Chapter 114: Three Fangs Rising
Blood pumped in thick spurts from Thragdur's torn stump, and Azakh-Tur cursed himself for wasting even a heartbeat. He surged forward, teeth bared, hurling a command through the broodlink that sent a wave of lesser broodlings scrambling over one another to reach Vhar'Sith. They threw themselves at the towering snake, bodies breaking just to slow its swing.
Azakh-Tur caught Thragdur by the shoulder and yanked him back.
"Fall back and heal!"
"Off with ya!"
The dwarf ripped free, eyes blazing, jaw clenched hard enough to crack stone. He stared at the ragged mess where his arm had been.
"That was my favorite arm! I'm gonna rip his tongue out through his asshole!"
Azakh-Tur shifted, blocking Lilid's view, and dropped his voice to a low growl.
"If you die, the deal's dead. Go heal before you drag this down. Move back."
Ahead of them, Pain and Panic tore into the monster with a frenzy that bordered on joy. Both were hitting harder now, the fresh kills from Lilid's spiderlings had filled their brother's charges, and Snare's support had turned the chaos into something organized. Every strike from the elder broodlings carried the weight of his buffs.
Thragdur looked past Azakh-Tur, chest heaving, then roared once before turning away.
"Don't finish without me."
His footsteps hammered the soil as he barreled toward the rear lines.
"Stubborn fucker…"
Azakh-Tur shifted back toward Vhar'Sith. The air around the beast stank of burning venom and ruptured magic. Its soul flickered in his vision, red surging to yellow, then back again, unstable and convulsing.
"Just like she said. His body's cracking."
[I estimate approximately 10% additional Health loss before total structural failure.]
The three sigils carved into Vhar'Sith's brow blazed like brands. Muscles spasmed across its limbs, coils jerking out of rhythm, movements degrading into violent, twitching lashes.
It was coming apart.
"This is easier than I thought, now we just—"
System prompts exploded across his vision.
Damage. Kills. Losses. A blast of green pressure ripped outward as Vhar'Sith's aura detonated. A wall of toxic gas surged from the snake, shoving bodies back and melting whatever it touched. Broodlings shrieked as they dissolved mid-step.
[You jinxed that.]
"Oh fuck off!"
He swiped the readouts aside and dragged up another panel. Pain and Panic had survived, both scorched but standing. Their troops weren't so lucky—fifty wiped to the last. Azakh-Tur filled their ranks again with a snarl, assigning fresh lesser broodlings.
"Ashi'r! Forgive me!"
The cry rumbled through the gas, and Azakh-Tur felt the curse magic before he saw anything. Sharp and ancient, digging through his blood. His tail snapped once in reflex.
"Get back!"
Pain, Panic, and their new troops obeyed immediately, cutting their charge short and pulling away from the spreading cloud.
Inside the rolling gas, Vhar'Sith burned like a furnace buried under a cloud. Dark layers of aura peeled off him in waves. Azakh-Tur didn't know what the monster was doing, but he knew he didn't want to let it finish.
He tore a Soul Stone from his inventory, crushed it in his palm, and felt the surge hit him.
[SM // 48/48]
He raised a hand and locked onto the beast's soul.
"Take it all."
[Desecrate // Activated]
[Soulmass Sacrificed // 47]
[Damage // 3196]
Cold knifed through his veins. His vision blurred for a heartbeat—then snapped back clear.
And nothing happened.
No damage text. Just another prompt.
[Desecrate // Miss]
[Target Lost]
"Bullshit! It's right there, you fu—king…"
The fog shifted.
Four yellow eyes stared back at him, still four...but split. No longer one head. Three skulls pushing forward through the gas, jaws widening as they emerged, each bearing a burning sigil.
Three massive serpents writhed out of the fog. One with two purple eyes burning like fresh bruises, the other two each carrying a single glowing eye: one grey, one orange. Their scales were no longer uniform; each body carried its own color and pattern, scarred where the split had torn them apart.
No longer having arms, they were also smaller than before, maybe twenty feet of muscle each, but they were no less violent. Hoods snapped open as all three roared.
"Three now?! He split himself right before I hit him—you gotta be kidding me."
The numbers had tripled, but their strength hadn't. Their auras had collapsed from pseudo-A back to peak B. Didn't sound like much, but the difference was huge.
A voice he didn't expect drifted up behind him, bright with a cheer that didn't belong on a battlefield.
