“Gone?” Villanelle stared in surprise at the forest in the distance, now completely dark.
The sun had fully set, dusk had closed in, and the empty snowy field was deathly silent.
The White Water Town militiamen lit torches and oil lamps.
Hanke’s calloused hand unconsciously rubbed the hilt of his sword as he frowned and muttered to himself, “This isn’t right… it’s too few…”
“What’s too few?” Patton strode over, his shield on his shoulder, following Hanke’s gaze toward the forest that had become a silhouette of black.
“The number of bugs is too few,” Hanke explained in a low voice, a heavy unease appearing on his face. “Before, they always came in wave after wave. They would never come only a dozen or so like today. And… even when driven back, they’d linger on the outskirts, looking for chances to retrieve their dead. For them to die off in a batch and then go completely quiet like this… it’s very unusual.”
Patton nodded silently.
He had once been a junior officer in the Eternal City Garrison Army, and his veteran’s intuition also made him feel something was off.
Winning too easily wasn’t necessarily a good thing; it could be the calm before the storm.
“Maybe reinforcements came, and they got scared,” Finn chimed in, his tone light.
Hanke just shook his head, not saying anything more. “I hope so… I’ll go arrange the night watch. We’ll take the first half, and we’ll trouble you all for the second.”
The night watch rotation was quickly arranged.
Villanelle, holding her backpack, walked into a shed assigned to her. She cast a spell to blow the dust off the wooden plank bed before sitting down.
She looked left and right, waved her Magic Staff to close the door, and then unzipped her backpack.
Ignis poked his head out from a pile of supplies, his molten-gold pupils particularly conspicuous in the dark.
‘I feel something’s not right… From within the Silent Ancient Forest, there’s been a low sound constantly coming out.’
“What?” Villanelle whispered.
‘Can’t make it out clearly. It’s been buzzing non-stop since daytime until now.’ Ignis fell into thought. ‘It seems… after that batch of Crystal Shell Bugs died, the sound grew slightly louder for a while, but it didn’t take long before it went back to how it was.’
“That sound is related to the bugs?” Villanelle keenly grasped the key point. “Could it be…”
Ding-a-ling-ling…
A series of urgent bell chimes suddenly sounded from outside the door, accompanied by Hanke’s panicked shout: “Quick, quick, quick, assemble, everyone assemble! They’re coming!”
“Another incident?” Villanelle hurriedly stood up, gently pressed Ignis back into the backpack, zipped it up, and rushed toward the door.
The White Water Town militiamen and her other three teammates also quickly gathered near the low wall and the watchtower.
Villanelle took the steps two at a time, rushing up the low wall to look at the scene outside.
Under the moonlight, the first thing that met her eyes was a vast expanse of spine-chilling dark-blue luster, boundless, to the point where the color of the snowfield was no longer visible. It seemed to be undulating slightly…
“Bugs! Th-those… they’re all bugs!” a militiaman stammered and shouted.
“This many?” Patton’s usually calm face finally changed expression.
“Burning Bottles! Quick, the Burning Bottles…”
Villanelle forced herself to calm down, raised her Magic Staff, and a ball of light flew from the crystal atop the staff, shooting straight into the sky. The intense light it emitted dispelled the darkness below.
No matter what, getting visibility first was the priority…
It would have been better not to have lit it up. Doing so sent a collective chill down everyone’s spine: the Crystal Shell Bugs were almost blotting out the sky and covering the earth as they swept forward, like a turbid, dark-blue tide. More swarms were continuously emerging from the forest…
All resistance seemed futile.
All the pre-laid traps were triggered one by one. Large numbers of Crystal Shell Bugs either tumbled into pits and suffocated to death or triggered the Fire Rune Mechanisms and were burned to charcoal.
But their companions above still trampled over them without the slightest hesitation, pressing forward.
The Burning Bottles Hanke and the others threw with all their might didn’t achieve much effect. Fires blazed on a few clusters of bugs, but more of the swarm, like a stream encountering a rock, quickly split to flow around both sides of the flames and continued their advance.
Villanelle’s Magic Staff was moving so fast it was almost a blur. Fireballs continuously condensed in mid-air and fell, like a rain of flaming meteors. Finn, watching beside her, was dumbstruck.
The explosions of the Fireballs were continuous, almost igniting a line of fire around the outpost, barely holding back the charge of the insect tide.
Witnessing this scene, Hanke felt greatly reassured, while also feeling a bit more awe toward Villanelle.
“It looks like we can hold…”
Before his words even finished, more Crystal Shell Bugs hesitated for only a moment before forcibly charging through the rising flames. Covered in crackling fire, they fearlessly pounced forward.
Even though they had become moving torches that could topple at any moment, before their lives ended, they could still charge a significant distance. Even the fire wall was on the verge of being smothered by their relentless advance.
“This… why?”
Villanelle’s eyes widened, but her staff-waving movements didn’t stop.
Even at this point, why wouldn’t they retreat?
“Prepare to engage!” Hanke, snapping back to his senses, roared, tightening his grip on his longsword. “Mr. Patton, please protect Miss Vela!”
The militiamen on the low wall all assumed fighting stances, staring fixedly at those clusters of firelight illuminating the night.
Finally, the trench below the low wall was filled. The first hissing Crystal Shell Bug climbed onto the low wall. Its body was over a meter long, charred black, with a few flickering flames still clinging to it.
A militiaman’s spear accurately pierced it, and it fell back down before it could steady itself.
But more Crystal Shell Bugs surged onto the low wall with an unstoppable momentum. The defensive pressure on everyone suddenly increased.
Layla couldn’t keep up anymore and could only prioritize shooting the targets closest to the defenders on the wall. Her arrows never missed; each one could take the life of one or even several Crystal Shell Bugs.
“We can’t hold on like this, Mr. Hanke!” Patton shouted, swinging his heavy, giant shield with such force it whistled through the air. Each swing sent a large swath of bugs flying, splattering guts and fluids.
His armor was already stained with rust from the corrosive acid.
With too many bugs swarming onto the low wall, Villanelle had to stop summoning Fireballs and prioritize attacking the targets on the wall. At this rate, her Mana and mental energy would be exhausted soon.
Hanke cleaved a bug lunging at him with his sword, seeming to have made up his mind.
“Abandon the outpost! We retreat directly! We must get the message back!”
“But how do we retreat? These sticky bastards won’t let go!” Finn responded loudly, wielding an iron rod he’d picked up from somewhere, smashing it down on the Crystal Shell Bug in front of him.
Patton’s heart sank to the bottom.
Just as he was feeling somewhat desperate, a black shadow swept past over his head like a ghost.
“What was that?”
The black shadow circled for a moment, then hovered in mid-air. Immediately after, a beam of Black Flame that pierced the night shot out like lightning, licking over the crowded swarm of bugs in front of the low wall like a broom…
Unlike Villanelle’s Fireballs, any Crystal Shell Bug touched by the Black Flame was instantly reduced to ashes, not even given a chance to scream.
The swarm finally felt fear.
The waves of insects surging from the rear all halted in unison, retreating like a tide, putting distance between themselves and the outpost. The Crystal Shell Bugs that had already climbed the low wall also turned and jumped off without a second thought, rushing back toward the main force.
Those desperately defending the outpost finally got a temporary breather.
“Ignis?” Villanelle looked up in pleasant surprise.
She had actually forgotten about the little guy.