Heron carefully positioned the hand mirror close to the ground. It was a circle the size of his palm and wasn’t really all that clean. That helped a bit since it prevented more light from reflecting, which made it harder to be spotted. He was next to a corner, hidden from the turn of the street by a square building.

The Femorants’ patrol circle was just past the edge, and he had little more than five paces clearance from the corner. Or at least, it was five paces before. Today, it was less, and the mirror revealed that the ants were merely a couple of paces from the corner. They marched down the road and spun around as soon as they reached the border, as illogical as it was not to go to the end. But the antmen were as far from logical as could be, Heron thought.

Carefully, he crawled back a couple of paces, making sure that his back was next to the building’s wall before he stood up. Braden, Orrin, and Asami were just a dozen paces away from him, waiting patiently. Asami could have used her Wind Scour technique, but earlier on, they noticed that the ants reacted to the girl’s Animus-laden winds, so they couldn’t take the risk. Heron slowly made his way back and gestured for the others to move as well.

Once they were away from the street corner and had put another block between themselves and the ants, Heron felt it was safe enough to talk.

“They’re expanding their patrols this way, too,” he said ruefully.

Their current base camp was merely a longstride away, but in the direction of the expansion. If the Femorants continued the way they were, it would take hundreds of days to get caught up. Of course, the ants could expand explosively instead, and in that case, they’d have a fight on their hands.

Heron’s gaze couldn’t help but drift towards the western pillar, where he knew Yuriko and the others had gone this morning. He wanted to join them, but she said he would better spend his time training and helping keep the camp safe. It stung a bit, her saying he wasn’t strong enough, but it was the truth. His Anima reach was fourteen inches, but the only thing he could do was compress and expand it. He couldn’t even feel or see through his aura, not by much, and only instinctively. However, it did boost his resilience and toughness by several orders of magnitude.

Which meant not for scouting and more for direct fighting.

“Do we need to move?” Asami asked softly.

“No. Not for a long while. But we do need to keep wary,” Heron said. “Let’s go, we need to che-!”

“Ants!” Braden hissed as he drew his arming sword. Red sparks danced between his fingers and flew up to the tip of his weapon.

Heron spun on his heel and spotted the offending creature and was struck dumb. It wasn’t a typical Femorant, nor was it the warrior version. It was actually smaller than the bigger variants but looked more compact. In fact, it exuded an air of menace that Heron felt keenly, and the hair at the back of his neck rose in response.

Its antennae wiggled to and fro, and its head comically twisted and turned. The rest of it wasn’t so comical. Sleek carapace covered thick forelimbs. It had three fingers and a thumb on either hand, and it could rotate its wrist all the way around. Worse, its abdominal parts weren’t the usual Femorant, but a longer, sleeker thing. Its compound eyes zeroed in on them even as they watched.

“Swarm fodder,” Orrin cursed as he summoned his own black lightning. Heron’s Anima coated his body and his collapsible spear extended to its full form. Asami’s Wind Whisper and Wind Scour techniques enveloped the four of them, and she brought out her staff.

“...krrk, kerrk…shwaaarmm foddderrrr…” The antman’s mandibles clicked as sounds almost like words came out of its mouthparts.

“...did it just talk?” Braden muttered.

“Staaalk. Taaaaaak.” The antman walked slowly towards them, hands lowered by its side. Despite himself, Heron didn’t feel much hostility all of a sudden, as if the creature just wanted to converse. “...taaaalk.”

“What’s happening?” Asami’s voice wavered and she staggered. Heron say it out of the corner of his eyes, how the other three’s posture loosened up and how their weapons lowered.

“...happeeeeninnng. Hwaaaats happeeeening. Taaaalk. Shwarrrm fodddderrr.”

The antman’s clicking voice irritated Heron’s ears, and he gritted his teeth.

Blue Anima covered his body. Why was it expanded though? Why was his Anima receding into his body?

“Taaaaalk.”

Heron blinked. The creature was merely three paces away. Its hands were reaching out to touch his shoulders. Heron’s eyes widened and his Anima flared its full fourteen inches, then condensed into armour. His fist flew towards the creature’s face, slammed into a mandible, and knocked the head around. Completely around. It spun around the neck, looking behind it for a moment, then back in Heron’s direction. Then, the mandibles, none the worse for wear, clamped down on his fist.

Crrrrk!

Fissures into his Anima. The pressure was greater than any he’d faced except against Yuriko. A hardened air shield materialised and tethered to his arm, and he slammed it on the thing’s torso, and this time, he utilized his full body weight and power, properly braced against the ground.

“Graaak!” The antman grunted as it slid back a couple of paces.

“Wake up!” he yelled, but that was all he could get out before a scorpion stinger lanced from above and struck his shoulder. Greenish venom pulsed out, but thankfully, it didn’t manage to penetrate his Animus Armour. The relic activated as soon as his Anima was breached, and a green puddle formed over his shoulder.