"Now this we can play with. One will take the grey one."
He turned just in time to watch her body collapse.
Lilid's naked humanoid shape shriveled like paper in fire, crinkling in on itself before being sucked backward into the gaping maw in her thorax. Flesh folded, bent, and vanished. The massive spider-face stretching across her abdomen pulled into a grin, its cluster of eyes flaring like lanterns.
"The orange one's mine."
Thragdur stomped into view, a new arm hanging from his shoulder. Raw, unarmored, but whole. The skin was fresh, pink as butchered meat, but it moved like it had always belonged there.
Azakh-Tur didn't even get a chance to argue. Sides had been chosen for him.
"Let's hurry and end this."
Crimson system light flickered across his claws as he ripped another Soul Stone free and filled his Soulmass. Desecrate was useless now, a wasted shot, but he shoved the irritation down. The spider queen and the Forgemaster weren't waiting.
Lilid's monstrous body trembled once, then launched skyward. As she rose, Azakh-Tur finally saw the source of the clicking she made whenever agitated, a slit running the full length of her thorax, peeling open into a second maw lined edge-to-edge with fangs.
"And you fucked her. Ha!"
Thragdur barked a laugh, then shot forward like fired artillery, slamming the orange snake so hard the two vanished into the trees.
The remaining two moved to assist, but the grey serpent screeched as webs lashed across its body. Lilid and her children dropped like a storm, binding the thing in layers until it couldn't twist.
The last serpent, purple scales glowing, recoiled, hood flaring wide. It lunged toward Lilid—
—and a broodling smashed into its face like launched meat, bursting on impact. Guts sprayed across violet scales.
"Hey, Vhar-shit! Eyes over here!"
Another lesser broodling exploded against its snout, cracking teeth.
Azakh-Tur stood in the open, one more broodling dangling from his grip by the spine. Bloodlight rolled off him like heat, drowning the clearing in red. With a flick, he threw the broodling aside and grinned.
"Come kill me if you can."
The purple serpent hissed, coiled—
—then charged.
[It appears his intelligence has dropped significantly. Expect animal-grade behavior.]
"I don't think the boys will mind."
Azakh-Tur didn't move. The command hit the Broodlink like a hammer.
Boom!
Fire blew out from the serpent's flank as Pain tore into it, the impact cracking scales and drawing a shriek. Snare appeared at Azakh-Tur's side, no staff, just a stolen dwarf rifle braced against his shoulder. Grinning wide, he opened fire. Azakh-Tur felt the moment the broodling triggered a skill.
Darkness thickened around them, rolling out like spilled tar.
A prompt pulsed across his vision.
[Buff Received // Shadow Relay]
[+10% Agility / +10% Hit Chance when targeting Snare's marked enemy]
Lesser broodlings, burning, spiked, or simply feral, climbed the purple serpent in a churning swarm. Teeth sank. Claws raked. Flames spread. Every second peeled more meat from its hide.
Azakh-Tur added fuel.
[-2 SM]
[Hive Pulse // Activated]
[All Broodlings // +15% Attack Speed for 10sec]
He drew breath to join in—then realized someone was missing.
"Throw me too! Throw me, throw me!"
Panic stood at his hip, vibrating with excitement like a child begging for his turn. Sighing, Azakh-Tur grabbed him by the skull, and hurled him like live ammunition.
A soft poke tapped his hip.
"No. Stay back and support."
Snare deflated for half a heartbeat, then resumed firing.
'Weirdos.'
"Alright...time to feed—"
"Apologies, Broodfather."
Snare spoke without looking away from the fight, voice steady even as his rifle bucked.
"My brothers and I ask that you leave this to us. Not to protect you, we wouldn't presume. Only to prove our growth. Without aid."
Butcher's Wrath shivered in his hands, metal buzzing like a blade itching for blood. Azakh-Tur felt it too, the tug, the choke of rising bloodlust, thick enough to taste. He forced it down.
He stepped back.
The maces liquefied into cleavers, folding into his arms. The process dragged, slower than ever. Metal writhed beneath his skin, angry and restless, thrashing like trapped beasts trying to break free.
"Do not disappoint me."
Snare paused his shooting for a single breath, eyes glowing through the dark.
"Thank you, Broodfather!"
Azakh-Tur folded his hands behind his back. His horns sank into bone. His black skin peeled into human softness. He let Seo-jin take shape again. Less hunger, less pull, enough to watch without tearing the battlefield apart himself.
