There was a loud, fleshy, crunching sound as I ripped my hand away from a particularly chunky Prius Cicada. A mass of purplish gunk fell off the tip of the iron knuckles as I disabled the extended blades. I then stepped back as it started to thrash around wildly, ducking out of the way of the mandibles on it.

  It was about two days after our little investigation. I had gone through and checked the requirements for everything I’d bought. I’d given out Local Map and Second Wind to Deacon after asking a couple questions and used the books for Farsight and Detect Traps for myself.

  Farsight

  You are capable of zooming your vision in up to a value of Perception divided by 10 times your current visual range.

  Detect Traps

  You are good at seeking the hidden dangers of dungeon delving. You know those holes in the wall probably hold spikes. That suspiciously round rock is absolutely going to roll down the passage you’re in, look at the curved walls. That chest. A mimic. Note: This skill does not allow you the ability to disarm found traps.

  Tier 0: You managed to find a few traps without tripping them first. Good job!

  The first time I’d activated Farsight, I had fallen over and vomited all over the ground. I’d been outside at the time, so it hadn’t been that bad, but it was taking some getting used to zooming in and out on things. Funnily enough, Scan worked with the trait, and I committed to abusing that feature maliciously.

  I’d also gotten Local Map from the Shop for myself. I then worked through the feature and then walked Deacon through setting it up to be easier to keep track of people.

  But because of that purchase of 10,000 Experience, I had decided to push for killing bugs sooner than anyone else would like. It was worth the purchase though…

  “Paige! Down!” I shouted before I’d even turned to look at her. When I turned, she’d hit the ground and rolled as another large bug tried to divebomb her. As it flew past where she’d been, I watched as Zaion put several water projectiles through it’s multifaceted eyes. With that one taken care of, I went back to crushing the larger bugs smaller siblings.

  It was only four of us: me, Zaion, Elayne, and Paige. We’d been at this for a couple of hours, taken frequent breaks at a nearby farmhouse that we’d cleared out. The crops from the farm were gone, and luckily there wasn’t another stable to worry about. It made a great reference point, though, and the stone walls of the farmhouse kept us safe.

  And three other teams.

  I looked off in the distance and heard more than saw a loud clap of thunder followed by a bright flash. Past them, another team was using large paddles on sticks with holes drilled them to make them easier to swing. Most of them were just waving them through swarms of smaller bugs.

  I checked the bug counter.

  Summer Screaming Storm

  Mission Type: Extermination

  The Prius Cicada have entered their active season several years early and must be dealt with.

  Objective: Kill Prius Cicada

  Reward: 100 EXP per Prius Cicada killed. Bonus Rewards every 100 kills.

  Current Kill Count: 544 (335 claimed)

  As we’d begun our work, it became clear that the smaller bugs counted for the kills. But only marginally so. You didn’t get credit for the smaller amounts unless you were killing dozens at a time, and even then the numbers were weird.

  A couple of knee high bugs flew down to try and get the drop on me. I weaved out of the way and got one of them through the top of where the head was supposed to be. It was hard to tell sometimes with their anatomy. The blades extended inside the creature as I pulled off half it’s head and flung it and another punch at the second bug coming from me. I planted my foot and hit it hard enough that the shell deformed.

  546…

  A huge insect crashed down on top of me before I could move. I hit my head pretty hard on the dirt. Snarling, I felt for the mana inside of me. As the bug’s legs started to stab into me, I dug my nails into the fleshy underbelly of the thing and used Wind Manipulation, since I wasn’t confident I wouldn’t cook myself with Fire Manipulation.

  The bug inflated momentarily and then exploded in a shower of gore and chitin. I rolled to my feet and tried to wipe the guts from my face to try and figure out what had happened.

  Something splashed across my face and then I felt all the gross wet bits leave. Zaion gave me a cheerful smile and pointed into the sky. “You may wish to move.”

  I looked up and scrambled away as the remains crashed down where I’d been. I stared at it in confusion and then at Zaion. I mouthed the words ‘what the fuck’ before moving on to another creature.

  A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

  720…

  It was getting late, and I was breathing pretty hard. Despite Zaion being nice enough to regularly wipe the viscera from us with water, all four of us were starting to feel rather disgusting. Well, maybe not Paige.

  She was a bit… concerning at the moment as I watched her jump onto a bug Elayne had pinned down and start tearing into it with a pair of daggers. Something about the look in her eyes as she screamed at the thing to die made me think she was using it to work through some things.

  I didn’t blame her one bit.

  However, I was low on mana, and the bugs would never truly stop coming. “Let’s disengage! Back to farm!” Even as I said that, I yelped as something the size of my hand latched onto my arm and started biting it. I squished it and started moving back to relative safety.

  969..

  I waved to a couple of people leaving the farmhouse. They’d been doing regular rounds, keeping the farmhouse itself free from the bugs. I wasn’t going to complain, even though I suspected they weren’t doing it out of kindness. Maybe the farm’s owner paid them?

  When I got inside, the constant screaming was muffled and I pulled out the earplugs we’d all been wearing to prevent hearing damage. I collapsed into a chair and rubbed at the bridge of my nose, trying to relieve the migraine that was building.

