--------///----Reina's POV----\--------

We were walking in without any issue, though the "we" part didn't include Ava and Orven. I could hear Endis and Mina trying to help them out by talking to them or trying to bargain, too bad i was more focused on the soothing feeling of petting Eclina's fur to pay much attention to their worries. I could just make it up to them later, so it was MY time now. Though after a bit, we had to stop since we reached a room with multiple tunnel structures.

(Mina) " So it's more then just the outside... This looks like an entirely different area then the cove we were in earlier. "

(Endis) " I mean, shouldn't that have been expected? A fuckton of ants came out from here. Why wouldn't they change it to how they liked? "

(Mina) " True. "

There were holes all around the place, some were big while some were person sized and wide enough for a bigger ant to fit through. The bigger ones were closer to the ground level while the smaller ones were higher up and spread out randomly. There were some on the ceiling, a few spots on the ground and even some that were closer to the way we came. I thought the smaller ones were suspicious since the ants we fought were way too big to fit into there.

Mina had even moved a bit further up to start inspecting the tunnels. I could see why since we all knew these weren't the right sizes for the ants from earlier. Endis eventually followed behind while Orven annd Ava looked over at me and Eclina a few times before following after them. I didn't really mind not joining the conversation since i was having the time of my life doing nothing but pet Eclina. Though Eclina herself ended up taking me out of my petting break when she started to look at the tunnels and started to think about something.

I watched her face slowly change around as she seemed to be putting the pieces of some kind of puzzel together. It wasn't even long after that she started to focus on everyone else and their conversation.

(Mina) " Hmm. How are we going to figure out which tunnels lead to where? We cant go through them all and Orven's earth sense can't possibly cover them all. "

(Eclina) " I can do that. "

(Endis) " You sure? This place could be a mountain you know. "

(Eclina) " Still fine. I've had a lot of time to work on my elements so something like this isn't that hard. "

(Ava) " Elements? "

(Reina) " It's what beasts call magic. "

(Ava) " Ohh. "

We never brought up the whole "magic is called elements by beasts" thing with Ava or Orven since it never really came up. Though to be fair, a lot of things that never came up before would probably end up finding themselves come up in some of our near future conversations.

(Mina) " Well, if you say you can do it, lead the way Eclina we'll be right behind you. "

(Eclina) " Yup. I'll keep you all safe. "

(Reina) " We can keep ourselves safe Eclina. Just lead the way and we'll show you what we can do. "

(Orven) " I second this idea. "

(Endis) " That's fine with me. "

(Mina) " You ok with this, Ava? "

(Ava) " If everyone else wants too then i'm fine with it. "

(Mina) " Then we'll be fighting. Just lead the way Eclina. "

(Eclina) " Ok. "

After she agreed, i could see her fan her tails out and noticed that the one with the brown fur and ring had started to glow. I'm pretty sure everyone else noticed that too since we were all looking at her. I was curious about this since this has never really happened when a beast would use their elements. And I've hunted a bunch of beasts capable of using their elements. So has everyone else. So seeing something that declared what element would be used was a surprise.

Then we saw another tail lift up. It was the silver furred tail which signified her air being used. It was a strange thing since the rest of her tails stayed down while the other two stood up. I could tell that the others had questions of their own but now wasn't exactly the best time to ask them so we waited on her to finish up whatever it was that she was doing. After a bit, she opened her eyes and lifted a paw to point.

(Eclina) " There's something this way. "

She was pointing towards one of the worker tunnels that led to the area with all of the workers. It was small and it was going to be an issue to go through, but she seemed to use her earth to expand the tunnel for us to go through.

(Mina) " Alright. Time to see what we've got to deal with. "

(Ava) " And to get answers. Don't forget about those! "

(Mina) " Alright. Eclina, start whenever you feel like it. "

(Eclina) " Sure. "

We started walking but when i looked over at Eclina, it looked like she didn't actually know where she should start. Her face was scrunched up and she seemed to conflicted on what to say first. It actually looked a little amusing to say the least. Though i knew i should probably say something to help her out.

(Reina) " How we met is good. "

(Eclina) " Ok. "

And then that was what she started with. She started with how Martiq smelled Phoenix and how they went to us to see what was going on. Though she didm't get to talk for long because the other two interrupted and asked about papa and Phoenix.

(Mina) " From what i remember... Martiq had met Phoenix before, right? Or did i forget something? "

(Eclina) " That's right. "

When Mina had answered, Orven and Ava were suprised. It wasn't shocking since we didn't get to that ppoint of the story yet so they didn't know that Martiq made it to where Mina and Endis lived.

