Chapter 78 - A Blinding Flash

  I had a plan to wipe out the remaining pill bugs, but it wasn’t going to be a simple, one-step process. In theory, I could just wade into the creatures, smashing them all up, but their ranks gave me pause. The ones I had seen were all in the tier two to four, but there was no telling how high some others might be, back in their caves. I wanted to be smart about this, if I could.

  Fortunately, nature had provided me with a great tool for the job. The problem was, the little guys were all doing everything they could to avoid the water, which was where I wanted them.

  I ripped a chunk of pip from a wall as I flew down the passage. That would serve as a temporary weapon here. I used the pipe to smash the first few pill bugs I saw scampering along the walls, but once I got nearer to their lair, there were too many of them for that to be expedient. Instead, I summoned the strongest Gust of Wind I could manage and sent that rushing down the passage.

  In the confined space of the tunnel, the impact of the Wind was magnified, and it knocked most of the pill bugs from their perches. They’d been racing along the walls and ceiling to avoid the water, but the Wind sent them flailing into the small river running down the tracks.

  That wasn’t going to kill them, of course. They would drown, but not right away. Almost as soon as they hit the water, the creatures began a rapid scramble to get themselves back to the walls so they could crawl clear.

  “Not today, guys. Sorry,” I said. I meant it, too. They were animals, just doing what they were supposed to do. The changes magic wrought on their bodies turned them from cute, harmless little critters into something much more dangerous, though. If they kept breeding and growing stronger, eventually they’d be out there on the surface, killing people.

  And we’d already lost the majority of humans, from what I could tell. It was time for that to stop.

  I activated my Lightning Bolt spell, sending a tier five blast directly into the stream of water. There was a brilliant flash as the Bolt lit up the tunnel. The jolt carried through the fluid, sparking and flashing as it reached each pill bug. When the electricity was gone, every pill bug that had been touching the water was dead.

  Two of them had managed to squirm their way up a wall and survive, but I finished each off with a couple of well-placed blows of the pipe I still held.

  I flew down the tunnel, all the way to the entrance, picking off any stragglers I spotted. There were a few, but I’d wiped out most of the ones outside their nest with the Lightning. That didn’t mean the threat was past, though. I had no idea how many more of the creatures still survived in their tunnels. All of them would need to be cleared out before I could be certain the danger was eliminated.

  When I arrived back at the entrance to the bugs’ side passage, sure enough, a bunch more of the creatures were already squirming their way out into the main tunnel. I launched myself forward, smacking one down with my pipe, then another, and a third. The creatures kept pouring out, though. There were so many of them!

  “Guess you guys have been busy making baby pill bugs or something,” I grumbled. With all the damage I’d done to their population a week or so ago, I figured there would only be a few of the things left.

  Definitely not the case.

  I flew back from the gap and lashed out with another Lightning Bolt, frying more than a few. My mana was getting low, though. Between the constant flight, multiple Gusts of Wind, and two tier five Lightning Bolts, I was starting to push up against my limits.

  “Time for a little fancy flying,” I said, soaring forward, into the gap.

  I held the pipe in front of me, knocking a pair of bugs into the water as I passed. The pipe helped me as I cruised down that long first tunnel, bashing more of the little critters into the drink. I streaked thirty feet into the passage, knocking down over a dozen of them in the process, then turned and blasted the water with another sheet of Lightning.

  The blast lit the passage up like daylight for just a moment and left smoke trailing from each dead pill bug body. Any of them touching the water had to be dead, at this point. The main trouble was they were all actively avoiding the water.

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  “I could use Alex and his Create Water right about now.” Flood the passage, blast it with lightning, and I’d be done.

  Instead I found myself flying down one side passage after another, whacking each survivor over the head with my pipe. Most of them went down with a single blow. Only a few of the higher tier bugs took multiple shots. I had a hunch those were the ones with Natural Armor crystals. One of the biggest up sides of having to do this clean-up duty would be all the crystals I’d collect once I was done.

