Chapter 27: Enemy in the Woods

Michael and Rihelah hid together beneath the low-hanging leaves of the injured sapling, emerging only after their injuries had healed.

Rihelah sulked while they began moving carefully across the forest floor, toward a hill in the distance. [I wish we knew where Sika and the others went.]

[We don’t know much of anything about this island, and even if we did; they’re probably too far away by now for us to catch up.]

[I know…] She kicked a small pebble in frustration.

The pebble bounced a couple times off a nearby leaf, then disappeared down a small slope ahead.

A jet-black spider with light-blue bands on its legs raced up from its underground lair to find out what had disturbed the edge of its web.

Target

Status

Tesla Spider Level ??

Hungry - Hunting

[Holy shit!] Rihelah exclaimed as both mantids stopped moving.

[Youuu!] Michael growled as he stood tall while facing the familiar spider at least four times his size, while his antennae furiously whipped in its direction.

[Is that the spider you-] Rihelah began.

[That’s not the same one that ate my leg; but it’s the same fucking type!] Michael snapped angrily as he stalked forward. He stopped, feeling a pang of dread when he caught a glimpse of its sprawling sheet-web.

[I see.] Rihelah hissed, and an orb of water appeared directly above the spider.

There was a bright flash like a bolt of lightning when her spell discharged, and then everything went black.

A few minutes later, Michael’s senses started returning to him. Everything ached. His ear rang, and he found it difficult to move his legs. He noticed a system message that gave him some idea of what had happened.

-73HP. Electrocuted! You are paralyzed!

+11HP Regeneration.

…

+11HP Regeneration.

You are no longer paralyzed.

Ten seconds later, his vision returned and he found himself lying on his side next to Rihelah, who had gone prone.

The spider was nowhere to be seen.

[Rihelah, are you okay? Rihelah?]

There was no response. Her antennae lay limp in front of her, but her abdomen still moved.

Michael fought through the stiffness in his joints while he wobbled to his feet. He placed one of his front feet gently upon Rihelah’s thorax and nudged her a bit.

Her antennae jolted upward and twitched a little while Rihelah regained consciousness. She read her own system messages, which were identical to Michael’s.

[Why the fuck would I suddenly attack a huge spider?] She groaned.

[Yeah. I’m thinking we should probably leave those spiders alone…]

[Mm. This is fucked, Michael! We both need anger-management therapy.] She agreed, still groaning.

[I appreciate it, though.] He helped her to stand.

[What do you mean?]

[You attacked it for my sake.]

[Oh, that…]

[You’re becoming more like me!] He swayed back and forth happily.

[Ugh. I must be losing my damn mind.] She grumbled, trying her best to sound annoyed while smiling inside.

[Hey! We both resemble that!] He assumed a threat-pose for emphasis, alternately leaning left and right as he’d seen his pet mantids do.

Rihelah’s body automatically responded with the same, and they engaged in an awkward stand-off for a few seconds before Rihelah shook her head.

[Don’t tempt fate, dumbass! You know our bodies are gonna do something stupid again without our permission! The ruthless instinct of these bodies isn’t something either of us can fully control and you know it!]

[Yeah, I know. I wasn’t trying to get too close… But I figure we might as well have a sense of humor about this shit! We’ve had moments of weakness, but it’s not like we were unable to snap out of it when it mattered. Also, both of us heal quickly!]

[Mmh. We’ve been able to stop ourselves… so far.] She grumbled.

[Hey. I’m here with you, and I love you. Dork.]

Rihelah’s antennae swept backward for half a second, then whipped in Michael’s direction.

She muttered, [That’s not fair, and you suck. I love you, too.]

Michael answered quietly while looking down, [My human life sucked after you moved away, Rihelah. I’d rather be together with you as a mantis.]

[Even though I might literally bite your head off at some point?]

[I’m probably strong enough now to stop you before you could, but yes. Even despite that.]

Rihelah let out a dramatic mental gasp while snapping her head toward him, [Is that a challenge?]

[Hah! Also despite your morbid sense of humor.] He deliberately looked away.

[Bleh. I’m also trying to find a reason to laugh through it all, dummy. And… I’m happy you’re here with me.] She moved a little closer.

