For three weeks, Wisnu and Muyang moved through the tunnels with mechanical efficiency, going deeper and deeper into the underground carcass.

  The air grew heavier with every step, thick with essence, pressing into Wisnu’s skin like how divers from the Deepwater Legion Front described the abyss. She learned to ignore it—the way she ignored the damp rot of the stone walls or the pulsing heat that sometimes radiated from the fleshy growths they passed—but now, as the two of them stood atop a dark and sloped cavern, staring down into yet another descent, she felt a slow, gnawing tension in her chest.

  The tunnels weren’t endless. They had to lead somewhere, and judging by the density of the essence emanating from the bottom of the cavern, they were getting close to the heart chamber.

  I do hope Emilia and the others are navigating just fine as well.

  Perhaps we will meet them down below.

  Muyang stood beside her, still as ever. His expression was unreadable, but that was just how he tended to be—as if the filth and blood and stench of this place didn’t touch him. She admired that about him.

  “... We should take a break first,” she said. “Given we still have a week until the time limit, we do not have to slide down immediately.”

  Muyang inclined his head slightly. “A wise decision.”

  With that, they broke off into their individual tasks as they’d done many, many times before. Muyang moved around the top of their cavern, gathering bounds of dried flesh and taking out charred stones from his satchel to build a small campfire. At the same time, she pulled out a few metal rods she’d borrowed from the owner of the quaint little restaurant she’d been working at, setting up a makeshift grilling rack over the fire.

  Soon enough, they had a fire going. Wisnu rolled up her sleeves.

  “I’ll cook this time.”

  Muyang glanced up halfway through taking out chunks of wrapped bug meat from his satchel, one brow raised in quiet amusement. After all, he was always the one who cooked. This was the first time she’d ever offered to man the grill—and still she couldn’t help but feel a bit insulted at the look.

  She crossed her arms. “I worked as a waitress in the city, you know. I can cook a little.”

  He didn’t question her further, simply nodding and stepping aside, gesturing for her to take over. “Then I shall entrust the meal to you.”

  She pulled out a few strands of bug meat from their last few kills. They were nothing special—tough fibers of muscle carved from the lesser Giant-Classes they’d slain along the way—but seasoning made all the difference. She retrieved a small pouch from her pocket, fingers brushing over the coarse grains of salt and ground spices for rough measurement before sprinkling them over the meat. Once she was satisfied, she skewered the strips and placed them carefully over the flames.

  The scent of roasting meat filled the cavern. It really wasn’t much, but after weeks of underground travel where most of their meals were eaten on the move, just sitting around a campfire like this was a rare moment of comfort.

  After a few good minutes of flipping and turning the skewers, she handed Muyang his portion. He took it gingerly and studied it for a moment before taking a bite.

  She had to admit she found his surprised expression a bit insulting as well

  “It… is tasty,” he said.

  Wisnu smirked. “See? At least I got something out of working as a waitress.”

  There was a brief pause. “You do not have to answer if you do not wish to,” he said softly, “but I was under the impression that all Noble-Bloods of the Attini Empire are rich and influential. Why were you working in a restaurant in the City of Feasts?”

  Her fingers curled around her skewer. The fire crackled between them. She watched the flames twist, casting dim shadows against the fleshy cavern walls, and pondered—what was she to say to a question like that?

  A lie?

  Or the truth?

  “... In the south, where the human population far exceeds that of every other front,” she said slowly, “the difference between a Noble-Blood and a normal soldier is whether or not their Swarmblood Art allows them to transmute their blood into living ants.”

  With a sharp motion, she flicked her hand down to the giant sawtooth blade sitting beside her and sliced a thin line across her palm.

  Blood welled up instantly. Muyang didn’t react, but she could feel his intense gaze on her as the first blood droplet took the shape of a little ant.

  Yellowish-orange. Frenzied. Its tiny mandibles clicked violently as it skittered across her skin. Then more came, pouring from her light wound in a frantic swarm, their bodies twitching and writhing, darting in random directions. There were a hundred of them. They ran over her fingers, down her wrist, onto the ground—biting at everything indiscriminately. The dried fleshy ground. The charred stones around the campfire. Even the air itself.

