Chapter 87

The leg felt like it was being burnt slowly.

“It is termite venom!” Ivey screamed. “Get Sophia. She is the only one who can heal it.”

Daniel held down his own scream scream while anxiously watching his mana. The moment he judged it to be enough, he triggered Animal Sense, directing it in a beam of force toward where the queen was.

Relief flooded through him. It was still there. He had been petrified that it would sneak up on them.

The club in his hand sang to him, wanting to get closer to the leg. Priscilla’s vision showed his thigh torn open, the armour having done nothing. It was a foot-long wound, infected with black streaks running through it. Venom and dark magic were what the king had control of, and Daniel wondered what he was looking at. Some unholy amalgamation of the two, he was sure.

The club urged him to move it closer to his leg.

Daniel could sense the weapon and Priscilla communicating with each other. A continuous flow of information, and he knew it was about him. I am right here, he thought at them, but they were ignoring him.

Once more, the urge to place the club against his leg hit him. He had half lifted it before he stopped himself. He understood what the two had planned. They had divined that normal healing was insufficient, and the venom needed to be cut out. They wanted to let the club cut, bite, and leech the venom out.

“The club is on my side,” Daniel groaned out, hoping they heard him.

The weapon, while not excited, was impatient. It twisted in his hand, and its surface slapped down on the wound. It withered its teeth and claws, apparently hitting every nerve in his leg, and darkness swept over him.

“Wait,” Tamara ordered. “The club is doing something.”

She was not joking. It was like red-hot pokers being pushed into his flesh, and his mana was continually draining into it. An instruction to move the club came from Priscilla. Lift and place lower. Daniel did as instructed. A surge of pain in a new area, and his eyes rolled as he struggled to maintain consciousness.

“It is working,” Tamara said in excitement. “There is less black.”

Again. Priscilla’s emotions were insistent.

He couldn’t. The pain was too much.

Do it. It was a like a mental slap. Daniel’s head rang. She was on his side; he reminded himself. If she . . . he needed to listen.

He lifted the club up and down. “Oh god.” Daniel gasped, but stopped himself from losing consciousness again.

Another healing spell hit him.

“Keep going,” Ivey encouraged him. “It is working.”

“Sophia?” Daniel begged, wanting relief. Hoping that she could negate the need to use the very blunt instrument that his seed club represented.

“She is doing all she can. Her magic is not strong enough to fight the venom by herself,” Ivey told him. The words were almost the final straw. He would have to move the club again. He did not want to do that. And then he remembered Zac. The boy had demanded to be allowed to fight. All enthusiasm and energy, but just a kid who needed to be protected. A child that he had sworn to protect.

Move . Another demand. Priscilla wanted him to push the club harder into his leg. It was going to be bad.

He pushed.

Agony! Pressure, cutting, sucking, right to the bone. The frantic movements reduced.

Maybe it was over, he thought.

Move!

Fark!

Lift the club like this!

He remembered Janice fighting and forced his muscles to obey. Stop torturing me, he begged inside. Sympathy but unrelenting resolve met him from the mouse.

Move.

No complaints, no argument. He lifted and pushed.

God.

More heals hit him.

Despite the aggression of his action and how much force he directed into the club as he pushed it into the open wound on his leg, it felt like the pain was less this time. There was a bubble of conversation around him.

Shift.

After the initial shock of contact, there was only a tickle. The club needed to do less in each new position.

“What do you mean there was no core in the king?” Ivey said from next to him. He could hear the disappointment in her voice.

“Too much magic damage,” a male voice answered.

Move.

He could do this!

There was a slight pause. “I guess we couldn’t hold back during battle,” Ivey said with regret.

“How is he going?” the male voice asked.

“He will live,” Ivey said. “It is a pity about the core.” The way Ivey was talking made Daniel realise the danger was passed. He was going to be okay. “It would have been the strongest we have had,” Ivey finished.

Daniel did not care; there was no way he would have used such an evil thing. Then again, Alisha or his crafting might have benefited from it.

Healing kept striking him, and the club was encouraging him to move the weapon away from his wound.

It was over.

His mana was bottomed out, but the sickness was gone. There was itchiness in and on his leg where the injury had been, and when he looked down and examined it, he winced. The armour that he had been given was torn open just like what Priscilla’s first image had shown. The armoured pants were going to have to be thrown out, as besides the damage the king had done, the armour had later been hacked away further as the healers had opened it up to give them access. A thin scar ran up the leg, but even it was fading. He stood a little unsteadily, with Luke and Tamara supporting him on either side.

