“Now we are in an interesting situation,” John mumbled.

Singed and Karia both had been fought to a standstill. Nia had agreed to not fight as long as Singed did not and Beatrice had managed to outmanoeuvre her opponent by playing her advantages to their maximum value. Under other circumstances, John might have decided that this was to his detriment, just as Gnome still being busy with the soldiers was, but if Liakan was true to her word, these enemy forces remaining alive would be somewhat beneficial in the long run.

That he had a soft confirmation that the Azure Tribe would be adversarial as long as Nia existed was a diplomatic headache for another day. The current headache was more pressing, that being that, according to the three dimensional map he had been building of the Serpent’s Graveyard, Liakan was coming for their position.

Not so incidentally, that position was the lowest, most heavily protected segment of the entire hive. The queen’s chamber was somewhere down there. The demigoddess wanted to meet with the queen that the other demigoddess wanted exterminated. John was going to stay true to his word.

‘The question here is who Mengele thought he could make a deal with… According to Nahua, these ants now serve the sins, gluttony specifically. Is that literal? Is there a god of gluttony around or is that a saying for using Huitzilopochtli’s obligation to repay sacrifice in a corrupted way?’

The party stopped when they arrived next to a massive gate formed out of overlapping layers of chitin, silk and stone. It was the same gate that he had seen through Beatrice’s eyes. “This the place?” Rave asked.

“It lines up with my projection where the tunnel should go,” John confirmed.

“It was originally a delivery way to Quetzalcoatl’s embalming chamber,” Nahua informed them. “The quickest way from the main entrance to the lowest level…”

“I wonder if they have some sort of map or are otherwise in communication with the ant…” John shook his head. There were two options he had here. He could wait for Liakan, whose arrival was likely only a few minutes out, or he could leave someone here to delay the demigoddess and move to kill the ant queen in the meantime. The merit to the former decision was only that it gave him another chance at diplomacy. It would be better for him if he prevented any potential alliance from forming at the outset. To that end, he did not want Liakan to fight on the side of the ant queen. It would be messy enough as it stood.

Resolved to stop her, John then had to consider who to leave that task to. Summoning the other exterminator squads to his current position was an option, but it would leave pockets of the Serpent’s Graveyard not yet explored to potentially fester with ants. It was more time effective to summon less of them. There was also the factor that he could take more risks because Liakan was unlikely to go for the lethal option towards anyone he put in her path. They were adversaries, but if Singed was willing to keep staring at Nia, then Liakan certainly wouldn’t kill the non-pariahs deliberately.

“Jane, would you rather fight the ant queen or the coral dragon? You have about thirty seconds to decide.”

“Urgh, making me decide between two awesome fights… I’ll take the coral dragon,” Rave decided immediately.

John was interested in her reasons, but he could intuit his girlfriend well enough to know that she preferred her up-close fights over swarm encounters. “See you in a bit, then. Undine will stay here. Nahua, let’s go.”

“Okey-dokey!” the sickly sweet demigoddess chirped and took a couple of swift steps to get ahead of John again. The remaining way was clear, not least of all because of the ants that sat in their way.

The walls were covered in them. They were larger, their feathers thicker, their fusion of mandibles and jaws more pronounced, and they drooled the Giant’s Puss like a snail secreted slime. They had encountered a few of these on the way here: Queen’s Guard Ants. An apt name, covering creatures that were level 75 on average.

Amidst their crowd stood a bipedal creature. By sheer bulk, it appeared less. At over three metres tall, it was still an imposing figure. Four arms ended in four-fingered, clawed hands. A second Gluttony Emissary, the creature that Momo, Ehtra, Metra, and the Creator Puppet had faced before meeting the Grim Reaper.

“Step back,” John ordered.

“Me? Step back?” Nahua asked. The ants before them were inert. Either they were aware that reinforcements were coming for their side or they simply refused to be baited away from the queen. In either case, John had the time to roll his neck.

“Yes. I’ll take care of these quickly.”

Nahua did not doubt him further, and just stepped behind him while he raised his flame-wreathed left hand. Purgatory had been burning for a while now, the telltale sign that Rising Annihilation was maxed out. How couldn’t it have been, when his familiars were bringing havoc to every corner of this Eternal Sanctum Segment?

The boost to his Physical Stats that the Rising Annihilation provided was secondary in this situation. While the buff was maxed out, Arcane Ascension had its increase in potency.

And that was what he activated at that moment.

The air all around John began to ripple. It was as if several layers of serene water surfaces existed simultaneously and all of them were disturbed by the falling of thick raindrops. From the centre of these disturbances, the pointed tips of the Chains of Babylon emerged.

Courtesy of the way the Attribute was worded, this was his most effective bombardment spell. Arcana Ray would have just been one ray for a long duration. Unstable Arcana would have created one sphere that would have lasted for a long time. Skyfall would have created one impact, but in this confined space that was asking for a cave-in. All of them had a self-set cost. Arc Lance and Mana Chains were the two go-to options and the former was much better at single target damage.

John didn’t mind much that this was the most effective way to use Arcane Ascension for area damage. It looked too cool to care.