  Muyang tensed, but he didn’t move. He knew better than to give the ants a reason to target him.

  After a moment, Wisnu clenched her fist and willed the ants to dissolve back into liquid blood. They vanished almost instantaneously.

  “All noble households in the Attini Empire can summon and control a specific type of ant with their blood,” she explained. “And these ants do not require much focus or essence to maintain. Some households can summon leafcutter ants, which are skilled at harvesting natural resources. Some households can summon exploding ants, which are skilled at mining and demolition. Thus, since time immemorial, nobles with the privilege of these Arts have been granting their servants, their retainers, their soldiers, and their citizens their ants in order to consolidate their power. A noble who can summon leafcutter ants will give a thousand leafcutter ants to a farmer every three months so he can harvest his crops faster. A noble who can summon exploding ants will give a hundred exploding ants to a miner every month so he can secure more ore for the region. This top-down hierarchy of power lending forms the very foundation of the Attini Empire.”

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  Maybe Muyang already knew this, maybe he didn’t—she continued nevertheless.

  “ This top-down hierarchy of power lending forms the very foundation of the Attini Empire,” she said. “The current Empress of the Attini Empire is the strongest in the empire, who can constantly sustain lending a hundred army ants skilled at healing wounds to all of her Noble-Bloods. Then, the Noble-Bloods who each rule over a region in the empire lend their own ants to their soldiers, who then lend theirs to the common people. In return, the common people serve the army, who serve the Noble-Bloods, who serve the Empress. Unlike some other fronts, ‘nobility’ in the empire is not something to be loathed. In the southern tongues, the term is a cognate word that shares the same meaning as ‘taking care of the seed that bears the fruit’, after all.”

  Muyang said nothing, waiting for her to continue.

  Wisnu tightened her jaw.

  “My household,” she said at last, “summons and commands the crazy ants.”

  She’d already dissolved them into small splotches of blood around the campfire, but still, she gestured to them like they were still around, and there was a good reason why she’d dissolved them so prematurely.

  “They don’t take orders for me,” she said. “I can summon them, and I can maintain them and dissolve them at will, but while they’re summoned, they can’t be controlled. Unlike the Empress, who can give a hundred army ants to her Spore Knights that can last up to three months sitting in a bottle before they automatically dissolve, the crazy ants aren’t useful in organised armies. They don’t harvest resources for soldiers making camp on the field like leafcutter ants do, and they don’t serve as emergency bombs a soldier can throw in a pinch like clumps of exploding ants do. All crazy ants do is run around and destroy everything in their way, friend and foe alike.”

  She gripped her palm even tighter, trying to stem the flow of blood.

  “Its applications in an organized army are extremely few. Even if they could be used by soldiers in small elite teams, the fact is, they cannot even be placed in a soldier’s gourd without chewing through the clay and eating into the man’s body. That is how wild and uncontrollable they are,” she said quietly. “A noble household that cannot summon useful ants for the good of the people is not a respected household. Out of all the Noble-Bloods in the empire, my father—the current head of the household—has the lowest standing. He is not particularly influential outside of his region, and as a family, we are not particularly wealthy, either. And… after that incident a few years ago…”

  She trailed off.

  The fire flickered.

  More shadows danced across the cavern walls.

  She didn’t finish her sentence.

  Instead, she looked up at Muyang, forcing her voice to stay even.

  “That is why I am here,” she said firmly. “I must become a Hasharana. I must show the Empress that there are potential applications of the crazy ants, so to get her attention, I must first bring prestige and fame to the household. Considering the Empress is an Arcana Hasharana herself, I believe she would take the time to re-evaluate and change her mind on my household if she were to hear of my deeds as a wandering bug-slayer.”

  Then, finally, she dipped her head, pressing her fist lightly against her chest. “For that, I am grateful that you are with me,” she said. “If I were alone down here, I believe I would be in a lot of trouble.”

  For a moment, Muyang simply studied her. Then he carefully set down his empty skewer, dusted off his hands, and inclined his head slightly in response.

  “You are most welcome,” he said. “But I must say, I believe you would have been completely fine even if you were alone.”

  He thumbed behind the two of them as he said that, so she cast a glance over her shoulder.