  Back on that first day, it was finding this lair that got me my start. The pill bugs dropped only clear and grey stones, and the clear stones they’d dropped seemed far more focused than most of the other monsters I’d seen so far. I’d picked up almost entirely Strength, Stamina, and Agility stones from these guys, along with Natural Armor.

  That focus on a narrow band of stones allowed me to rank up faster than most other people, which in turn made me able to defend Boston against the Karabos invasion.

  If I hadn’t run into these guys that day, if they hadn’t grabbed Emmy, I probably wouldn’t be half as strong as I was. In a way, that bit of luck might have been what saved the city.

  Weird, how things work out.

  The nest wasn’t organized the way the ant nest had been. Delving into the ant tunnels felt like a peek into their psychology. I knew that there were reasons for all their tunneling decisions, but I didn’t know what those were. I’d seen hints of the patterns, though.

  This was different. The pill bug tunnels gave me no indication they’d planned much, if at all. The main passages weren’t something they’d made, for starters. They were cracks in the rock. It looked like maybe there’d been water flowing through those cracks before, sometime in the past, because the sand underfoot felt like what you’d find at the bottom of a river.

  They hadn’t made the main passages, but they certainly had been digging in and adding to them. When I’d been here the first time, there had been dozens of tunnels branching off from the main passages. Most of them had been at the floor level, though. I figured the little guys had just dug in close to the ground because it was easier.

  Now, the ground floor was completely flooded. The pill bugs had been forced to move out of the tunnels they’d dug, into the main passages. From there, they’d started work making new ones. Like the old, these new holes were about two feet across and went straight into the rock.

  The size meant there was no way I could slip inside. They were much too narrow. My presence outside the holes meant none of the creatures were leaving them. We were at an impasse.

  I saw a few of them, waving their antennas in the darkness. My NightVision let me see deep into their holes. I even shot a Lightning Bolt down one passage, frying at least one pill bug. But that wasn’t going to solve my dilemma. I didn’t have the mana to fire a lightning bolt down each hole, and even if I did there was no guarantee I’d get them all.

  What I needed was a more certain way of taking down the entire nest at the same time. As it turned out, it was the pill bugs themselves who handed me the weapon of their destruction.

  I pushed on through the tunnels, following the flow of water and squashing the occasional bug that was unwise enough to wander out of the smaller tunnels. It didn’t take me long to find the spot where the pill bugs had drilled into something they shouldn’t have. All the water was gushing out of one of their tunnels, set about two feet above the sandy floor. A steady stream of water poured out, adding to the water flooding the place.

  There was only one place I could think of that water could be coming from. They must have punched through into the river. If I could widen that hole, I could flood the entire area.

  That would be bad for the ratkin, though. Before I went in for mass destruction, I needed to cut this tunnel off from the train tunnel. I walked back out toward the entrance, carefully grabbing the crystals from each pill bug I’d killed. Once I reached the tracks, I waded out onto them and touched each bug there, too. I didn’t have time to count them all, but I’d gathered quite the collection. I’d slain dozens of the creatures.

  Now, to finish the rest of them.

  I went back into the crevasse and went to work on the rock. It was weak and crumbling, the concrete of the train tunnel wall rotted and weak in spots, and the natural rock behind it was no stronger. I went to town with my chunk of pipe and my Strength, ripping chunks of rock free from the ceiling and walls.

  The more rock I broke away, the easier it got. Stones and dirt tumbled down from above. There was a crackling sound above me, then a roar as material rained down. With a start, I realized I’d finally caused the cave-in I’d been aiming for. I activated Flight and darted clear as several tons of earth and stone tumbled and crashed down into a massive heap.

  When the debris stopped falling, I went forward to inspect the damage. It looked like I’d well and truly blocked the passage. The collapse filled at least the first ten feet of the pill bugs’ passage. It ought to be enough to hold in the water.

  Sure enough, the water level was already beginning to rise, which wasn’t a problem for me. I had Water Breathing. It was going to be a major issue for the pill bugs, though. Soon as the water level hit their tunnels, they’d flood.

  Now, all I needed to do was create a new way out of there for myself. Going out the way I’d come in wasn’t an option. Opening the hole to the river, though? That seemed like the best plan to me.