the bugs from each other's back only to shake off the creature that was in a position they couldn’t reach.
Soon, blood loss effects were showing and they slowly dropped forward one by one as the last of their blood was drained.
You have killed 1 Elder Rabbit and 4 rabbits
You have gained 150 exp. Level up
Elder Rabbit Hide
2 Rabbit hide
4 rabbit meat chunks
Elder Rabbit Ring
By killing an Elder Rabbit you have gotten the animosity of the rabbits
I looked shocked. That was a variant rabbit. Not to mention I got equipment.
I pulled out the ring from the inventory and identified it.
Elder Rabbit Ring
A ring from an elder rabbit. The elder rabbit is the one of the oldest rabbits of the burrow and is the wisest in the ways to survive many years avoiding and fighting off predators and humans. The ring symbolizes that wisdom.
Warning: Wearing this ring will cause rabbits to hunt you.
+5 agi
+10 Wis
A ring with pro’s and con’s. These rabbits are a pain in the ass to kill head on but ambushes work nicely. This drop if auctioned may give me a nice amount of cash.
…
Then again if I put this on I can attract huge groups of them and hunt them more efficiently than before while reducing their number very fast and feeding my bugs even faster.
“Yeah, let’s go with that but only after I have enough bugs to handle a swarm of rabbits.” I say grinning with my madman smile.
With that plan I turn to go look for more rabbits only to walk into a portal into the Queen's Palace and hear the screeching of a little queen and Pheromones screaming [HUNGRY].
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