“Keep running!” Darryl shouted.

“But my feet hurt!” Alexa whined.

“They’ll hurt a lot more if you stop running!” Darryl bit back. “Keep! Moving!”

Alexa flipped him off, but kept running. Darryl checked his minimap to see that two of the vespas were getting really close. And the swarm of 26 had appeared from the uncharted territory, along with about a dozen of their friends.

Berner was pulling ahead, which was fine. Darryl couldn’t run any faster, not without leaving Alexa behind, but there was no reason for the other guy to hang back as well. And he left everyone else in Belinda’s care to go in any direction but theirs, so he didn’t have to worry about them.

“Don’t stop, no matter how bad your legs are burning!” Darryl shouted as he stopped and turned around. The light of the torch that Alexa was carrying quickly disappeared to leave him in utter darkness, but Darryl was more focused on his minimap.

These vespa were coming from every direction, and Darryl suspected that at least a few of the pupae were birthing prematurely just to up the dramatic pressure on them. Not too many, just enough to make sure their race to the Safe Zone would be a close one.

Fortunately they always aimed their acid at your centre mass or face, at least the first shot, so Darryl found little difficulty dealing with their initial attack. When it was just one or two of the pests, at least. But even two of the buggers made the next bit difficult.

There was just one of them this time if dealt with quickly, so Darryl didn't stop running as he lit a torch. As the vespa buzzed aggressively and tried to circle around Darryl’s shield, Darryl swiped at the critter with the burning stick. His right arm screamed in protest and he saw his health bar take a miniscule dip, and to his frustration the swing was both rather weak and very inaccurate.

Darryl swung again, harder this time, and halfway through the swing the torch slipped out of his weakened fingers. It flew through the tunnel and extinguished itself after bouncing off the wall. The unintentional manoeuvre managed to take the vespa by surprise, though, as it backed off only to find the torch matching its movements.

Turns out, their wings were really meant to be their weak spot, as their flammability showed. The clipped wing immediately lit up and two seconds later the fire already spread to the other three wings before the vespa even hit the ground.

Darryl stomped on the screeching bug, killing it with one hit. His Pugilist skill jumped to level 3 as the guts went around his sole to invade his toes and make his foot feel disgustingly slippery and wet. He ignored it though, or at least tried to, as he turned around and started to run after Alexa again.

He didn’t need much time to do so, as Alexa had slowed down a pace that was at most powerwalking.

“Keep running! They’re right behind us!” Darryl shouted, and Alexa groaned before forcing herself to run again.

“I’m tired! I never ran this much like evar!” She whined.

“If you’ve got breath to complain, you’ve got breath to run faster!” Darryl shouted.

“Can’t you carry me?” Alexa tried.

“No! Now run!” Darryl said, his attention already back to the minimap and the vespas he’d have to intercept.

Someone screamed ahead of them, the echoes quickly spreading the sound to appear from all directions and turn into a cacophony of dying wails. Berner, probably.

Darryl cursed and grabbed Alexa’s wrist. “Damn it, get on and hold on tight! I can’t spare a hand to keeping you up! And keep that torch in the air!”

Darryl quickly allowed Alexa to hop on piggyback style and she wrapped her legs tightly around his waist while her free hand wrapped around his neck. She really was tired; her legs were already shaking from the exertion after a few seconds.

Darryl didn’t even wait for her to steady herself before making a run for it. If Berner just died, that meant there was another one of those vespa-attracting vespa up ahead. He couldn’t kill it without making things worse, as more gunk meant a greater radius of attraction.

Fortunately, Berner died to a single foe rather than a swarm. The potent vespa was enjoying the meal, but went airborne when it noticed them approach. Darryl just ran into it with his shield and didn’t stop moving, throwing the stunned beast against the wall. He couldn’t spare the time to kill it or pick up Berner’s body.

New achievement! I want them to suffer!

You’ve crippled a mob for life without finishing it off, and just left it there! Brutal! Well, let this be a reminder that this kind of sick, twisted, sociopathic and fucked up behaviour is EXACTLY what we want to see!

You’ve got a Silver Psychopath Box!

The next two corridors were uneventful, a welcome respite before a vespa appeared from the side. Darryl slowed down a bit to make sure it would intercept them from the front, and then ran ahead. The vespa dodged him, but Alexa waved her torch at it and the vespa lit up like a Christmas tree behind them.

“Ooooh! A silver pyromancer box, nice!” Alexa said.

“Stop hanging from my neck, I’m trying to breathe!” Darryl gasped.

“My legs are tired!” Alexa whined, stretching her legs one by one for a few more seconds before obliging.

The buzzing behind them was getting louder. The large swarm was still a bit away, but numbers didn’t really matter if the few vespa coming from behind could pin them down long enough for others to catch up. And with their acid spit, Darryl couldn’t do anything but stop and turn around if any of them caught up.

“We’re not going to make it…” Darryl realised.

“Keep running!” Alexa said. “They’re getting closer!”

Darryl stopped. “No, we’re not going to make it this way. I can run myself ragged, but this way we’ll both die.”

“What are you saying?” Alexa quietly said.

“Get off.” Darryl said.

“But…”

“Get off! We don’t have time to waste!” Darryl shouted.

Alexa sobbed once as she let go.

“My legs don’t hurt that badly anymore.” Alexa murmured.

“You were too slow even when we started running, you’d never make it.” Darryl said.

Alexa took out her Bax axe and wiped away a tear. “It’s okay. I can buy you some time, at least.”

