Records of Rebirth

I was thrilled my plan had worked!

Although I was being chased by a crazy angry monster, I wasn't too bothered. I swiftly fled in the direction of the terrifying wasp as planned.

I flew through tight spaces it could not fit through, causing the creature to create more destruction. Then I used this chaos as an opportunity to sting every wasp I came across until I cleared a direct path from it to my target.

But as I encroached on the terror wasp's vicinity, more of its squadron took notice of the tentacled monster and took off to fight it. 

I was having too much sneak attacking the wasps, but I knew I couldn't play around for long.

As soon as they got close, I attacked them openly, bringing their attention to myself, all the while keeping up my noise attack so the tentacled creature continued to chase.

I wove a twisted path through the air, dodging obstacles as I lead the wasps that pursued me through the monsters sharp tentacles. The culminating forces of which were brought down on the scary wasp.

In the midst of battle it now had to contend with a barrage of attacks from the tentacled monster.  Finally, the two creatures were brought face to face and another chaotic battle began. 

To my delight, the scary wasp was at a disadvantage. The tentacled monster was surrounded by the wasp squadron pursuing me, which deterred the scary wasp from using its terrifying long ranged attacks on it, in order to avoid hitting one of its own wasps. 

Or so I thought.

While I slipped away, pretending to be just another carrier wasp, I saw the scary wasp unleash a barrage of bladed attacks, slicing through members of its own squadron to cut down the tentacles of the monster without any hesitation. 

A few of those blades rushed upwards towards me and there was no other place to go but down. So I immediately halted the movement of my wings and plunged to the ground like a stone, narrowly avoiding getting sliced to bits. 

What the heck! How could it do that to its own wasps.

Of the seven hunting wasps that had been chasing me, three were killed by the scary wasp's attack, while another two got skewered by the monster's tentacles.

The remaining two wasps successfully evaded the attacks without injury. I slipped past them and went after the tentacled creature, knowing an attack from it would skewer them if they dared to follow. 

Amidst the interference of their battle, the two creatures carried on fighting like nothing was wrong and I found myself evading strikes from both the monster tentacles and the wasps long claw. 

I fought to keep myself alive and out of any collision path while taking some bashes and scrapes, to emerge out from the flurry of falling debris, and deadly attacks, into a quiet tunnel devoid of any creatures. 

Finally away from the chaotic battle, I was relieved to breathe in the air free of the scent of blood.

As I took in my new surroundings when I heard a buzzing sound behind me and found the two wasps had also exited the battle to rest here.

However, they were not as lucky as I was, both were heavily injured and covered in bruises. 

Annoyed by their persistence I ignored them and made a beeline for the tunnel's end. I would have taken them on, but I didn't see a need to attack them, even though it would've been a two vs one - they were injured. 

And besides, I was confident I could outrun them in a race, even if they were both hunting wasps. 

Unsurprisingly, as more tunnel openings whizzed across my sight, the two wasps behind me struggled to keep up. I entered into a thin tunnel passage that was no wider than my wing's width and came across a chamber that was dark and shone with an eerie glow.

It was large with a tall ceiling covered in stalagtite, and walls that were a curious shade of purple.

As soon as I entered, I heard the system ding and an alert appeared which sent a shiver down my spine.

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[Adept Level Quest - Find the Queen's Chambers] 

[Complete!]

[Quest Reward 100XP has been issued!] 

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The alert immediately put me on defensive. I flew at low altitude, peering around cautiously. I noticed the colour of the walls had completely changed to deep purple and I could hear warning bells inside my mind, screaming at me to turn around and flee. 

But then, the system dinged again, and a new alert appeared before me.

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[Required conditions met. Secondary Quest had been added]

[Adept Level Quest - Find the Hidden Queen. Reward [80 XP]]

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What? 

"Sensei! What the hell" I snapped. I wanted to scream.

But before I could demand an answer, a large shadow fell over me and I felt something fast and sharp stab into my wasp, striking its carapace with a deep blow. 

In the silence, the sound of the flesh tearing apart was mind numbingly loud. 

It took me a moment to realize what just happened. There was a deep cut across my abdomen that was bleeding profusely. 

The moment I looked at the wound, my body seized up with cold shock as intense pain seeped through my senses. My HP dropped by more than half in an instant and I couldn't stop my flight from spiralling towards the chamber floor.

«Calm down, you're not actually hurt.» Sensei's voice reminded me.

I quickly cleared my thoughts and tried to steady the descent of my wasp.

«Suppress the pain and stay focused. This isn't over yet, there will be more coming.» 

What? More? 

I tried to get my wings to beat faster, tensely looking around while bracing for attacks from the shadows.

All around, my surroundings were dark but as I got closer to the ground, I began to make out some forms. A series of half eaten corpses and other remains were spread out all over the ground, filling the chamber in numerous messy piles.

Some were very mangled, and others had so little remaining of them that it was hard to tell what they were originally. 

Unable to fly upwards, the terrifying scene only made me feel more helpless. The corpses everywhere filled the chamber with the overbearing stench of death. 

Will I also end up like them? 

The terrifying atmosphere and the unknown presence in the shadows overwhelmed me with fear and I began to crash towards the ground. 

«Aurelia!» Sensei tense shout snapped me to my senses and I shook out of my thoughts. «Don't let your mind wander. Fear is equal to death here.»

I used the still lingering pain in my abdomen to stay alert and rapidly focused on my flight. And just as I rose higher, a massive clawed limb sliced through the air where my body was a moment ago. 

I felt a chill and before I could heave a sigh of relief, several clawed limbs closed in on me from the shadows. They were so fast, they seemed to have appeared out of nowhere, and if not for Sensei's warnings I would have been cleaved into pieces.

I hastily moved out of the way as those clawed limbs crashed through the floor. It was then, I caught a glimpse of the monster in its full glory. 

It was a massive wasp covered in a thick hide that threw off reflections of its surroundings. Streamlined and glossy it moved like a ghost, its enormous body covered in spikes like a wreath of thorns that oozed bright green venom at their tips. 

It was a creature so huge, it filled the spacious chamber with a permanent shadow. 

The Wasp Queen.

It moved much quicker than should have been possible with a body that large and its limbs alone dwarfed the entirety of my wasp.

A single hit was all it needed to cause the instant death of my wasp. But that would be the least of my problems, because the queen was clearly an entirely different class of monster than all those I'd seen.

I was fortunate its previous attack did not damage my wings, so I focused on staying afloat, while ridding myself of the sensation of its pain. My host wasp was on the verge of death as its HP kept falling with every movement. 

Although my wasp was hit, I had to remind myself that it wouldn't affect my original body. A single attack had the power to split me in half so there was no room for error. So, even when I felt a lot of strain on the wasp's body I ignored it and pushed even further to fly out of the monster's attack range.

I was barely able to dodge the clawed limbs and quickly pulled myself further up from the ground.

However, as I was flying at a considerable height, my attention was drawn to a bright yellow floret, shaped like a pretty flower.

It rose from the bloody mangled corpse of a creature, right beneath the formidable wasp queen.

I started at it with pure disbelief. Like a lure my attention was fixed on the new target I had to get to at all cost.

So much so that the wasp queen faded into the background, as did the attacking claws coming my way.