The ants caught onto their impending doom and began to move. Swarm consciousness had its drawbacks in that instant. The Queen’s Guard seemed eager to retreat, while the Gluttony Emissary screeched and charged forwards. Hierarchy created confusion.

John brought down the lowered hand just as the ripples finished forming. 225 chains of silver mana hailed down on the corridor, each powerful enough to punch a hole straight through the Queen’s Guards. Mana Chains slammed into the ground all over, creating a forest of argent links. Even those enemies that managed to evade one chain by sheer luck had no space to truly dodge. Either a second chain skewered them or they were locked into the network originating from the Gamer.

The Gluttony Emissary was the sole exception and even it failed to deal fully with the onslaught. Four of the Chains of Babylon ultimately sunk into the humanoid form of the monster, then pulled taut.

John pointed his palm at the monster and fired an Arc Lance with minimal delay. The impact blew off an already weakened shoulder joint. Screeching in pain and hatred, the Gluttony Emissary charged forwards, ripping off another one of its arms in the process of removing the chain embedded in it. The other two restrictions shattered from the sudden pull.

Swiping and leaping, the Gluttony Emissary manoeuvred through the forest of chains, trying to get to the centre of it all. Every Mana Chain had to be spawned within a ten-metre radius of the Gamer, making the attack an increasingly difficult task. Every step of the way, John kept bombarding the creature with Arc Lances.

With one herculean effort, the Gluttony Emissary leapt up to the bundle of chain links in front of John. Neck and mandibles stretched and closed where his head had been before the Magus Step. Adjusting the position of his fingers, the Gamer fired five Blast Rays that immediately fused into one.

Ripping its head back, the ant-creature dodged at the last second. It started to clack its mandibles in amusement, only to realize the silver cube hovering on the other side of its head. Two more Blast Rays were loosened from the Companion Cube, meeting with the one that had missed one after the other. Two 90 degree turns fully changed the trajectory of the arcane blast, which slammed into the left side of the ant’s relatively flat head.

Excessive force had a tendency to create interesting results. The local application of this much kinetic energy made the head of the Gluttony Emissary do a nearly 360 degree spin on its neck joint, before the fibres keeping the arthropod’s head attached teared and the head fell. Purple blood oozed from the stump.

‘I suppose it’s technically not an arthropod,’ John considered, seeing the barest hint of a spinal column and neck joint in the flesh. ‘Abyssal qualifications get weird.’ He snapped the fingers of his right hand for effect. Suddenly, all the Mana Chains scattered into silver particles. The upright corpse of the Emissary collapsed forwards, landing on top of the severed head.

“You know, I am starting to get into my stupid brain that you are really, really powerful,” Nahua commented when he started walking. “But it’s still really interesting to see it happen.”

“Does it awaken something in you?” John asked flirtatiously, then immediately hit himself on the forehead. “Forget I said that. I know the answer. I’m just acting on my own worst nature.”

The asexual demigoddess just smiled and winked. It was like he was a lowkey alcoholic standing next to an alcohol free beer. He knew it wouldn’t hit the spot and that he shouldn’t in the first place, but he really did have a bit of a problem.

At least the corpses of their enemies made for a good distraction. Some of the ants were still alive and in the process of bleeding out, the rest had been killed either by the immediate impact or the ensuing disturbance created by the Gluttony Emissary. John did not have the time to put the survivors out of their misery.

Behind them, a bright light flashed in the corridor. “Guess that means Rave has engaged this Liakan?” Nahua asked.

“Indeed,” John said. That there was still so little distance between them was one of the reasons why John had been willing to use Arcane Ascension here. He did not like utilizing that cooldown. Thirty minutes was not a long time in real terms, but on a battlefield it was quite a while and that required him stacking Rising Annihilation first. It was one of the trump cards he liked to have up his sleeve until it was either necessary or decisive. This had been a little bit of both columns. Fighting a monster only 100 levels under him head-on would have taken a hot minute.

John wanted to wrap this up fast, just to de-complicate the situation a tad.

Deeper and deeper, they advanced, until there was no deeper to go. The chamber they arrived in was, by standards of rich Abyssals, small. End to end, it could have been no wider than twenty metres, even if all of the webbing on the walls made that difficult to fully gauge. The ceiling was high by human standards. The remaining ants that skittered about likely preferred the snug fit.

They were smaller, only about the size of a large dog, and moved around constantly. Just because of that motion, the massive body underneath was almost invisible. The Queen Ant was tucked away into the corner of the chamber. Its bloated abdomen was folded underneath the comparatively small body and head. Long legs formed a sort of cage, keeping the Queen Ant upright while food was stuffed into its maw.

Other ants had mandibles and jaws. The Queen Ant just had a funnel. Thin, sharp teeth protruded from the fleshy walls, helping the chunks of pre-chewed food down the gullet of the hungry creature. Parts of the organs were visible through the thin chitin, showing hints of the process of turning the food into the steady production of eggs from the curled abdomen.

