《Gaia Awakens》


 Preface: Six feet under

    Damien awoke in absolute darkness. As he slowly regained his senses, he was confused. He had been in so much pain just moments ago. Yet now all he could feel was the cold hard earth beneath him. But that pain, that unbearable, torturous pain... How could it be gone?


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    He had fallen... A missed step and a poorly timed gust of wind had seen to that. He was falling. He was going to die. From almost a hundred floors up, there wouldn''t be anything left below. A terrible drop cut short by his harness. As the tether reached it''s limit, he was brought to an abrupt halt. As he groaned at the thin straps digging into his groin, he laughed at his foolishness. Then he heard a horrible tearing noise. The strap strained against the edge of the cradle railing, and the old and worn fabric began to give out. He frantically tried to climb the tether, struggling to get a grip on the rapidly deteriorating lifeline. But before he could reach the bottom of his high rise lift cradle, the final fibers of his tether gave out. And again, he fell.


    Disbelief came first. As his cradle stretched further and further away, all he could think of is how he had spent 10 years in that metal box, cleaning the high rise windows of the city every day. For the first time in 10 years, he had taken overtime pay to stay into the night. For the first time in 10 years, he had slipped. And for the first time in 10 years, he had been assigned to a coworkers rig. If just one of those things hadn''t happened, he wouldn''t be falling. He wouldn''t be here, or he would still be cleaning, or he would have had his own gear that he maintained meticulously and been hanging safely by his harness. As regret gnawed at his heart, he turned to see where his bad luck would take him.


    The city had sprawled out below him, towering buildings and countless lights straining against the darkness, denying it''s sovereignty over the night. The rich ocean air caressed his skin as he plummeted past dozens of floors, the strong smell of the sea drowning out the smog of the congested city below. It was a beautiful view, and in this moment it seemed to be the most beautiful view in the world. As the pavement grew closer and closer, the regret was torn away by the wicked claws of terror. He had taken this job because of the pay, and that he had no fear of heights. He was steady on his feet. He had excellent balance. He loved the feel of being a thousand feet in the sky surrounded by nothing but wind. But no one could see the streets coming closer and closer and react calmly. He flailed his arms, scrambling as if he could get some purchase on the air, and he finally remembered to scream. Closer and closer, the street was rushing up to meet him.


    The pedestrians heard his cry, and looked up, powerless to help him they stared at the plummeting man in shock. For a brief moment, he thought someone might save him, but what could they do? And then he saw the last thing he would ever see. The object that would break his fall. He closed his eyes and groaned. "It''s a fucking Prius." And then, his fall came to an end.


    Somehow, he survived. The roof of the flimsy car had cushioned his fall. But not enough, it was nowhere near enough. Pain exploded throughout his body. Every bone he could imagine was shattered. He couldn''t move. He couldn''t see. He couldn''t breathe. His entire front had been crushed inwards. His eyes, his face, his lungs, his arms, his legs, it had all been completely pulverized. His heart still cruelly pumped what blood wasn''t staining the seats of the prius into his brain, drawing out this horrible pain. He slowly departed this world, to a chorus of screams and sirens.


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    As he relived the final minutes of his life, a terrifying realization swallowed his consciousness. He should have died. No one could have survived that... but he was still here. Wherever here was. It was pitch black, but slowly his vision was returning. It was hard at first, but the more he strained to see through the darkness, the more aware he became. First the ground he rested on, and then his view slowly expanded. Crawling along the floor. A few feet away from his body and he reached a wall. It was hard packed dirt, the same as what he rested on. He was underground. He tried to rise, but he couldn''t move. He couldn''t feel his body at all. As he began to panic, his view of the room rapidly expanded, he found a second wall, and then another, and then the ceiling, and then the final wall. He was trapped. He had been buried alive.


    As his terror mounted, he did what any normal person would have done. He clawed at the earth ahead of him, frantic to escape. He scraped and gouged at the walls of his grave, pulling out huge piles of dirt and loose rock with each thought. He knew he should have been digging up, but his instincts told him that if he just made it a few more feet forwards he would be free. His frantic digging began to slow, he grew tired, but his fear drove him onwards. He would not die like this. Not trapped under a mountain of dirt. Even as he felt on the verge of collapse, he plowed on. Even if it would kill him, he wanted to die in the open air. And then he broke through. Sunlight poured in through the hole, bathing his grave in light.


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    Damien reached out into the open world, but the moment he left the tunnel he had carved out he grew dizzy. He pushed blindly forwards, until he grew weak, his consciousness fading until he collapsed.


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    When he came to, he was right where he started. From the center of his grave he could feel the light blazing through the small hole he had made. And once again he threw himself out into the world under the blaze of the mid day sun. The same dizziness returned as he pushed out from the tomb, and less than a few feet away, as he strained and strained to keep himself above ground, his mind gave out, and he retreated back into his grave. As he rested on the verge of collapse, he examined the grave that he was trapped in.


