Menov was getting thrashed, smashed through trees, pounded into dirt. Yet she clung onto the mandible of the mother insectoid, continuously hammering its crown with her large fist. Sickening cracks sounded with each strike, like thunder in the night. And Pyrik ran toward the titanic battle up ahead.

Cracks of gunfire chewed on the incoming onslaught, with each volley biting through a substantial number of insectoids, yet there were too many pouring out of the Maw, clamouring over one another like a tidal wave collapsing toward the ranks of Hospitallers. If not for the arachne continually shooting their arrows, Pyrik was certain the Hospitallers would get quickly overwhelmed. Some insectoids took notice of Pyrik, and broke away from the main horde to attack her.

With her axe and bayonet, Pyrik hacked and stabbed through one bug after another as she ran, never daring to stop for a quick breath. Her heart pounded on her chest, with fear, with the thrill of a rabid animal allowed to turn loose. It fed her better than any bread ever could, for it sated her soul for violence. Despite how dire and stacked the odds presented itself, Pyrik had to admit, she enjoyed the challenge. She relished it like a drunkard in a tavern with a treasure chest crammed with gold. Yellow blood sprayed on her face when her axe cleaved into an insectoid, and it felt like the freshest rain. She was hoping this gauntlet would never end until she was finally forced to stop, having cut her way to the spider fire pit.

The mother insectoid raised Menov high up into the air, then slashed down, the gust of wind generated swayed trees and would have knocked Pyrik off her feet if she had not slid into the pit, and the earth shook from the impact, followed by clots of dirt raining down. When it straightened up again, it was missing a mandible and Menov was gone, having finally gotten rid of its pest after much difficulty. Pyrik could only hope that Menov did not get squashed upon impact as she tore strips from her shirt sleeve.

The kerosene was kept in a small wooden barrel, brought over from the settlement. Pyrik ripped off the top, dipped her strips of cloth in the kerosene, and found a barrel of spider fire. The jars that the arachne used to hold the flammable liquid were fragile, made with clay. The barrels were made of wood, pliable enough for Pyrik’s bayonet to make an opening large enough to slip the kerosene-soaked strip in. She only needed one to start the blaze, the rest to simply feed the ensuing flames.

THWACK!

The sound was like the crunch of a ship hull torn open from jagged rocks. Pyrik peeked out of the pit and saw Menov, alive, having swung a tree like a sword, sending the mother insectoid sprawling, screeching madly from the assault.

“Menov! Menov!” Pyrik shouted for her.

“Pyrik? What’s it you want? Can’t you see I have my hands full at the moment?” Menov said as the mother insectoid clumsily got back up.

“Use the spider fire! I’ll let it lit for you to throw at the beast!”

Digging though one of her pouches on her belt, Pyrik found some flint as one of Menov’s hands stretched out and lifted the barrel out from the pit. She was about to strike the stones to produce a spark, when two insectoids were scuttling toward her. It bared its mandibles at her as they belted out a screech. Pyrik raised her blunderbuss and blasted an insectoid, reducing its head to a misty spray of chitin and brains. She reached for one of her melee weapons when she realized she left them in the pit, and felt a great fear seize her heart as she stood there, powerless to defend herself against the insectoid getting closer.

There was a swift flash of steel, then a head rolling off its shoulders. When the body of the insectoid crumbled to the ground, Pyrik saw Cutter with his saber. He was splashed from helm to boot in yellow blood and bits of gore.

“Get that rag lit. I’ll watch your back,” Cutter said.

With a quick nod, Pyrik started striking the flints together, that was, until she looked up.

Menov was preoccupied with the mother insectoid, snapping, thrashing, doing anything to get its appendages around her. The only reason Menov was not already in its maw were her dexterous limbs, moving her out of the way in time from getting flattened.

Cutter glanced at a field cannon. “I’ll distract,” he said.

Pyrik wanted to protest, however, Cutter was already racing toward it. She swore, unable to do anything as she watched him bash an insectoid trying to intercept with his gauntlet, causing an all-black bulbous eye to pop out from its skull. He slashed through a few other insectoids until he was at a field cannon. Heaving up the trail, he turned to field cannon toward the mother insectoid and methodically started loading in a cannonball.

“Look out!” Pyrik warned.

An insectoid was coming up behind him when an arrow fatally hit its head before it could get any closer to Cutter.

Pyrik retraced the trajectory of the arrow and discovered the archer was Ira, who was perched on a nearby tree. She loosed a few more arrows, all finding their marks, covering Cutter from above with deadly good accuracy. Given a reprieve, Cutter managed to get a cannonball rammed down the barrel. With his linstock ignited, it hovered over the vent of the cannon where there was powder, waiting for the opportune moment to—

KROOM!

An uproarious bang deafened all other noise as the field cannon rocked back and spat out its cannonball in a great cough of smoke. The lead ball crashed into the side of the mother insectoid, garnering its attention with an antagonized screech, ignoring Menov for the human who had the audacity to provoke its wrath.

Cutter staggered a foot back, then exploded into a desperate sprint toward Pyrik. “Fucking light it now!”

The mother insectoids, with its unfathomable amount of appendages, was stampeding for Cutter.

Pyrik was striking the flints together furiously until a spark turned the rag ablaze. “Menov, now!” she shouted.

Menov’s ribbon-limbs flexed like muscle she used a pair of arms to run on them, swept up the lit spider fire, and right as the mother insectoid was about to careen into Cutter, its head snapped to one side as the barrel crashed into it, covering it in that red viscous accelerant, engulfing it in flames.

“Don’t stop, Menov!” Pyrik shouted. “Keep going! Make it burn til there’s nothing but ash!”

Whether Menov had heard did not matter, she was reaching into the pit for more spider fire to throw at the gargantuan beast. Wood splintered, clay smashed, spilling its yoke to feed the flames that ravaged the mother insectoid. It tried smothering out the flames by writhing in dirt, yet all it did was spread the spider fire over its gleaming black body.

A visceral ecstasy entranced Pyrik as she watched, her mind racing to preserve the details: the unceasing fire that ate through thick plates of chitin, the smoke that rose from the charred flesh, the crackling and popping. This moment, so golden, so precious, she could already imagine herself revisiting it at nauseum, wallowing in the details like a pig in mud. In her mind this beast would live and die continuously for her pleasure.

Eventually the mother insectoid stopped trying to smother out the flames, defeated, still, allowing the fire to plunder its body for fuel. Cutter opened his visor, and Pyrik saw in the perk of his eyes that he was smiling.

The mother insectoid was dead. Soon the rest of its broods would join the twisted pyre with the help of Menov, combined with all their guns and arrows. Yet when Pyrik glanced up at Ira, she did not see a smile. Instead, there was only a horrified stare. Pyrik followed the stare, and found smoke slithering up from the arachne village.