  Zaion was next, followed by Elayne and Paige. We’d been fighting for hours, and there was no sign of things slowing down. “You know, maybe waiting for Deacon would have been a better idea.” I said when the door closed and we wouldn’t have to shout at each other to hold a conversation.

  Elayne turned a chair around and sat down with her arms crossed over the back. She leaned her sword against the wall beside her, “Maybe. But we’re doing alright.”

  “Ugh, the stupid quest says I’m not even to five hundred kills yet.” Paige grumbled.

  “I’m just under a thousand.” I said, sighing and running a hand through my hair. I tried not to grimace at the chitin stuck in it. “Maybe we should try and get you a hammer or something.”

  Paige stared at me, mouth agape, “How?!”

  Zaion tilted his head as he considered it, “Unlike you, she is regularly going out of her way to stomp groups of smaller insects. As I looked around the battlefield, I noticed Elayne doing the same and was surprised when my own efforts raised my count so high.”

  “What’re you at?” I asked, curious.

  “1,566.” He said, simply.

  Elayne laughed as me and Paige both made exclamations of outrage. I got out, “How?! I barely see you moving!”

  He brought water up from his new hip jug. “They do not seem to like the river water.”

  The river… “You mean the highly toxic and dangerous river water?” Paige asked incredulously. “How is that fair?!”

  “It isn’t.” Elayne said bluntly. “And the only way to make it fair is to learn. Either get better at what you do, or pick something up to help.” She shrugged, “Or be like me and accept that while I’m not getting that high of a kill count, I’m also still good to go out there and keep going.”

  “How?” I asked, exhausted personally.

  She shrugged, “I don’t move as much as you do.”

  I raised my hand, finger up to object, but couldn’t really find fault with the logic. “That… doesn’t sound like the real reason…” I still said, though without any confidence.

  “Maybe it is, maybe it isn’t, but either way. Do we want to stay here or fight our way back to the road and try and get back to the city?” Elayne asked, changing the subject.

  “I am not opposed to sleeping here.” Zaion said, the river water going back into it’s jug. “I would like something besides travel rations, though.”

  Elayne nodded towards the door, “One of the other groups had a rather big bug on a spit and are roasting it. They even made little plates out of chitin, want to try it?”

  There was collective gagging, from myself, Paige, and a couple of resting adventurers. Elayne shrugged, “I’m going to get some, how about you Zaion?”

  “I would not mind trying some. I have a number of spices that may aide them in flavoring the meat.”

  The two stood up and headed for the door, Elayne making sure to take her sword with her as she looked around. After a brief increase in volume, the farmhouse was, relatively, quiet once more. It was an exhausted silence.

  I started combing the bits of chitin out of my hair with my fingers as I started to do a little clean up of my stats sheet. I’d been claiming the kill amounts during the few breaks we’d had so my Experience wasn’t overflowing, but I was a little worried about the others. I’ll have to get them to a crystal soon to level or they’ll waste all of it.

  With some quick math, she’d figured that her kill count had gotten her around 63,400 Experience. Since it was class experience, I hadn’t wanted to waste any of it. But that was also part of my current problem.

  While I’d complained about Elayne still having energy, I’d also been dealing with my new stats. I’d gone up seven levels over the course of the day and while it wasn’t as bad as when I’d gotten so many mental stats at once, it wasn’t pleasant feeling my insides shifting around and changing. That wasn’t even counting the free points I hadn’t touched.

  “What the hell am I going to do with thirty points?” I mumbled to myself.

  “What was that?” Paige asked, slumped over a table. She looked as tired as I felt, though I probably had more endurance than her.

  “Oh, just thinking out loud.” We weren’t alone so I didn’t want to elaborate. “We probably should head back to town so you and everyone can turn in the quest and level up before we come back out.”

  “Ugh, don’t remind me. Even without getting a lot of kills, I’m going to waste so much of this.” There was a half-hearted agreement from someone else in the room, but before I turned to look, Paige continued, “And I would hurt someone for a shower.” There was another sound of agreement and I turned to look at who was making the noise.

  It was a burly man with long hair that framed his face and a bushy goatee and mustache. He raised a hand in acknowledgement. “Sorry… I just feel the same. My team said they were going to get a wagon, but… it’s been a minute.”

  I nodded slowly, “Fair. You do look exhausted.” I turned back to look at Paige who was sitting up. She shrugged, and I went back to combing my hair with my fingers. “I need to figure out how to use Fire Manipulation so I don’t burn myself. I feel like that’d make this so much easier.”

  “For you.” Paige said, a little bitter, “I’m not really a lot of use out here…”

  I reached over and put a hand on hers, “Don’t compare yourself to me, Zaion, or even Elayne. If everything goes well here, we’ll find something to do where you can show off.”

  She smiled.

  Then the man in the corner spoke up, “Yea!” I looked over to him and he looked a little loopy. Grumbling, I stood up and walked over towards him. “Hey, what’re you doing?”

  I poked him and cast Heal. He blinked several times as my mana drained into the spell. “Huh…”

  I patted him on the shoulder, “Feel better?”

  “Was I losing blood?” He asked with concern.

  “Yes.” I said before going back to sit with Paige.

  “Oh… Okay.” He said quietly.