  If not for their campfire and grilled meat, the cavern would stink of intense bug blood.

  Twenty Giant-Class carcasses sprawled across the tunnel they’d emerged into the cavern from, some of their bodies still twitching with the last shudders of death. Some were torn in half. Others were crushed beyond recognition. The stone floor was painted in their dried blood, steaming under the campfire’s dim light.

  “... No need to be humble,” she mumbled. “I may have killed my fair share of bugs in the past three weeks, but you must also admit that you did most of the hard work. You are practically a walking fortress whenever you put that giant stag beetle helm over your head. How did you get so strong at such young an age?”

  He said nothing as he bit into his next skewer

  “I have heard of the Firegourd Wu Clan in the Hellfire Caldera Front,” she said carefully. “Supposedly, they have been raising ‘Beetle Dancers’ for over five generations. They are three warriors who move together as one: the Head, the Body, and the Tail. One man and two woman holding up the three parts of a giant beetle, dancing their way through the battlefield like a single beast.”

  She looked at the hollowed stag beetle head he carried. The answer was obvious.

  “You are from that clan, aren’t you?”

  Muyang was silent for a moment.

  Then, quietly, he said, “I am.”

  “That would also make you a ‘noble’ in the north, does it not?”

  “We are certainly celebrated like nobles, even though there is no such concept in the north,” he shook his head, “but despite my bloodline, I am no longer considered part of the Firegourd Wu Clan. ‘Exiled’ is not an entirely accurate word to describe my situation. It is more like… I am not welcome back there.”

  At that, he smiled softly again—just slightly.

  “I was to be the Head of my own trio,” he said calmly, “but I was chased out by my father because I could not bear to marry both the Body and the Tail.”

  Wisnu blinked.

  She had heard of something like that. In the far north, strong men would typically take multiple wives. It wasn’t just a matter of tradition, but of survival, because humans in the north had to be strong to account for the stronger bugs in general. A Head had to protect his Body and Tail, and that involved one marrying two—because in battle, they believed a man in love would fight harder and fiercer to protect his wives.

  “… I refused my father’s orders to take the ladies I was paired up with during training,” he said. “And so I was thrown out of the clan. Told to find another place in the world.”

  And yet he said that so casually it was like he didn’t really mind it at all.

  She considered him for a moment, her face as blank as could be.

  “You would rather devote yourself to a single woman?”

  At that, he let out a short chuckle. “I would. But for now, I simply seek a challenge, and to reach the pinnacle of just how strong a single Head can be,” he said, turning his gaze to the ceiling. “Perhaps one day I will find a partner strong enough I can devote my entirety to, but until then, I will travel the continent and slay bugs as I was taught to do. Being a Hasharana just seemed like the easiest way I could do that freely without having to worry about restrictions or bug-slaying authorisation from local boroughs and military fronts.”

  Wisnu exhaled softly through her nose.

  Then her lips curled into a small, genuine smile.

  “I really am fortunate to have paired up with a noble man like you.”

  Muyang gave a quiet chuckle, his usual composed demeanor softening. “And I, you.”

  They clasped hands across the campfire, a firm, mutual acknowledgment—but the moment they did, the ground trembled beneath their feet.

  It was a deep, resonant blast that echoed through the tunnels, shaking loose dust, flesh, and debris from the cavern walls. Their hands broke apart instantly, both of them snapping to attention as they picked up their blade and giant beetle helm.

  As soon as they did, silence.

  But Wisnu’s senses sharpened. Ears straining, she listened—searching for movement, for the telltale skitter of legs or the hiss of shifting stone.

  Wisnu felt it down the tunnel they’d entered the chamber from. It was a presence. A wholly unnatural pulse of essence, thick and clinging, and… it was drifting at the two of them from somewhere close by.

  Their gazes lifted slowly, cautiously.

  And a quiet sigh broke the silence.

  “…Damnit.”

  The voice was low. Frustrated. Both of them immediately snapped towards the source of the voice, and there—hunched up and clinging to the cavern ceiling—was a spider.

  Or so it seemed.

  Because even at a simple glance, it was clear it was no mere Giant-Class.

  Nor a Mutant-Class.

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