    Now that it had a tunnel and an entrance, Damien figured it would be more appropriate to call it a cave. Something quickly caught his eye, it was a huge ruby the size of a fist, just resting in the middle of the room. But as he looked at it, something began to bother him. He wasn''t looking at it, not in the normal way. It felt like he was around it, feeling it, seeing it from every possible angle. And then even stranger, it also felt as if he were inside it. Then he noticed something missing in the room. He could see everything in it, from every angle. He could feel the walls. But the only thing in this room was the brilliant red gem. His body was gone.


    As panic took hold of his mind once more, he rushed out of the cave again, even more franticly than the last time. Straining and straining. He made it further than he had before, a whole two feet, before his mind gave out, and he faded into the void of unconsciousness once again.


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    As Damien awoke, he was exhausted. He felt empty, and weak. He hungered. Just as before, he was in the same damned cave. But his perception was... narrower. It was just like when he had first awoken, all he could feel was the earth beneath his body, this cursed gem, and maybe a foot around that. The moonlight from the entrance allowed him to see the tunnel out, but the rest was shrouded in darkness. Moonlight? Then it was night? He wondered how long he had been out, but there was no way for him to tell. Before, his perception had slowly expanded however compared to now, it had raced to fill the room.


    Hours passed, but he had grown only a few inches. With every particle he took hold of, his hunger grew. He was so weak he thought he was going to die again. But then he felt movement. In the dirt below him, something wiggled. And as he focused on it, he saw it. A worm had crawled into his domain. And with a primal fury, he used every ounce of strength he had to pounce on it. It flailed as it sensed the attack, but his presence surrounded the insignificant creature, and he dragged it to the surface. Then he began to feed.


    There wasn''t a single mark on it''s body, but it''s life was quickly siphoned away. it''s pathetic struggles slowed, and then ceased as it''s meager life force was taken in by Damien. After devouring the worm, his hunger lessened. It was an insignificant fraction, but it was enough. With this tiny bit of energy, Damien flexed his perception, and gained half an inch all at once, and with that he knew what he had to do.


    He abandoned the air of the cave, and directed his entire perception at the ground beneath his body, reaching into the soil. And he found dozens of worms wriggling around in the fresh soil. And once again, his hunger took over. He slaughtered them all. Each and every last worm was smothered and drained, one after the other. With each worm he drained his territory grew, and more and more worms fell at mercy. Within a matter of hours, he had mercilessly massacred dozens of worms, and his territory had more than doubled. From the center of his body he now controlled almost three feet in every direction, and his hunger was finally sated.

 Chapter One: Genocide

    Damien stared at the carnage around him, the piles of corpses were all that remained of his foe. His entire domain was littered with rotting bodies. All 28 square feet of it. Every time a worm crawled into his domain, he had butchered it. A few more hours had passed since his he finished his rampage and had to settle for the slowly migrating worms to enter his territory, however he had not grown any further. The more he expanded, the stronger his hunger became, and the more he had to devour. As the early dawn light began to trickle through the cave mouth, he stopped to ponder his situation.


    As impossible as it had to be, he was a living crystal with the power to subjugate his surroundings. He survived only by draining life from the living, and he had somehow carved out the firmly packed dirt of the hillside without his "body" moving in the slightest. It was a small tunnel, only six inches wide now that he saw it, and the dirt he had moved wasn''t a large amount, and yet it was still absurd. As he waited for new victims to enter into his domain, he experimented. Without expending too much energy, he could draw in the dirt with nothing but his force of will. It wasn''t that he was thinking about doing it. He had to do it, as if putting his body into motion. It was a strange distinction, one that caused him difficulty at first, but the more he used his "body" the more natural it felt.


    He wanted to experiment more, but he was afraid of using too much energy and losing what progress he had made. As he continued to brood, he spotted new victims within his domain. This time, they were flies. They seemed to be attracted to corpses of his prior victims. Grateful for some variety in his dull routine, he pounced on the first. His full power as a mighty butcher of worms completely outclassed this pathetic specimen, and the fly was paralyzed by the onslaught. He drove it down to the ground, and kept it pinned while he siphoned away it''s pitiful life. But it was over all too soon. Compared to his usual diet of worms, there was almost no gain from such a small creature. He was about to tear into the second fly to vent some of his frustration, but he saw something that gave him pause.


    This other fly was a female. And as he whirled upon the intruder, she was laying eggs in one of his past victims. As he watched, she lay dozens of tiny white eggs within the worm''s remains. Damien had a moment of revelation, there was a far, far better way to sate his hunger. One fly wouldn''t make much difference, but how about a hundred? Or a thousand? He waited patiently until the fly completed it''s business and made to fly away, before he pounced. Bringing it down just as he had her predecessor. She had served her purpose.


