A dwarf by the fire did stay,

Flipping flapjacks at dawn's golden ray.

As her friend charged to fight,

Swinging steel left and right,

She just sipped her strong ale for the day.

Goldie Honorhide.

I could feel the tension behind me as I picked up the pace, approaching the ants. The constant smell of burning. The heat. I picked up the pace again, then, just before I stepped into the fire, I made a 2m wide path with Frigid Void and ran through it with Felix at my side.

I sensed a number of people hesitating behind me, but then the footsteps crunching down on frozen ants started repeating behind me as we moved deeper into the heat and haze.

We move forward as I refine my skill's path and timing. If I make it too far ahead, the ants will return before we pass. I hear the steel of those last in line. I continued for half an hour until we were away from major tunnels and came to a halt.

"First Guard," Nash yells. "Ten-minute break." The warriors spread out, and I heard the sound of steel on carapace startup. A cool mist washes over us from Makara. "That was good," Nash said, "I expected to lose a couple breaking through the outer ring, and I expected us to be exhausted already. My team will lead for a while. You watch for surprises. As far as I am concerned, you have already earned your cores."

Makara came up after he turned away. "Should we ask for more, then?" she grinned. She patted me on the shoulder, and I felt a wave of coolness sweep through me. In my querying look, she said, "A New skill called Hydrate. It is not something I would even have learned in the ocean. It is amazing how dependent you mammals are on water. The skill is quite efficient, too."

That sounded good. She crouched down and patted Felix. She never pets Felix, so it was to hide her new skill. I assume she is not sharing for now as she doesn't want people demanding things from her. Maybe she will charge for it. Probably the latter once the water levels get low. She is a Mercenary.

We moved out again, with two warriors in the lead this time and Thomas behind giving directions. He seems to have a skill for detecting tunnels. These people were at a higher level in everything than most of the guards in the caravan. Nash must have picked the best he could. It was a learning experience just watching them work.

Nash decided we would take a five-minute break every hour. You could tell those with good Heat Resistance and self-healing skills were handling things even better. I was not sure what that did to their energy levels, though. Would a self-healing skill eat through my Spiritual Energy? Probably. That is more reason to spend the time learning to use it efficiently.

Thomas had many scouting skills, and he was the one who spotted a large mass of ants swarming and on the move. He had farsight but didn't have Clearsight, so the haze hampered him.

I am definitely getting Farsight next.

We deviated to check it out.

When we got close Nash swore, "Fucking goblin shit. It is a queen on the move. The main nest is full, and they are spreading. We are going to have to sweep the whole area. We will take this one and then deal with the main nest. Depending on how it goes, we can set more contracts to sweep the area over the next few months. We will save the barrels for the main nest." He looked at Makara and me, "Energy levels?"

We had been helping as we went, mostly Makara. We have not been dropping below three-quarter energy levels. "Good."

"Mog is in charge. You are on barrel guard duty and emergency support. As for the rest of you, it is time we improved our kill count and caught up to Ivan the Ant Cruncher. No heroics. Heroes die, so we go carefully and methodically. There is a queen. The worst danger is you idiots looking for a monster kill rushing in. We will not be rushing in to save your ass. We will not be shedding tears over your death. It is a waste of moisture. We will be eliminating this group methodically. We'll go in two minutes."

I watched them form up and head to intercept the swarm. The swarm was maybe a couple of thousand or so ants spread over about a hundred-meter diameter. A lot of the larger cat-sized ants. I caught a glimpse of larger ones. I am not sure if it was the queen or her elites.

The mercenaries formed a double line. I could tell the existing teams stuck together. And this was expected. They advanced on the swarm, and the front line started to eliminate the outliers. They were using their mele weapon, but being economical with their moves. Often they would just stomp on them. They were not thick on the edge. I haven't seen any unusual skills in play yet.

Looking from my advantage on a slight rise, I could tell when the swarm became aware of the attack and the ants started to move toward them as a group. The mercenaries stopped moving forward and let them come.

The fight was outside my Aura range, even with the extra Spiritual Attributes. I could push over 60m in one direction, but I also had to watch my surroundings. Felix had already killed a small ant that came near us.

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The fight intensified, and I saw some frontliners switch out for a rest. I saw one of them rub burn cream on her leg. I watched as a line of ants had their legs removed by a skill as the mercenaries started to get serious. I wanted to know the skill and feel the spiritual energy, but I was out of range.

Mog stomped on an ant near us.

I watched as one mercenary was overrun, and ants crawled all over him. The person behind him dragged him back, and they tried to clear off the ants as the other frontliners tried to cover the gap. I heard Nash yell, and a backliner stepped forward into the gap. They were surprisingly disciplined. The sort of discipline you usually only get from the army. I guess that was what Nash was looking for when he chose the team. I was looking at the best Jern had in mercenaries.

I stomped an ant and speared a cat-sized one. My spiritual energy was almost full.