“What are you talking about?” Darryl asked.

Darryl glanced at the toilet door not two steps away from them.

“Get in and wait until someone comes to get you.” Darryl said, and turned around to resume running. “Don’t come out before then!”

“You jerk! You could’ve said that from the start!” Alexa shouted after him.

‘What should I have said?’ Darryl wondered briefly, before dismissing the thought and focusing completely on running.

He could run a lot faster now that there wasn’t a little girl squeezing his air pipe, and though his dexterity wasn’t that high he still felt how his constitution allowed him to run a lot longer before his legs would simply give out from under him.

It was a shame that he couldn’t use the bicycle. It would’ve allowed him to move faster than the vespas, but there was no way to use it in conjuncture with his shield. Which was an absolute necessity versus the vespa acid, and the critters wouldn’t give him the time to slow down and get off before they’d use their opening move. Maybe if the bike still had working brakes that would allow a quick stop, but not with the slow reaction time it had now.

Two more vespa came from the sides as Darryl kept running, knowing they'd still be gunning for him as Alexa rubbed some of her pheromones on him during the piggyback ride.

Darryl managed to slam one with his shield again, and this time he had to turn around to stomp on it as the bash didn’t injure its wings enough to strip away its superior mobility. The other one he threw his spear at, and of course all three projectiles missed, before running away and ambushing it at the nearest corner.

That one was a close call, as the vespa almost spat him in the face point blank before Darryl shoved his torch into its face. Specks burned his neck and shoulder, but it was nothing that the heal spell couldn’t fix.

Darryl went back to running as the burning vespa screamed in agony, getting the same pyromaniac reward as Alexa for burning a mob enough to cripple it and leaving it behind alive. Pretty much the same achievement as the last one, but with a different box.

He didn’t quite care for the AI’s always enthusiastic voice in his head as he sprinted the last stretch, opening the door to the Safe Zone and collapsing not two steps in.

For two minutes he just lay there, gasping for air. No one came to help him, because there was no one here. And he was honestly amazed that he was only this tired from that feat of endurance, considering he had been all but sprinting for at least a kilometre or two.

“That… Sucked.” Darryl gasped, slowly sitting up with crossed legs. He didn’t like how comfortable the floor got once his body warmed it up.

Damn. This was all getting too much. Not too severe or impossible but simply too much. Things had been too hectic lately. Too many problems piling up before he could even think about solving them.

On the first floor, you ran into a problem and either solved it before moving on to the next problem, or you walked away from it. It was a perk of being just a small group that stuck together, there were no problems aside from the one right in front of you.

But now there were problems piling up that he couldn’t even bother to think about, ones that were simply too far away or unrelated to you to be concerned about. To be honest, Darryl hadn’t even considered the otherwise huge issue of the impending fairy army, simply because it wasn’t his problem right now.

And that wasn’t even considering the whole Martin situation, which he felt had slipped from his grasp after he looked away for just a minute. Much as he hated the thought, he couldn’t even concern himself with that now, not when vespa were popping out all over the place and becoming an issue at an alarming rate.

Remembering his own problem, Darryl quickly typed the situation at hand and Alexa’s location in the party chat.

Ben: damn thats bad! :o

Thomas: I’ve notified Dave and all other relevant parties about these potent vespa. Oh, and all corpse farms have been burned down, no need to worry about them anymore.

Darryl: Oh, and pheromones =/= perfect bait. Vespa still attack everyone they see, they just migrate to location and prioritise the marked. No using one person in a safe zone to kill vespa that will ignore you.

Darryl closed the chat, and felt his neck where the acid sprayed him. Nothing but smooth skin. A bit sensitive, probably because the heal spell hadn’t regenerated his hairs and the layer of dead skin, but otherwise it felt as if nothing happened.

The more interesting part was his shoulder. Curiously enough the acid hadn’t corroded his magical items, rather it slowly dissipated into thin air while the flesh underneath the unblemished gear burned like a bitch. Darryl checked it to find his skin turned bright red, but with everything including his hair to still be there.

He shrugged, and pulled himself up to go sit at a table. It was quite nice that their pretty much invaluable magical items weren’t going to be destroyed by just about any mob’s attacks. He assumed the red skin would go away if he healed again, but the heal spell required three mana points and that was exactly what he had. Meaning it would still take hours before he could use it again, and he wasn’t going to pop a potion when there was no rush.

Darryl: How are you holding up?

Alexa: Fine. Bit cramped and there’s like thirty or more of those wasps outside going crazy over the pheromones, but they can’t get in.

Darryl: Good. Stay put, we’re discussing how to get you out of there.

Darryl sat back and thought about nothing for a while. He was too tired to see to the vespa problem, or any problem for that matter, for the time being. Right now, his burning legs were his main concern.

When it rains, it pours. He smiled. It had been pouring, but at least this should be the last of their problems for the time being. And from this point forward, they were going to solve their problems instead of coping and weathering the storm as they piled up. From this point on, things were only going to improve.

Thomas: Guys, find shelter. Safe Room, Tutorial Guild, toilet. Doesn’t matter. Just be sure to be near a safe place to retreat, pronto. One of the people that made a run for the Southern Safe Zone was cornered by vespa and pissed his pants.

Ben: …

Ben: so?

Thomas: Remember what happens when a crawler defecates without using the toilets? We’ve got a rage elemental roaming the tunnels, it’s moving impossibly fast and it's headed this way.

Darryl looked up at the ceiling, half shocked and half indignant.

“Come on, I didn’t even say it out loud.”