A flock of birds cast hundreds of terrifying shadows that followed along the forest floor below them. Michael and Rihelah stopped talking and huddled together.

After both had time to recover, they did their best to spend most of their time hidden within various plants and beneath newly-fallen leaves while skirting around the massive web.

[It’s too bad that damn thing survived my spell…] Rihelah complained while glancing toward the depression in the middle of the web that marked the spider’s lair.

[What’s really important is that we survived. But yeah, I agree. What I want to know is; who the fuck decided it would be fun to shove a battery up that thing’s ass?! I hate those Tesla spiders even more than I did before…] Michael twitched his antennae irritably.

Near the former Freedom Watch camp, a patrol of 48 invaders returned with four prisoners in tow.

The bruised, barefoot captives followed behind one huge invader who held the rope to which their steel collars had all been tied. Their hands had been bound tightly in front of them with glow-worm silk.

Heika whined quietly and pitifully as the raw sides of her mouth burned against the rough gag that pressed down upon her tongue. Her entire lower body throbbed with agony, but she didn’t dare stop walking.

The other three captives had eyes filled with determination and vengeance at the betrayal of their so-called allies, but while none of them were gagged, neither did they dare to speak a word after what they’d witnessed.

Heika had never been truly close to anyone, but she had felt cared for at times. Kaleb was just the latest in a growing string of men she’d sampled as she searched for the right someone to marry.

She was just an ordinary girl from New Freeland, who hoped to find the love of her life among the Freedom Watch. Her luck hadn’t been the best thus far, but at least none of the men she bedded had caused her permanent harm.

Having witnessed the state Kaleb was in upon his return from Nytalis, Heika knew she could do nothing for him. The man was already dead as far as she was concerned.

She saw no benefit for either of them if she waited around while he simply finished expiring. Thus, Heika had latched onto the last group of three to flee their camp after receiving word of the assault’s failure.

Heika had hoped to return to their own island of New Freeland to the North, but that hope had been crushed.

Their small group was quickly surrounded after being ambushed along the road toward Lady’s Fathom.

The invaders had stripped away all but their smallclothes. Heika’s eyes still ached from the quiet sobbing she had done while they searched her for hidden weapons.

Heika was no stranger to humiliation, having experienced it at the hands of certain men ever since she started her lunar bleed, but it had never been like this.

She had tried to stop them from looking literally everywhere on and in her body for daggers and poison, but the invader attempting to search her had responded to her resistance by flogging her legs with a riding crop until all she could do was scream.

Afterward, he was excessively brutal in his impatient search, and now Heika found it painful just to walk. Even worse was the fact that these men treated her as if she were merely some beast of burden that had misbehaved.

The shocking words of her abuser’s commander still rang in her head; That one gets the whip. Continue until it calms down. If it fights too long, dispose of it.

It?!

That word frightened her even more than the ruthless beating she’d received. For some reason, it terrified her even more than the threat of death itself.

Heika’s despair increased as the patrol of invaders and their prisoners arrived at the camp. The other six who had fled before them had also been caught and were already hard at work with axes and hatchets, clearing more trees near the old training ground.

The taskmaster overseeing the prisoners stuffed a hatchet into Heika’s trembling hands, cut her bonds and pointed toward the others. Two men in dark gray wizard robes and six archers maintained watch over the captives from a distance, while hundreds of armored invaders hustled to and fro.

While hobbling toward the other prisoners, Heika cast a wistful glance toward Kaleb’s cabin, barely a stone’s throw away. The door opened and two invaders stepped out while carrying something.

Heika fell to her knees when she recognized Kaleb’s empty armor, and her eyes widened when she saw lumps of flesh fall out from his boots.

Just the day before, she’d laughed and smiled while bedding the man.

Her shock was interrupted when something slammed into her upper back, and she was sent flying toward the dirt. Heika’s head slammed into the ground, and the hatchet clattered away upon the hard-packed earth.

A high-pitched wail escaped past her gag as the taskmaster’s strong hand closed around her upper right arm and roughly jerked her upward.

Her new abuser’s clean-shaved face radiated pure scorn as he spoke down at her with a disturbingly calm voice, “On your feet, heretic. Choose your fate. Work, or eternal rest.”