When I looked back, Ants were swarming around the end of their line, Nash at one end and the other boss, Sandy, I think it was from the colour of her hair, curved the ends of the line back to stop ants attacking from behind. There was another mercenary down.

I caught the moment Thomas tapped a dwarf on the shoulder. He stomped his foot, sending a shockwave through the ground ahead of them. He must have had Tremor or its more powerful big brother, Quake. A wave moved through the ground, and tunnels collapsed. This forced more ants onto the surface, including the Queen and her elites.

The Queen was about the size of one of those mountain goats, but with six legs. It had a large head on the front with sparking mandibles. Two smaller sections of the body had legs coming off, and a large tail section at the end had a sting—maybe it was her egg-laying organ. I don't know. It was a bright red colour.

The elites were only slightly smaller. I assume the larger the ant, the more spiritually enhanced it was. There were eight elites with the queen.

Four of the elites surged forward to attack the mercenaries, which is how we discovered they can spray fire about two meters in front of them. Three of the frontliners went down, and ants surged in the gap.

Thomas dodged out of the way, but the dwarf who had the quake skill was lit up. I was impressed as the dwarf didn't panic but dropped to the ground and rolled until the fire was put out. It didn't take long, and he was back on his feet while others were still frantically panicking and needing help.

Maybe I should have brought my shield.

This split the mercenary line in two. I looked at Mog, but she shook her head to wait. "Makara," she said, "go put the idiots out of their misery. " At her grin, she added, "Only the fire. We still need the actual idiots." Makara jogged down there.

I needed to concentrate on killing ants, but I heard Nash call for a charge. When I looked up, they had moved forward in two groups, and two elites were down. I could tell there were a lot of skilled strikes happening, and one group engaged the queen and her final elites.

I heard Mog say, "Shit, they charged to far."

Makara was in the middle of Nash's group, putting out fires and smashing ants. She seemed to be enjoying herself.

Both groups were surrounded now. Nash's one was more organised and methodical, and steadily moving toward the queen.

Two mercenaries were limping toward us, obviously out of the fight. There seemed to be no deaths yet.

"How much can you help, and can you get in there?" Mog asked me.

"I can help a lot. Yes, I can get in there."

"Nash was using this as a test for the group. They will win this, but there will be more wounded. Based on this, we would be turning back as a failure if you and Makara weren't here. You help them finish this quickly, but don't run yourself low on energy. I can protect the barrels if you leave Felix, and those two idiots can help."

I nodded, checked on Felix, and ran down the hill. Nash had Makara in his group, so I aimed for the other group. I cut a path with Frigid Void. Crunch, crunch with each step. My spear was working.

I could hear Sandy shouting at the mercenaries, trying to keep them together and working together. She is only having limited success.

I really only have one area-damaging skill that works here. Tremor is useless as the tunnels have already collapsed, and Solar Flare will cook everybody here.

The problem is that all the ants are on the surface, and I don't want to freeze the mercenaries. I wrap my aura around and under them and let a powerful pulse out. All the small ones and the cat-sized one die. The elites and the queen resist it.

They are in my aura, so I target my Spiritual senses to find out why. It is because they are burning so hot. I focus on an elite that is about to spew flames everywhere, and keep Frigid Void on until it finally overcomes the elite's heat, and it dies. It took about thirty seconds.

In that thirty-second period, the rest of the mercenaries no longer had the small ones to worry about, and they engaged the queen and the remaining elites.

I looked over to Nash's team and got rid of the small ones there, too. It does not cost me a lot to pulse Frigid Void. Putting on a constant freeze will drain my energy faster.

I move to the head of an elite, as it looks ready to spew fire and put up a zone of Frigid Void in front of it. The spray of fire hits the frozen air, and it puts it out, with only some sort of liquid continuing through the air. I assume the liquid is what burns and is contained in the glands that are so valuable.

The queen is putting up a fight, and one mercenary is down and missing an arm. It is not bleeding, so he has either taken a potion or the fire cauterised it. I suspect the latter, from the noise he is making.

I join the attack and get my spear between the head and the body… Thorax? I think that might be the term? This hampers it, and a large human brings a hammer down onto its head. The hammer bounces. Idiot. To crack the carapace, you need a spike.

I let go of my spear and drew my axe with the spike on the back. I crashed the spike down hard on the head with Death Strike and saw cracks appear in the carapace.

"It's my kill," growls the human, bringing his hammer down again. This time, the cracks widen, and a dent appears. I bring my axe down again between his blows, and my spike drives deep into the brain, and the queen collapses.

"No!" shouts the human. "You stole my kill!" He starts coming at me with his hammer. Another human and Sandy stop him. "This isn't over! You will pay for that."

"It is just a fight, Brom, everybody was trying to kill it," Sandy says.

That does not calm the man down, though. I kept quiet, but my Kill Thief Class agreed with him and levelled.

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