He looked at Sophia. She was young, barely out of high school. Her posture was one of absolute exhaustion. “Thank you,” he said, testing the leg. It was feeling better, and while not recovered, it felt like it would improve quickly.

“The club did most of the work,” Sophia said. “That venom was horrific.”

Blood Drinker radiated smug satisfaction.

“What did it do?” he asked curiously.

“It looked like it was doing a combination of eating the poisoned flesh and cutting it out. Sort of like sucking out the poison from a snake bite,” Ivey said. “Whatever it was doing, it was physically damaging you, and we needed to heal aggressively to keep you alive.”

“I doubt it was doing that,” Daniel told her tiredly. “That doesn’t work once the venom is in the blood stream.”

“We saw it.” Ivey objected.

Images came from the club highlighting what it was actually doing. “The club was cutting out what is best imagined as magical gangrene.”

“Whatever it did. It let us save your leg,” Ivey told him. “We were considering amputation when Sophia couldn’t touch the poison.”

“You were considering chopping off my leg.”

“Yep,” Ivey said without hesitation.

“Maybe we shouldn’t have engaged.”

“We all knew it was dangerous,” Tamara said. “And your wounds were the worst.”

“No deaths?”

“Nope.”

“Thank god. Just the queen to go, then.”

“That is not a good idea,” Ivey said, rounding on him. “Not only did you almost lose your leg you also almost died.”

“We need to kill the monster before it makes more footsoldiers. Now. Tomorrow it will be harder.”

Daniel pushed himself free, and he hobbled towards where the queen was.

Tamara moved up to his side, supporting his weight. “How is your mana?” she whispered.

Daniel stopped and felt a flush of embarrassment. “Maybe I need a few minutes to recover,” he said loudly and sat on the ground.

Tamara shook her head in mock exasperation at him. “How long?”

“Ten minutes.”

“I will go rally the troops.”

She left, and he watched her as she moved amongst the fighters who had followed him. A hand on the shoulder, an encouraging word, a bit of laughter as one of them made a joke. Ivey, meanwhile, was in an in-depth conversation with Sophia with Dave standing nearby as he usually was. Daniel appreciated that, staying near your friends. It must have been really hard for the guy to be mutated so badly that strangers would attack him on sight.

Daniel checked his mana. “Time,” he called and got up and started walking once more towards the queen. They needed to end this. With every step, his leg strengthened. Traps were not the answer. They would take too long to craft and probably could not get through the carapace. Plus, as big and strong as it was, he was not sure it was a threat. Hopefully that would equal slow.

“Daniel,” Ivey implored when he led the way, ignoring Luke and the juggernaut’s attempt to pass him. He was the strongest; he should be at the point of the attack. He would try to lure the queen out, he decided.

He hit the door, getting ready for it to explode out.

Nothing happened.

Again.

Thud.

“Daniel,” Ivey yelled, voice shrill. They had to finish this. His gut was telling him that if he let it be, in a few days, the insects would have replenished. “We need you. You can’t risk yourself.”

He ignored her.

The queen was not responding either by running or attacking. He was hoping it would come out and they could fight in the corridor where their numbers would turn the tide.

Thud.

Animal Sense.

It still had not moved.

Well, he if it wanted to fight in its den, he was happy to accommodate. A single touch and the wood warped around the lock, and he yanked the door open, club at the ready.

Daniel burst out laughing when he saw his fearsome enemy. He couldn’t help himself. He had built it up in his head as being like the king, only larger, and reality was the opposite.

The queen was massive. It filled the room and had flattened two beds and still looked cramped, having curled awkwardly to fit into the space. Most of it could be best described as a giant maggot with the very end bit comprising a section that was more like an insect. Six relatively tiny legs, each as long as one of his arms, and a torso that was slightly smaller than a human’s. It tried to move and shift its weight but could do nothing.

Stepping right up to it, even when Daniel brought his face close, the queen could not do a thing.

“Daniel,” Ivey called out, and he realised no one had followed him.

“Yep,” he said brightly. “You guys should kill it,” he declared, and walked out. Choosing a spot well away from both where they had fried insects and where the queen was about to be butchered, he leant back against the wall. These three floors were not cleared yet, but the termites had controlled the corridors and they had been defeated. They had eliminated the major threats already, but there were a scattering of minor ones and luckily no more mind worms.

“Guys, it is safe to come out,” he called to the door next to him. “We have killed most of the monsters. It is safe.”

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