After a good rest and feeling the refreshing hate bubbling inside Noah from the torturous pain of mutation, Noah clacked his mandibles and stretched his legs, ready for more exploration.
Noah gave a glance at the remaining bones and some other monstrous body parts of the demon lizard laying to the side. Ones that can't be consumed, and he was pretty sure, even if he consumed them, they wouldn't give him any bio-points. So he was better off leaving the remaining leftovers here.
Speaking of that, Noah had received three more bio points after finishing the whole lizard. He didn't use them for mutation instantly. Instead, he had decided to save the points, as Noah didn't want to feel the damn pain of mutation again for a while.
With a sigh, "Okay, enough rest," Noah muttered, turning his head to Ruby, his fellow ant brethren. "Alright, we should go back for more hunt and exploration then, Ruby," Noah spoke.
But different from Noah's lazy back, Ruby was already striding forward with steady confidence, leaving Noah without so much as a sparing glance.
Noah's antenna twitched, noting the sassiness in her flicking antenna and the pheromone trails. Which, for some reason, Noah could tell she was calling him a lazy bum. He sighed in defeat, following behind her with a slumped head.
...
Noah and Ruby moved through the barren terrain of the demon realm, scanning their surroundings and keeping vigilant for any demons.
Noah had noted back in his first visit to this place. The surroundings of this particular region, more or less, were a small wasteland, filled with either jagged cliffs and small rugged mountains. Which kept the habitat of the biome in a very messy and chaotic state.
And the population of the monsters or demons around this territory itself was on the lower spectrum of the food chain, ranging from around D-rank demon hounds to C-rank demon lizards, or different types of demons, but still ranging around that low rank.
But aside from that, even if the conditions for living in this chaotic region granted the low-level demons a safer hiding space, they would still need to fight and clash against each other in order to satiate their hunger.
So, where were they fighting?
Well, it didn't take long for Noah to get an answer.
Noah's antenna twitched. "Oh, what's this?" Noah hummed, turning his head to the direction where the vibration of fierce combat was resounding. The sound bounced off the cliff walls and the flowing wind. Ruby had also picked up the vibrations, as she turned around and quickly rushed to the place.
Noah was forced to follow. And soon enough, following the directions of the fierce combat, they quickly found what all the shit was about.
Tucked between a narrow crevice of jagged rocks, Noah spotted a small clearing—no bigger than a small parking lot. There, he witnessed a group of four large demon centipedes locked in a vicious battle of death with an almost 3-meter-tall boar demon.
Noah groaned, staring at the group of demon centipedes with disgust. "Urg... Centipedes, I fuckin' hate those creatures. Those wiggly little shits with hundreds of legs... Yuck, fuckin' abominations." Noah clacked his mandibles, his mood suddenly sour as he gazed ahead.
The four crawling demon monstrosities, known as centipedes, had already surrounded the much larger and vicious-looking giant boar in all directions. Their teamwork flawless as they advanced, retreated, and fought with almost instinctive coordination, snapping their sharp claws on the giant boar. And from the looks of it, the giant demon boar had already been wounded in many places.
But the giant boar wasn't going to go out that easily, as it did its best to keep itself guarded from all sides, ramming into any centipedes that came closer. However, the giant boar's opponents were too slippery, quickly dodging, feinting, or ducking away before the powerful front tusks of the demon boar hit them.
Noah glanced beside him, as his partner in crime was also watching the fight ahead with unblinking eyes. "You wanna go, Ruby?" Noah asked.
Ruby turned to look at Noah, her antenna flicking as she cocked her head, feeling amused, almost as if saying—why? Can't do anything without me?
Noah's compound eyes twitched in exasperation. "Wow, sis. Didn't know you were even capable of sarcasm. I guess I can finally understand what it's like to have a sibling." Noah shook his head in exasperation, finally experiencing what sibling love was.
But while Noah was busy rambling to himself, Ruby had already moved.
She charged into the battle without a care, sneaking right up behind one of the centipedes. Her compound eyes glittering as she rushed ahead, her mandibles twitching before snapping closed clean into the demon centipede's slick segmented body.
SHRIEK!
The centipede shrieked in pain, its long, slippery form quickly curling up in an attempt to wrap around Ruby like a snake in a chokehold. But that was a huge mistake. As Ruby swung her large head side to side, and with a vicious snap—CRACK!—the body of the centipede split in half.
She threw the demon centipede from her mandibles. It dropped to the ground with a thud. Dark blood oozed out from the cleanly cut body, pooling on the ground beneath.
It didn't take her long to finish off the large demon centipede in just a few seconds.
Silence.
But well, her sudden intrusion had definitely caused the rest of the demons to notice her. As they all stared at the red ant in stunned silence, completely forgetting that they were once fighting for their lives.
Noah couldn't help but feel giddy inside as he jumped up and down like a child. "Ok. She is badass, I give her that." Noah muttered, staring ahead with glittering eyes.
Meanwhile, the centipedes, finally coming to their senses, shrieked at Ruby in rage, realizing one of their brethren had just been shredded right behind them. They shifted their focus immediately, completely forgetting that they were once fighting the giant boar as rage blinded them all. A fatal mistake.