(Orten) " How do you know her fathers name? "

(Mina) " Hmm... Should we add in our parts, Endis? "

(Endis) " When they come up. We aren't there yet so don't skip ahead. "

(Reina) " He said something smart for once. "

(Endis) " Wait a minute. "

(Mina) " Anyway! Back to Eclina. We can fill in our parts when she gets to it. "

She nodded at that and then went right back to it. She talked about what happened after we met up and then she was interrupted again.

(Endis) " I don't remember if that assassin was ever caught. Did they? "

(Reina) " Last i heard, never caught. "

(Endis) " Hmm. "

(Eclina) " Can i start talking again? "

(Reina) " Go ahead. "

She grumbled a little but, which despite her changed form, still looked cute. She got back to the story. She managed to go uninterrupted for a while. But then we encountered some of the workers. They were similar to the warriors that were pouring out but they were smaller, had a brownish coat instead of the silver and with mandibles that didn't actually look like mandibles. They looked more like drills. The workers didn't even look threathening either, they just looked weird since they had drill like stuff all over their bodies.

(Mina) " Should i just deal with them? "

(Reina) " I mean... No one else wants too, right? "

(Endis) " Nope. "

(Ava) " No. "

(Orven) " I would rather not. "

(Mina) " Alright. "

Mina took a step forward and started to gather water around herself to take on the ants. Then the water turned into thin blades that she sent after the ants. The first few blades tore through the ants and then stopped after they couldn't go through anymore. She had to make more to decimate the rest of them. We just sat back and watched the ants fall apart. After she was done, she dusted her hands off and turned back to us.

(Mina) " Welp, back to the story. "

Eclina nodded at that and started the story again. She got a good ways in without being interrupted but then we made it to an entirely new area within this colony. It seemed to be a big area that had some weird substance coating the walls. There were workers and some warriors gathered around each other and moving some eggs throughout the tunnels. The eggs seemed to be see through and had some slimy substance around the eggs themselves. That substance seemed similar to what was on the walls but it seemed a little different.

(Mina) " Looks like they're taking eggs to different hatcheries... If we follow them we could find the rest of them and kill off all the children before they hatch. "

(Orven) " However, they will not let that happen. If we are caught we will most likely have to fend off more ants then appeared outside. We will also be in a disadvantageous position in these tunnels. "

(Endis) " Just means we don't have to get caught. "

(Ava) " I don't think we can avoid all of them. "

(Eclina) " Why do we have to avoid them? I can just collapse this whole place after we leave. "

(Reina) " Huh? "

(Eclina) " What? "

It wasn't just Reina that was surprised. We all turned her way and looked at me with looks of disbelief on their faces. If someone else had said this then we could just laugh it off and say they were fuckin around. But Eclina had just come from the sky with slabs of earth as thick as walls and smashed them down to the ground. If it was her, then that sounded plausible.

(Mina) " Can you actually do that? "

(Eclina) " Of course. "

(Endis) " Then why not do that from the start? "

(Eclina) " Curious. I've never actually seen anything like this from the things that come out of the rifts. I also want Espiral to get some rest. If i did crush them all, then he wouldn't get to rest at all. That and i wouldn't get pats and to tell the story if i just crushed it all. "

(Endis) " Huh... Well we can just go look for the queen and then let you bring this place down after we kill her and the rest of the ants. "

(Eclina) " Then let's do that! "

And that was what we were going to do. Though it might end up taking a while. Oh well. It was better then letting her do everything and just acting like our hard work over the years could just take a break while we got a free ride. Though now we had to go the working route.

(Reina) " Which way should we go now Eclina? "

Eclina looked over to me but she had a awkward look on her face.

(Eclina) " Umm... i don't exactly know. "

(Mina) " What do you mean? Can't you sense the tunnels with your earth and air? "

(Eclina) " I can! It's just the weird substance that's on the walls. It's getting in the way of my senses. I can still sense around but the picture i get isn't the clearest thing in the world. "

When she said that, we all looked at the slime and gunk that covered the area. Endis even went over to check it out and swipped some off the wall with one of his disposable daggers. He even coated it in darkness as we all watched how it affected the gunk. At first we all thought it would go how things hit by darkness normally went, but when we saw that it actually resisted the effectss, we all looked surprised.

