114 Chapter 3 (1/2)

Dragging his broken body behind a rock to shield the line of sight of any pursuers from the sky, Aeryn Corvus collapsed against the rock, cradling his injured hand and broken wing. He knew that it wouldn't baffle the following ants for long. Their primary sense was smell after all. It was only supposed to be a sortie into the airspace of the ants. Just a quick survey of their numbers and positions from an aerial vantage. As a Tier 3 peak Shadow mage and as the most accomplished flier in the regiment, save the General, he was the most appropriate for the task of scouting ahead.

At first, everything had gone according to plan. He had wrapped himself in his magic and concealed himself within the shadows of the clouds, mapping the terrain and the distribution of the enemy forces as he went.

The land beneath him was a rugged mix of mountains, valleys and canyons and the Calamity was like rivers of flame spidering through the terrain. He saw the rills converging with each other near Firang, growing into a river that battered its way towards the contingent. War wasn't long in coming.

Tracing the streams back to their source with his eyes, he had seen a pillar of smoke rising up into the sky in the distance – the erupting Zhurong. Hoping for some intel that would pave the way for the Expedition and increase their odds of success, he had forayed deeper into the Forbidden Zone.

He had seen it then. It wasn't just one pillar of smoke, there were two thick columns that seemed to hold up the sky, dyeing the swirling clouds above them black. Purple streaks of lightning arced from cloud to earth, the distant rumble of thunder rolled through the lands. Beneath the dark clouds, a red glow covered the two volcanoes. It wasn't just Zhurong that had erupted, its offshoot Gun had too.

Fire elementals propagated by splitting parts of themselves off whenever they got too saturated with mana but weren't ready to impact the realm of Demigod yet. Zhurong had split a part of itself off about a hundred years ago to form the volcano Gun which had become a home to one of the five ant queens that resided in the Sixth Forbidden Zone. The immature flame dungeon was nowhere close to a stage where it would be ready to impact the higher realm. There was no reason for it to erupt at that time.

Aeryn was sure that this oddity was the reason behind the Calamity sparing the territory of the Crimson Coyotes. Catching a thermal with his wings, he had spiralled upwards, gaining altitude before increasing the amount of mana he was pumping into his Stealth spell. Transitioning into a silent glide towards the two volcanoes, his eyes had scanned the surroundings for any sign of aerial patrols.

Approaching closer, he had seen neat rows of ants facing off against each other on the southern side of Zhurong. While the battle at the Firang wall had been tactical with the soldiers trying to efficiently decimate the legion while it advanced heedless of its losses, here the combatants met directly on the field of battle without any wall separating them. The fighting was extremely fierce with the two antagonistic forces doing their utmost to shred each other to bits under the urgings of their respective queens – house sized ants that hung back at the rear of their forces and hissed at each other across the field littered with corpses of their subordinates.

The eruption of both volcanoes at the same time had sparked a conflict been the colony at the southern face of Zhurong and the newly formed splinter colony that had taken up residence in Gun. Aeryn had comprehended the Duchess' plan at that moment. She had pitted the two colonies against each other so they couldn't set their soldiers aside to attack the Crimson Coyotes. It made sense now that he thought about it. The nascent Dungeon of Gun was obviously easier to influence than a mature one like Zhurong. Whatever trick she had played, the crux of it lay within that volcano.

He hadn't stuck around to spectate any longer. He needed to get back to the base and report on whatever he had seen so the Expedition group could plot their path better and avoid the majority of the Calamity's forces.

But unfortunately for him, he had been discovered by the winged Tier 4 ant that had been patrolling the airspace with its subordinates on his way back.

The problem was that while Shadow magic was great for stealth, muffling sound as well as obscuring his figure when he utilized Call of the Dark, it was of no help in hiding his scent and olfaction was the primary method with which ants perceived their world. It couldn't be helped though. The dynamic vision of the ants wasn't poor either and unless a wind mage and a shadow mage collaborated, perfect stealth wasn't possible.

The war and chase had followed and now he was stuck within enemy lines, injured and hiding behind a rock with critical information that he needed to pass onto command before the squad set out. And it wouldn't take the pursuing Tier 3 ants to catch up to him. In his condition, he wouldn't survive a fight.

To make matters worse, his realm was showing signs of backing up with his intensive mana usage right after promotion without letting his body acclimatize to the sudden surge of power.

He sighed and leaned back against the rock.