Because the giant boar took advantage of the chaos. It rammed straight into one of the distracted centipedes, its massive tusks drilling into the demon's body before launching it aside like a goddamn baseball.
A perfect prey for Noah to sabotage.
As he quickly turned around and blasted the centipede who got flung to the side, drenching the foul demon in his acid right where the boar had already struck. The acid hissed and sizzled, eating through flesh. The centipede coiled and shrieked, writhing on the ground painfully, before dying miserably in a puddle of pain.
[You have defeated a Mid C-rank magical beast: Razorcoil Centipede.]
[You have gained experience...]
Noah ignored the system notification, as he quickly re-aimed and shot another fire at the giant boar, splashing the burning acid to the side of the beast. By this time, Ruby had already started to engage in a fight with the giant boar demon.
"Damn, she is fast. She is killing those centipedes left and right like it was no work." Noah muttered, noticing Ruby had already finished the third centipede of the group, as it laid lifeless on the ground, the body half cut.
Meanwhile, the last remaining centipede, finally realizing it was the only one left, let out a distorted shriek of panic, its segmented body twisting wildly as it turned tail and bolted—hundreds of legs scrambling in unison as it skittered across the cracked ground of the barren land.
Its long, spiked body coiled and uncoiled like a fleeing snake, a gush of blood leaking from where Ruby had already nicked its side during her rampage.
But the dumb centipede made a terrible mistake in its panic.
It was running straight in Noah's direction.
Noah's compound eyes narrowed, his mandibles clacking in sadistic glee. "Oh no, you are not going anywhere, you discounted spaghetti freak, now get a load of this!"
Paw! Paw! Paw!
Without hesitation, Noah raised his abdomen and fired the last of his acid artillery straight into the panicking centipede's face. The sizzling stream of formic acid splashed across the demon's fanged mandibles and upper body.
The recently upgraded acid gland did its work efficiently as the demon centipede shrieked in agony, its body jerking back and forth, trying to wipe off the burning acid. But the acid clung to the demon like a wet cloth, only more corrosive as it quickly ate away at the demon's carapace and sank into the soft meat underneath.
Once the acid reached the soft flesh, the centipede got to know a new world of pain, as it writhed violently on the ground, twisting and flipping over, desperately scratching its own body in an attempt to leeway its pain.
The sight of the sorry demon centipede almost made Noah feel pity for the vile demon. But he quickly shook his head and walked into the battle himself.
"Last time, I had only hunted those demon hounds by myself in a direct confrontation. Let's see how strong I've become since then." Noah clacked his mandibles, ready for some direct action and also to test out all of his upgrades.
Noah watched the centipede thrash for a moment—it was still alive, but clearly in a world of pain. Its scorched upper shell had already started to crack, acidic steam rising like smoke off a half-cooked meat. A disgusting, half-cooked demon meat to be exact. It writhed and screeched, curling and twisting as its legs clawed at the ground—trying to flee, trying to attack, trying to just do something through the mind-numbing pain.
Noah didn't hesitate, as he ran forward.
Activating the skill, Dash, Noah's black ant body blurred forward, his six legs blurring as he zipped across the distance and appeared right beneath the centipede's twisted head. Before the demon could react—
CHOMP!
His mandibles sank in deep. The first bite cracked through the softened plates, and—
CHOMP!!
The second strike landed right after. His skill Double Chomp showing its effect as Noah's mandibles surged with newfound energy, his attack potency gaining an additional 10% more power. Digging straight into the centipede's skull, cracking through the bones.
The centipede wailed, its body thrashing wildly, smacking against the cracked earth, flinging dust into the air.
But Noah was already gone, side-stepping cleanly with a quick flick of his legs, narrowly dodging a tail slam that would've flattened his smaller ant body.
"Missed me, jackass." Noah clacked his mandibles, watching the demon flail uselessly.
The centipede let out another blood-curdling scream, blindly thrashing toward Noah with desperation, using all of its remaining life left to do one last attack in an attempt to take the damn ant with him.
But Noah wasn't so willing to let that happen, as he dodged away. Crawling up to the centipede's side before finishing the fight with two more chomps to the demon's exposed underside.
Chomp! Chomp!
Finally, the demon centipede jerked its entire segmented body and then, it went limp, dropping to the ground miserably. A low hiss escaped its twitching maw before it finally slumped, unmoving.
[You have defeated a Mid C-rank magical beast: Razorcoil Centipede.]
[You have gained experience...]
[Warning: Since the user has already reached the required level for evolution, all gained experience will be recounted after evolution is complete.]
Noah huffed, ignoring the system messages while wiping the acid and gore off his face with one of his front legs. He let out a sigh, before turning his head around where Ruby was fighting off the giant boar alone by herself. Noah wasn't really worried—after all, the red ant was a low A-rank monster after all.
By the time he was done with the centipede, Ruby was done with the demon boar too.
She stood atop the fallen demon boar, her mandibles thick with dark blood. The boar's body twitched once beneath her, then stilled for good—its thick skull crushed and mangled, a gory mess.