(Endis) " Well... That's new. "

(Mina) " From what we saw earlier, those eggs had the same substance covering them... So could it be from the eggs and its some passive secretion? Or is it from another source? "

(Reina) " It wasn't on the warriors from earlier so we can rule them out. "

(Mina) " And the workers. When i took them out, there weren't any traces of this stuff on them. So it still leaves the queen or the eggs. But the question now is, where do we go first? This stuff could be dangerous if the source isn't dealt with properly. If its the queen, all we have to do is kill her and we're done. If it's from the eggs, then we have to get rid of all the hatcheries before letting Eclina collapse this place. "

(Orven) " Should we not just allow her to collapse this structure after we kill the queen? "

(Mina) " No. We have to make sure that all the eggs are gone. If any eggs survive and hatch, and somehow lead to another queen, then all of this would've been for nothing. And if this substance somehow gets in the hands of the wrong people, there'll be problems. "

(Endis) " *Ahem* Cous, you might be overlooking somehing here. "

(Mina) " Huh? And what's that? "

(Endis) " We don't know where the hatcheries are. Or how many of them there are. We might end up getting lost if we can't sense our way through these tunnels. "

After Endis said that, we all realized he was right. Our main navigator, Eclina, couldn't sense these tunnels correctly and that was definetly going to impact how fast we could make our way through this place. Add that to not knowing how many hatcheries there might be, we had a lot of hurdles to hop through. We didn't seem to know where we were going to go from here but we had some time to brainstorm before we made a move against these ants.

(Mina) " Then how about we break our objectives into steps and carry those out first. The hatcheries are our biggest issue so finding all of them will be our first step. After that we know that the last few steps are killing the queen and leaving so Eclina can topple the place. "

(Orven) " What other objectives are there? "

(Ava) " Shouldn't we figure out just how big this place is? If we know what the scope of this place is then that'll help Eclina when she has to bring the place down. "

(Mina) " That's doable. It'll be easier though if we had a map or something to keep our progress. "

(Orven) " I should be capable enough to create a tablet to follow our path. "

(Endis) " Then that issues done. Though we got another issue... Which ants are we going to follow first? We're not going to split up and there are atleast three different tunnels that the ants with eggs are splitting off too. So which ones do wee go for first? "

(Orven) " What would be the problem with splitting up? "

After Orven said that, we all just couldn't help but turn and stare at him... Cause to be honest... That was a really stupid question.

(Mina) " There are a few reasons... First off, we are in a COLONY of ants. Individually they are all weak. But if we get swarmed? Death. Secondly, these tunnels hinder some of us. You especially. You can't exactly swing your hammer too much without ending up smashing it into the ceiling or a wall. Reina could probably use her Siellas for medium range and close range but definetly not for long range. And let's not talk about any of us getting lost in these tunnels. "

Mina was right. So there wasn't any reason to talk back on any of the points she made. Though now we had to think back on Endis' question. That, that was a good question. He was right. There were a few different tunnels that we would have to take into account when it came to finding the hatcheries. And without being able to accurately know where they would lead, we could even end up taking hours trying to find one without following they ones carrying eggs.

(Eclina) " Are you sure you don't want me to just bring the whole thing down? "

Eclina was getting as frustrated as we were and i couldn't help but lean more to her idea. It looked like everyone else was thinking about it too since i could see some hesitation in their eyes.

(Endis) " Wait a minute... Eclina, you can use fire, right? "

(Eclina) " Yep... Should i flood it all then? "

(Reina) " Wouldn't the flames be weakned by the slime? And what if it misses some eggs? "

(Mina) " We haven't checked if fire is completly affected by the slime. "

She sort of had a point. But darkness was essentially the runner up for most destructive element, so the chances that fire was an exception were kinda slim. Though that didn't stop Mina from grabbing some slime off the wall and bringing it closer to Eclina. When she did, the tail with the red fur and ring, lifted up and started to glow. Then the slime that Mina had dropped in front of Eclina went up in flames as if it was oil. The flame burned and consumed the slime in a matter of seconds which made Mina nod her head and smile.

(Ava) " ... It worked? But why? "

(Endis) " We can think later, the time to act is now though. "

(Mina) " He's right. This'll save us time and since we've found out that the eggs have the same substance on them, then if fire get's near them we won't have to worry about missing any. "

We nodded at that and all moved behind Eclina. She seemed to have a smile on her face as her tail started to glow brighter. But she stopped for a second and started to use her air and focused it behind her, at us. It seemed to form some sort of air wall that did something, i just didn't know what. But Ava seemed to figure it out since she widened her eyes and started to help out.

(Eclina) " There we go. Now i can make my first fire flood! "