He pointed toward the others, and the icy look in his eyes scared Heika just as much as being referred to as it. The burly man seemed like he might enjoy cutting her to pieces with the short sword at his hip.

Heika face went numb while she hurried away to join the other prisoners. Her throbbing head and aching back now added their own brutal notes to the cacophony of pain in her legs and groin.

Tears leaked from her eyes as she began using her hatchet to de-limb trees that had been felled by those wielding axes. The bruised faces and hollow expressions of the captives surrounding Heika came as no surprise, but they did cause her to sink further into despair.

The other two women who had been taken were limping in a similar manner as Heika, and her heart sank further.

While dreading the horrors that she knew would almost certainly be visited upon her at night, Heika wished from her very soul that she had never strayed from her own family.

The taskmaster spoke evenly as he used his sword to mark notches in one of the straight trees that had been felled, “You will cut four identical lengths from these-“

The burly man abruptly whirled about in place and slashed his blade through the throat of a prisoner who had approached him from behind, spraying Heika and two others with the half-decapitated man’s blood.

The dying prisoner’s eyes rolled back in his head while he wavered on his feet for the briefest moment. When that moment passed, the ax that had been ready to strike down upon the taskmaster fell from the prisoner’s hands as he crumpled to the dirt.

“The first heretic finds rest. Do any others wish to join this worthless heap of carrion below ground?” The taskmaster’s calm voice held a deadly edge to it while his emotionless eyes scanned over the remaining prisoners as if surveying a herd of livestock.

Silence.

The taskmaster pointed to Heika and one of the men, “You two, take that mess and bury it one fathom deep. When you finish, I want the ground above packed just as flat and hard as it is now. Afterward, you return to work with the rest.”

At the sound of unfamiliar human voices shouting orders, Michael and Rihelah quickly ascended a tree trunk. Michael camouflaged himself while Rihelah made use of her new Occlude Self spell.

Her entire body faded in his sight to some degree, but he could still tell where she was quite easily. By contrast, a handsome flock of black and white birds broke off their brief pursuit when the mantids abruptly vanished from their sight.

Michael followed Rihelah past other, oblivious arthropods and out onto a limb. They stopped together amid a cluster of long, slender leaves.

Neither spoke as the yelling drew closer, accompanied by a frenzy of footfalls.

Below them lay the well-trod path through the forest that they had followed for a few hours, and over the shallow rise in the direction from which they’d come, a familiar old man sprinted furiously.

Viago’s unkempt hair and beard fluttered outward around his head as he ran for all he was worth, his eyes focused and determined.

When he was nearly half-way to the tree upon which Michael and Rihelah stood, his pursuers came into view behind him. Despite their front runners being clad in heavy, shining armor, bearing both sword and shield, they were outpacing the old man. Behind those six armored men ran another four holding bows and one who was robed.

The robed man continued to yell, “Halt, heretic! Stop this instant, or die!”

Viago made a show of grabbing his own backside while continuing to run, then raised a gnarled fist with two fingers extended in a lewd gesture.

“Formation!” The robed man barked.

The armored men and archers moved aside in one practiced motion while continuing to run, giving the wizard a clear view of their quarry.

The wizard raised his hand, and a small bolt of fire shot forward with tremendous speed before striking Viago squarely in the small of his back. Michael and Rihelah shrank away from the resulting fireball’s brief radiant heat as the old man was completely immolated. Viago’s beard and hair burned away in less than a second while he screamed and fell to the ground not far from where Michael and Rihelah hid.

The old man tumbled roughly upon the path while his clothing continued to burn. He wailed and beat at the flames for a few moments before coming to rest, face-down, only a few meters away from the mantids.

“Savages!” Viago screamed against the dirt as he trembled in agony, unable to extinguish the flames while his pursuers approached.

The wizard stepped forward to speak coldly after the others had surrounded Viago with weapons drawn, “You were given the chance of surrendering without harm.”

He closed his hand and the flames ceased. But old man Viago had already suffered grievous burns to his arms, face, and head.

The slender wizard stared down at his victim briefly, then spoke once more, “This one is worthless. Dispatch it.”

