Chapter 39: Chapter 39

Kai fell to the ground, desperately pressing her palms against her ear holes. Right then and there she only knew pain and it took a few excruciating long seconds for her brain to adapt enough to the feeling that she was able to think.

She groaned out and looked slightly up to get a grasp of the situation. One of the drones ran past her, seemingly unbothered by the scream of the moths. 

Kai blinked in confusion. By all means it should be lying on the ground right next to her, no matter what orders it had.

She raised her head a bit further to see more. Not a single drone was affected and they were all running around the group in confusion. Similar to her though, all her daughters were on the ground, covering their ears. At the entrance to the covered area two of the moths had entered at the same time. It had forced the two beasts to squeeze themselves into the street in such a way, that one was partly on top of the other. 

Really, these things were just too damn big. The street could easily be used by two trucks at the same time and here the moths were trampling on each other, though that was mostly because of their legs protruding from their sides. It nearly doubled the room they occupied.

The moth on the receiving end wasn’t happy of course and regularly snapped at the other beast to express this. None of the two moths were screaming anymore though.

Kai’s pain suddenly began to fade and she watched the snapping, pushing and kicking, but generally advancing moths for another few seconds a bit addled by the situation. She had been so focused on the pain that her brain didn’t even realize that the scream had long since ended. 

Kai frowned. There was only one possible conclusion her gamer mind had for this. They had just been blasted with some kind of magic, likely mind magic and it had taken them completely off guard.

She used the hive connection to explain the situation in a quick sentence to her daughters. They didn’t have time to lie around, especially since the situation at the smaller entrance was a lot worse. 

Only one moth had entered there and wasn’t slowed down by a second one like in the main entrance. 5 drones had already died there to buy time for her daughters and Kai was endlessly grateful for their sacrifice.

The two bickering moths reached the injured one and began to climb over it without any regard for the thing’s injuries. As a result moth one’s wings were practically ripped apart, more and more blood leaving the body and the animal was left whining underneath the other two.  She doubted that it would survive this night.

Another moth entered the street, advancing towards Kai and her daughters. Now that they weren’t in pain anymore, they hurriedly grabbed their weapons and got up before they started to retreat in an orderly manner.

Teresa, the hunter with the bow, took one of her last 5 arrows and shot it at the two moths. The arrow struck one of the legs of the moth that was partly on the other one and the animal shrieked in anger. It was a good thing that they hadn’t used their javelins yet, because without the arrows they would definitely need them.

The other moth immediately snapped at its injured kin and kicked out in annoyance. None of the two backed up to make room for the other however, determined to reach Kai and her daughters first. 

The group reached the first and only crossroad before the ramp at the trunk and stopped their retreat. Kai’s daughters had put bone spikes into the walls of the main street here, hopefully giving them an advantage in a fight. The drones spread around to prepare for the fight, with some of them scaling the walls again.

Kai positioned herself together with the others near the street that led to the other group and the tavern. She looked at the current time estimate of the hive and cursed to herself. It’s been maybe 2 hours since the moths became active and not even a tenth of that was their fight with the first one. This wasn’t going too well for them.

The pair of moths was now past the injured one and close to the spiked area. They wouldn’t be able to pass there together without getting injured in some way. The fourth moth was right behind them however, pressing them forward. The entrance of the mainstreet was blocked by a fifth moth entering the hive.

Kai bit her lips in worry. They had to change their fighting tactic from killing to stalling, but except for the glaives they didn’t have any weapons to keep the moths at bay from a comfortable distance. The javelins were sadly much too short for that.

She looked at the map of the hive, hoping to get some inspiration for a possible solution.

The two moths reached the spikes and the lower one of them simply broke one of the spikes on contact, chittering angrily. Teresa shot an arrow at it, hitting the moth in between the eyes again and doing the damage the spike should have done.

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Kai frowned. The spikes seemed to be no more than an inconvenience to the beasts and they couldn’t rely on the things anymore. If only they could block the moths somehow.

She blinked in realization and facepalmed herself with her free hand. “Ohh gods, I am so stupit! How haven’t I thought of this?”

Anna stepped next to her, not leaving the intruders out of her eyes. “What do you mean, my lady?”

Kai gestured at their surroundings, disappointed in herself. “Look, these tunnels are too narrow for the moths and we are the ones who built them.”

She turned to Anna. “So what stops us from building walls with even smaller entrances to keep the moths out into the tunnels?”

It was really that easy and quite insane that no one had thought of it. Barricading the hive was by no means a permanent solution, because Kai really didn’t want to live oppressed by an animal species for the rest of her life. It would give them the time they needed to get more and better equipment however.

Anna’s face very much mimicked the expression of Kai and she clicked her mandibles together repeatedly.

Teresa shot another arrow and the first drones jumped onto the advancing moths, who were just breaking their way through the bone spikes, not receiving more than a few shallow scratches.

The upper moth began to beat its wings to keep the drones away from them and attacked any drone that jumped on the wings of the lower moth. One drone was kicked away right after landing and impacted the wall with a sickening crunch. It looked like they wouldn’t have it as easy as with the first moth.

Anna looked down the street that led to the other group. “We might still be able to build a wall right before the tavern, if we buy enough time.”

She looked at Kai and pointedly emphasized the name of her sister. “Give Tiffany about 8 workers and there is a chance they get it done fast enough.”

Kai just nodded and ignored that Anna had just given the job to Tiffany so she could stay close to her. As long as someone was going to build the thing in the next few minutes she would be happy.

Kai sent the plan to Tiffany and 8 other workers who weren't badly needed for the fights. Those were mostly the ones carrying the javelins, because they could just give the short spears to their sisters.

3 of Kai’s daughters in their group handed their javelins over to one of the hunters and nodded to Kai before they ran down the street. It was a good thing that she didn’t have to shout out orders, because strategy games didn’t train that and the thought alone made her very uncomfortable.

Kai focused back on the problem at hand, now that they only had to squeeze out enough time for the plan. The spikes and drones had slowed the two moths down somewhat already, but if nothing was done they would reach the intersection in a few seconds.

She very much preferred them to stay on the mainroad however as they were practically blocking off the following moth there. Once they reached the crossroad they could split up, not that Kai believed they would do that.

Despite not being comfortable with giving orders she shouted one then and there. “Throw the javelins and try to keep the moths on the mainroad. Once you are out of ammo go and help your sisters down the street.” Most of them only had one javelin, which made them useless after throwing it and the wall had need for the silk they could produce so it would be stupid to have them stay around.

Her daughters acknowledged the command and 4 of them spread out a bit to make sure they didn’t hit each other. Then they threw the small spears with as much power as they could manage.

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