Ruby turned her head to glance at Noah, giving a flick with her antenna, almost as if saying she was done.
Noah gave a flick with his antenna too. "Yeah, me too." He muttered, before turning to look around his surroundings.
Four centipedes, all mid C-rank threats, laid scattered across the rocky terrain in mangled heaps. And now, the High C-rank boar was down too, blood soaking into the cracked earth beneath it.
And all of it was done by two ants.
"Hehe, that's why ant supremacy is the best." Noah clacked his mandibles, feeling pride.
Noah took a deep breath. Then suddenly, with zero warning, he raised both front legs in the air and shouted, "Let's go, baby! We are fuckin' rich!"
He stomped the ground excitedly. "There is going to be so much sweet—oh my sweet—bio-points after I consume every one of them!" His mandibles clicked together with a gleeful buzz.
He even started doing a small victory dance, wiggling his back carapace side to side.
Ruby just stared at him, standing there with dead eyes.
She looked more tired watching Noah's dance than she had been from fighting the whole time.
....
After the battle ended, Noah wasted no time. He immediately lunged at the corpses, ready to chow down and rack up some juicy bio-points.
But of course, Ruby stood in his way. "Nope, no way. You're not eating all of them," was the silent message in her deadpan glare, backed up by a sharp flick of her antenna that smacked him right on the head.
And this time, no matter how much Noah begged, pleaded, or rolled around dramatically on the ground, Ruby wasn't going to let him hog all the demons for himself alone.
In the end, Noah was forced to choose only one. Naturally, he shamelessly picked the biggest and juiciest target—the demon boar. The thing was huge and had to be worth more bio-points than any of the other centipede corpses lying around.
Sighing lightly, Ruby just shook her head. And then, both of them hauled the rest of the centipede corpses back to the rugged mountain, where the Crimson Gate was located. Both Noah and Ruby dumped the monster corpses into one of the deeper cracks, creating a makeshift food chamber. A temporary stash for later use.
Oddly enough, Noah noticed no other ants showed up.
Noah had expected a swarm to roll in, especially since ants always left pheromone trails to signal food sources. That's how they operated—a single ant finds food, they leave a trail, the rest follow.
But here? Nothing. Not a single ant aside from Ruby. Which was odd again—after all, Ruby had gone out from the demon realm to give away that rat demon into the colony. Which meant Ruby didn't leave a trail at all to let the rest of the ants follow behind. She made a conscious choice to keep this place hidden.
That made Noah hum in thought, a few quiet suspicions crawling into the back of his mind… as he turned to glance at Ruby.
But he quickly shook his head. He had some conjectures in his mind for why Ruby might had done something like that—probably to first scout the area. After all, Ruby was, in fact, a pretty intelligent ant monster so far.
So instead, he focused on what was important.
From the demon boar alone, Noah received a whopping 21 bio-points. A rich harvest, if he had to say for sure. Without wasting time, he invested 12 of those points into maxing out his stomach mutation.
[-> Bio Points: 24]
[Stomach Efficiency (+5 Stomach) – Increases digestion speed, granting slightly more bio-points per consumed monster. - 12 bio-points deducted.]
Noah confirmed. And like usual, the intense pain hit Noah, fucking him up as he twitched on the ground like a dying shrimp, screaming in agony and despair—while Ruby stood nearby, entirely unbothered. She even clicked her mandibles once—probably a sigh.
But hey, Noah's stomach reached its mutation cap of +5, so great stuff. Well, aside from that, any more improvements would require evolution, and to evolve, he needed to fully mutate every body part.
After that, Noah saved the rest of his 12 points for later. He needed to max out the other body parts soon anyway. Then he'd evolve.
And after that? Well, back to hunting of course.
For the next few hours, the two ants swept through the region like a plague. Any demon they found, they hunted. Ruby always took the position for vanguard, fearless like any ant should be. Not Noah though—his lazy ass always stayed behind Ruby, backing her with acid fire, and whenever possible—after the hunt was done, he would shamelessly steal away a few good chunks of the corpse to chew on for bio-points.
One target was a demon cave gorilla—a hulking, three-meter beast living alone in a dry volcanic cave. It looked domineering and fierce, but that didn't matter. Because once Ruby—much smaller than the gorilla—entered inside the cave, the gorilla got fucked. Or more precisely, got shredded to pieces by Ruby's mandibles.
Noah also snuck a limb of the gorilla like a shameless gremlin and oh boy, he instantly got 17 bio-points for that small stuff. Max stomach mutation doing work.
After each hunt, they rested for about 30 minutes. Always returning to the rugged mountain, keeping the food chamber near the Gate to drop off bodies. The pile of food was growing at a rapid pace. Noah could only imagine how the colony would start to grow after he and Ruby returned to the colony with this amount of food.
They will probably think of them as heroes or something.
Noah thought with a giddy clack of his mandibles, humming happily. His mood very good.
And just as Noah and Ruby were hunting again—this time, Noah found something very interesting.
"What. The. Fuck. Is. This?" Noah muttered, staring at a mysterious ball of darkness in front of him.