Four arrows immediately pierced Viago’s torso and abdomen, and those were followed by six swords that stabbed forward as one. The old man gurgled pitifully for a few seconds, then released his last breath.

The wizard stepped forward and pried an old silver ring off Viago’s hand, then wiped it upon a kerchief before stuffing both away into one of the archer’s packs.

He gestured to Viago’s corpse, “Toss that aside. The animals will deal with the remains. We continue our pursuit! Every heretic must be cleansed! For the Empire!”

“For the Empire!” The others shouted in response.

Viago’s corpse was kicked roughly off the path, the archers retrieved what arrows they could, and the soldiers continued along the path in the same direction Michael and Rihelah had been headed.

“Keep your eyes open for that elven witch!” The wizard’s voice could be heard fading into the distance.

After they had gone, Rihelah turned to look at Michael while trembling, [Those soldiers looked like-]

[They were. They’re from the same army that chased Sionella toward Nytalis.] Michael responded while taking in the sight of the old man’s broken corpse.

[What the hell is wrong with people in this world?!] Rihelah shouted.

[War, Rihelah. This is what war is like. Even on Earth, things like this happen almost every da-]

[No! People on Earth don’t do things like this! There was no trial, no mercy… The old man was a bastard, but those soldiers just executed him!]

[Okay… I’ll grant that he didn’t deserve to be killed. But you have to understand, Rihelah… People on Earth absolutely do things like this. They don’t use magic, but I’m sure you’ve read about murders? Wars? The Holocaust?]

[But those are things of the past! They don’t hap-]

[Yes. They do. Things like that still happen. The strong oppress the weak in many places around the globe, Rihelah. We were lucky for most of our lives on Earth. We lived in the USA, where we enjoyed a lot of freedom and security, compared to what people experience in third-world countries.]

[I don’t want to believe that, Michael. People were getting better! Before the pandemic, I mean…]

[I was murdered by teenagers, Rihelah. All I did was push past them to use the drinking fountain in that park to wash my face after some sick woman sneezed on me. It annoyed them, so they beat me to death. Bad people are very real.]

[Well, they shouldn’t be.]

[That’s a terrifying way of thinking, Rihelah. Are you going to kill all of them to prevent killing? They aren’t just going to disappear.]

[Can we stop talking about this, Michael?!]

[Sure.]

[You always do this when we talk about the world! You just have to remind me of all the bad things in it! That’s the only thing I don’t like about-] She stopped talking.

[You don’t like that about me? Sorry, but that’s part of who I am. I don’t ever intend to fool myself into believing people are inherently good.]

[I don’t think people are inherently good, Michael! That’s not- I just don’t think they’re inherently evil!]

[I don’t think that, either. But I know that some people decide to be evil.]

[I just… I never saw anything like this on Earth.]

[I did.]

[It’s uncomfortable to think about.]

[I know, but it’s reality. And we have no choice but to deal with it.]

[We really did have it good in the US, didn’t we?]

[We did, but others suffered to make our lives easy.]

[I know… The sweatshops and the low-wage jobs we sent overseas…]

[Exactly. It’s a lot more pervasive than most people realize. I studied it in one of my sociology courses, but even I have only scratched the surface of understanding just how deep that rabbit-hole goes. That said, we’re in this world, now.]

[Yeah. I don’t like the humans in this world, Michael.]

[Neither do I. At least, not so far. If it’s anything like Earth in that regard, it’s likely there are plenty of decent people just trying to live their lives. But we’re dealing with soldiers. When people are sent off to war, some of them turn into monsters.]

[No kidding…] Rihelah shook with revulsion at the memory of Kaleb’s cruelty.

He gently touched her thorax with the tiny foot at the end of his left foreleg. [I’m gonna protect you, Rihelah. I know we’re tiny, but I’ll do my best for you.]

[You already have. That bird… it would’ve-]

[But it didn’t. We’re both still alive, and I aim to keep it that way. Our best path forward is to get stronger. We need to hunt. We should focus on that before we try to travel too much.]

[Okay, but can we go somewhere else? I’m uncomfortable with… him down there.] She pointed to Viago’s corpse.