Observe revealed nothing new or interesting about the Queen Ant. ‘Level 100… I suppose most of that power goes into her recreational abilities…’ The Gamer suddenly turned his head. “You’ll get to finish this yourself. Liakan broke through.”

“Did your first woman not live up to your expectations?” Nahua asked, her teasing broken by the delight she took in letting her plagued mucus drip from her limbs. One of the attendant ants skittered about, likely assuming this was another food delivery or something like that. These level 5 monsters had neither mind nor brawn, they just existed to attend the continuation of the species.

“It’s rather difficult to pin someone down with her skillset, now go ahead and clean this out,” John answered and turned around. “I’ll delay her.”

Nahua, covered in viscous goo, stepped into the swarm with a nod and a smile. John walked back up the corridor they had come through. He stopped after only one corner, put his hands in his pockets, and watched the flashes of light bouncing down the cave walls get brighter and brighter.

Undine had lost sight of Rave and Liakan. The slime lady was hasting after Rave, who in turn was hasting after Liakan. They entered John’s field of view long before Undine caught up.

Liakan leapt against the wall and then pushed herself off the slanted surface with enough power to sail right past John. Three Blast Rays rapidly bounced off each other. Liakan was used to this kind of spell, predicted the pattern, and raised her spear in defence. Scales of mana shielded her from the worst of the impact, but it wasn’t a full Particle Skin and therefore did not prevent her from losing momentum.

A moment hanging in the air was all that the feline Lightbearer needed. Rave was fast, arguably faster than Sylph in short stretches. Interweaving Martial Arts and her ability to turn her physical form into light for bursts of movement, she caught up with the teleporting arcane elemental mid-air. A spinning kick caught the coral-horned demigoddess by the midriff, catapulting her back up the corridor just as Undine flooded into the tunnel. A cascade of gnashing teeth and yellow eyes, the gothic shoggoth kept herself deliberately spread out to limit Liakan’s movements.

“I wanted to fight!” Rave complained, slamming her fist into the palm of the other hand. “Come on, what’re ya doing?”

“Can hardly blame her, it’s not her goal,” John informed the love of his life. “A pleasure to meet you in person, Liakan. I don’t believe we have talked before?”

“We have not.” The demigoddess glanced over her shoulder, then down the corridor. “I take it the queen is dead already?”

“Yes,” John answered. It wasn’t the exact truth, but with Nahua’s pathogens spreading through the heart of the colony, the queen’s existence was likely between solid and soup.

Liakan’s body language changed immediately. The spear was lowered, her posture relaxed. As a show of good will, John had Undine consolidate back down to her normal form. Rave reduced the light output to a minimum to keep the otherwise lightless corridor pleasantly lit. Faintly, the hissing sound of melting biomatter could be heard.

“I will ask again: must we fight?” John had to repeat the question in person, now that their clashing goals were removed – at least for now. “I am perfectly happy to offer refuge to the elements of the Azure Tribe and Purest Front that do not clash with Fusion’s way of the world.”

“A gracious offer.”

“Gracious and extremely beneficial to me,” John answered simply. There were moral questions to be raised about Operation Paperclip and the likes, but the technological advantages were obvious and Fusion was still hungry for capable people. Skimming them off the top of a civil war was simply pragmatic.

“Yet I must decline.”

John sighed and scratched the back of his head. “It really sits that deeply, doesn’t it?”

Liakan turned her head in the general direction of where Nia likely was. John could feel the weirdness as well, but to him it was just a well-acquainted flavour in the air. To Liakan it was… well, it was like being directly exposed to Thana’s Aura of Humanity’s Bane, without any of the resistance John had gained over time.

“It is most regrettable,” Liakan stated. “I can guess that she is not a horrid person objectively… yet all I can sense, all my mind can conceive in her presence is ‘kill it’. There is no coexisting for us in agreement with Maidens of Null.”

“How about distanced neutrality?” John asked.

“That would be my desired outcome. You would aid me in that endeavour if you got out of my way.”

John sighed again. “I can take that to mean you’ll continue snooping around here?”

“It is the most productive use of my time.”

“Even knowing the Grim Reaper and the Illuminati are also around?”

Liakan tilted her head so suddenly and violently that her torso bent with it. “Are you earnest in that claim?”

“Trust me, this situation is a clusterfuck already.”

Liakan straightened back up harshly. For almost half a minute, there was silence. The daughter of chaos had a lot of thinking to do, so John gave her that space. “The presence of all of these forces means that the potential payoff is just that enormous,” she concluded. “We are that desperate for allies.”

“Is this the part where we jump at each other?” Rave asked.

“It is the part where I retreat… Will you stop me?”

“No,” John said and waved off. “I lack ways to constrain you adequately right now and I’m not going to kill you, so there’s nothing useful involved in having a fight.”

“But Joooooooohn, you promised me something fuuuuuuuuun!” Rave whined.

The Gamer decided to take a handful of her ass and squeeze. The implication was enough to make the cat woman purr and stay quiet when Liakan turned heel. Undine and the demigoddess met halfway and passed each other without another word exchanged. Soft trembles stopped just as Gnome stopped hurling her fists.

‘Alright, clean this up,’ John ordered everyone.