The scorpion tail came directly from the Femorant’s abdomen and struck him from over the creature’s shoulder. The mutated Femorant was just a bit shorter than he was, and had shoulders just as wide. Its four hind legs provided a powerful foundation and Heron’s shove didn’t even unbalance it for long. As soon as it skidded to a halt, it struck, and the stinger wiggled side to side, straining his Anima further.

Heron’s spear stabbed directly at an eye but was deflected by a thick forearm. At the same time, he twisted away from the tail, getting himself free and stumbling back.

Braden, Orrin, and Asami were groggily shaking their heads, defenceless. The scorpion-ant thing stepped past them and lunged for Heron. He shoved using the hardened air shield and knocked it sideways.

“Wake up!” he yelled again, and that seemed to work, somehow.

Asami shook her head, saw that the thing was right next to her, and then screamed. The creature staggered, but then again, who wouldn’t if they had someone scream right at their ear holes?

Heron took advantage of the distraction and struck with both spear and shield. The disoriented creature couldn’t react in time, and the Anima-enforced spearhead sank into the carapace as though it were a hot knife through butter.

Before he could attempt to widen the wound or simply to make the creature’s insides into mush, the antman jumped back, though it wrenched open a gaping wound in the process. It hissed and clicked its mandibles, growled and swiped its arms at him. Like the warrior variant, this one could also snap out an elongated blade from its wrist. Heron’s shield took the brunt of the force before he deflected it downwards.

And, since his air shield wasn’t connected directly to his body, he repositioned himself and struck back. The creature was a quick learner and avoided the spearhead, but Heron’s spear technique, honed by countless spars and battles, wasn’t so easily defeated. He anticipated the dodge and easily adjusted the target point. He managed another poke into the creature’s guts, and it once again screamed and hissed in anger.

“Heron, help!”

Asami’s cry caught his attention and it was to a sight he didn’t expect. Another antman, with silky threads coming out of its abdomen, had managed to catch all three of them into a net. Black and red bolts of lightning discharged from the twins, but that did little to combat the stickiness and toughness of the webs.

“Asami!” Heron yelled, but could barely do anything as the three were dragged away by the antmen.

He didn’t even notice when the other antmen came but the brief glance he caught showed him that they were all variants like the one he was fighting. There were only a couple more, and other than the one that shot spider webs out its bottom, the other one had…wings. That one grabbed a handful of webs and lifted off. Well, it tried to anyway. The web ripped from the weight and sudden pull, leaving one of the others on the floor while the other two were dragged into the air.

The webber blasted him with a congealed mass, but Heron sidestepped and struck the scorpion-antman on the side, knocking it into the web’s direction. The white ball burst and entangled the scorpion-ant’s stinger tail and abdomen, and effectively anchored it in place.

Heron threw a stab at its face, but it managed to deflect the blow sufficiently that he only managed to carve off half of its forearm and grazed an antenna. The creature squealed in pain and threw itself back. Heron rushed to his remaining entangled companion and thrust at the webber, who skittered away in panic.

He swiped at the webs, thrusting his Anima-coated spearhead to cut, and was rewarded with snapped threads, revealing one of the twins, Braden, underneath. He grabbed the fallen boy and dragged him away, noting that the flying ant was already out of sight. Asami’s panicked voice coming through her Wind Whisper made his heart clench in fear, but he could only assuage it by thinking that they had been captured and not killed out of hand.

But the window of time to enact a rescue was swiftly closing. He needed to get to Yuriko, or perhaps one of the other Knights. Sheamus, Rolland, or Hurin. But he didn’t know if he could get to them in time.

“Orrin!” Braden gasped as they pulled away from the mind-numbing aura the scorpion-antman had. “No! We have to get him!”

“Can’t do it alone,” Heron grunted as he carried Braden by the waist across a couple of blocks, stopping only when he saw that the Femorants weren’t pursuing.

“Why’d you leave them behind!” Braden growled, and Heron plopped him down on the ground. “Swarm fodder! Orrin…”

“Rotting ants,” Heron gasped. His hands were trembling as the full weight of what happened dawned on him. What would the ants do to Orrin and Asami? Eat them, probably. He shivered and his eyes turned towards the tower. “We have to tell Yuri.”

Braden unsteadily got to his feet, his face was red and he was trembling too. “Yes, we must. But what about the camp? They need to be warned about the new ants.”

“You go,” Heron said decisively. “I can fight through them, you can’t. Tell them. I…I hope Yuriko can…” He swallowed the rest of his words.

The scorpion ant he fought was as tough as any Knight, and only his Anima was able to fend it off. The thing had to be a Knight-level foe, otherwise, the couple of stabs he got in should have spelt its doom.

“I…” Braden hesitated, “I’ll go. Get him back. Please!”

“I will,” Heron grunted. The twins were rivals for Yuriko’s affection, but he didn’t want them to go this way. “Go!”

Nodding, Braden spun on his heels and ran. Heron watched the smaller boy for a long moment, then gritted his teeth and oriented himself towards the tower-pillar. He didn’t know what he’d face on the way there, but he didn’t have a moment to lose.

He condensed his Anima and kept a hardened air shield active, then used it to propel his run. He only hoped he had enough time.