[I'm surprised you're letting this happen. Never known you to skip a fight you know you can win.]
'Normally I wouldn't. But it's the first one they've asked for. I'm not gonna deny them outright. And I still get the experience, so… win-win, I guess.'
[Are you convincing me or yourself?]
'Shut up. I'm watching.'
A burst of light cracked against his vision. He winced but didn't blink. The noise, the tearing and crashing, the wet grind of bodies, he didn't want to miss any of it.
Since the attack on the dwarf fortress, each broodling had grown. Snare had pushed one level. Panic two. Pain, of course, had sprinted ahead, gaining three full levels from the slaughter he'd caused in the forge hall.
Seeing them now, Seo-jin felt something tight and layered: pride pressed against pressure.
A sheet of scales ripped off in one sweep as Pain carved a wide arc across the serpent's spine. The first born's current power made every counterstrike from the beast manageable, his stance unwavering, his flames biting deeper.
His assigned swarm worked the exposed tissue, burning open every wound, adding their fire to Pain's.
While Pain held the front, Panic lived on the creature's back like a parasite that didn't understand gravity. Gnarled Fang punched in again and again, his teeth sinking into muscle as he tore strips free, lifting them only to sever the rest with a clean jerk.
His minions skittered in sync, one organism with a hundred limbs, clearing scales with manic speed, slipping between strikes, stripping armor faster than it could regrow.
Any time either brother caught a hit, a leg crushed under a shift of weight, an arm cracked blocking a strike, they healed just as fast. Wounds mended without pause.
Off to the side, the grey serpent fared no better. Lilid had both forelimbs buried in its eyes, riding its thrashing bulk as webs snapped and spiderlings died around her.
It was there that Snare's troops waited for each corpse to drop, feeding the fallen back into the fighters without pause.
[Once Hex gets stronger, you're gonna have a decent army. At this rate you barely need the Dead Hands.]
'No. I still need them. But this isn't an army. This is just the start.'
A grin crept across his face. His brood was still in its infancy. Before [Corpse Harvest], he'd thought a broodling army was something distant. For the future.
Now he could see it.
Clear as blood.
[+1500 EXP]
Snare flared bright as another level hit.
Scanning the field, Seo-jin saw both snakes still thrashing. Only one enemy remained unaccounted for.
"Dwarves finished first. Too bad."
The line was thrown at Snare. The broodling caught it instantly. The glow of his fresh level pulsed through him, but he shoved it aside—his need to prove the Brood burned hotter.
"Panic! Join Pain and finish this! Combine your forces to hold it down!"
Dropping prone, Snare drew a breath, shut one eye...and squeezed the trigger.
A purple eye ruptured in a wet burst.
[Looks like the spider's about to finish.]
Lilid had the grey serpent welded to the ground in layers of silk, her colossal frame hovered over its skull. The jaw under her thorax hung open, drooling, teeth clacking as she lowered herself.
"Better hurry."
He didn't need to say it.
Pinned by its own tail, the purple snake writhed under a swarm of broodlings chewing through it like piranha. As it twisted to shake them free, its lone eye flared, charging another curse. Seo-jin felt the pulse through the broodlink first. Snare's signal.
Pain had room to move. Panic was directly between.
Panic's bloodlight flashed, bright, frantic pulses as he sprinted away from Pain towards the snake.
For once, his face was calm.
Pain met him halfway. At the last second, he swept Surtur's Tooth in a rising arc. Panic jumped, both feet planting on the flat of the blade mid-swing.
Seo-jin flinched. He expected paste.
He got half of it.
Panic's legs folded with a crunch, blood spraying wide, but his torso launched like a cannon shot. Claws forward, he struck the serpent's throat and punched straight through, severing spine and scale in one violent burst.
A beat of stillness.
Then the notification hit.
[+1500 EXP]
The purple serpent collapsed. His broodlings had scored the kill.
Another flare lit his vision.
[+1500 EXP]
Lilid finished hers a heartbeat later.
Seo-jin leveled while notifications stacked. System light spilled across the battlefield as Pain, Panic, and Snare leveled again—each one burning crimson beside their father.
"They did it."
For a breath, he let it hit him. Pride. Real, heavy, swelling pride. The kind that pulled tight in the chest.
But the feeling didn't get long to live.