    As Damien continued his hunt for worms, he began to watch the air above him for his new airborne intruders. By mid day, he had a steady stream of fly customers, perusing his slowly rotting wares. So he continued his careful hunting of his cattle. Males were culled on sight, but the females were free to come and go as they pleased. Until they laid their eggs of course. With the new source of life force, he stretched out his domain even further. He had nearly taken hold of the entire first room floor. As the day wound down to it''s close, he felt satisfied with his accomplishment for the first time since he had awoken. It was strange, but he was truly happy with his progress.


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    As dawn arrived on the second day, the first of the eggs began to hatch. The larvae began to feed on the corpses around them, and Damien had his first dilemma of the new day. How many of his newborn herd to cull? He had no knowledge of the fly''s life cycle or the survival rate of the larvae, but he hungered. He didn''t want to wait and watch to see for himself. He couldn''t wait. Something deep within him knew that he must grow, and quickly. He was in danger. Despite his unease, he knew moderation would be key. His compromise was half. He slaughtered half of all the maggots birthed in his domain.


    As the day progressed, he flexed his power. He dug deeper grooves in the ground to experiment, and filled them in again. He gathered the corpses into neat piles, gently carting over those infested with maggots. A maggot had less of his craved life force than an adult fly, but even with a tenth the benefit from each victim, multiplied by the hundreds which emerged every hour it was a prolific harvest. As he watched the surviving prey feed upon their fallen brothers, he noticed something missing today. Very few adults had come to lay their eggs, despite his continuing to drag up new worms that entered his domain. This was a problem, as he didn''t know how long his flock would take to mature and begin breeding themselves.


    He looked to the entrance, and saw his first rival brazenly flaunting his success at the entrance to the cave. A spider had crafted a web across the narrow entryway to his den. Damien was outraged. These were his cattle! His food! And this meddling arachnid dared to interfere! Damien gathered his power, and rushed through the short tunnel expanding his domain far more aggressively in response to his new foe. He culled maggots by the hundreds to fuel his expansion, leaving only a quarter of the original number to grow. As he reached the entrance, he carefully surrounded his foe. It was a common brown spider, it''s web had likely started the day in pristine order, but due to it''s monopoly on cave entry, it was a mangled and hastily patched mess with a dozen flies caught in it''s trap. Just as Damien was about to sweep down upon his new and most fearsome foe yet, he came to an abrupt halt at the last moment. The flies were dying.


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    This came as no surprise as the spider was dutifully biting each captive in turn and swaddling them in it''s silk. But what shocked Damien was that as each fly slowly expired within his domain, he still gained it''s strength. He had assumed he had to be the one to deal the deathblow by forcefully drawing the life from it''s body, but obviously this was not the case. Now that he had extended his territory past it, every kill of the spider grew his power.


    He continued to watch as the hunter silently waited in the center of it''s web. A new fly appeared from the outside world, and drifted into the sticky white silk. Trapped, it began to violently but fruitlessly flail. Almost the same time the fly noticed it was caught, the spider dashed across it''s web, and bit down into the crunchy insectoid flesh. Within moments the silk began to entomb to the pitiful fly, and as it slowly died from it''s wounds, another trickle of life force joined that of the others. He continued to watch, completely enthralled by this spider''s work.


    Over the course of the next few hours, he learned a great deal about his powers. First, draining the life force slowly would provide significantly more power than killing the creature outright. Second, anything the spider killed resulted in slightly less power than if he did it himself. He proved this when the spider bit down through the fly''s head, killing it instantly. However as he watched closely, he realized that this lost life force wasn''t being wasted. He sensed a fraction was being absorbed by the spider itself. At first he was annoyed that the spider was stealing from him, but he considered that it was fair payment for the spider''s labors. Damien''s final lesson from the spider was that the benefits of his raising flies was not merely limited to devouring their children. Flies attracted predators. And just as the worm''s corpses brought flies, he hoped that he could gain from whatever came into his world next.


    As the sun passed it''s zenith, Damien had a second hard decision to make. This spider was a fine pet, however he couldn''t allow for it to block the entrance. Without the female flies reaching the worm cadaver stockpile, he would have no larvae. And the larvae were his greatest source of power at the moment. He could either kill the spider, his first pet, or he could allow his cattle farm to dwindle. After a long moments debate, he realized there was in fact a third option. He widened the entrance of the cave, expanding the mouth to a three foot wide diameter. While an arduous endeavor, this expansion allowed both open air and webbing to share the cave entrance. Next, he widened the now disproportionately narrow tunnel but making it 18 inches wide was the limit of his strength. The rest would have to wait. As he nestled down in his heart to rest, a warm feeling washed over him. His domain had grown.


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    Each day had brought new shocking revelations, and today would be no different. Overnight, he had finally managed to finish expanding through the walls and ceiling of his cave. Everything inside was his. With his lost territory regained, his domain seemed to... what was the word? Deepen? Condense? Solidify? Whatever it was, the stronger he grew, the more control he had over his territory. He had a more acute sense of the events in the cave, his consciousness seeped deeper into the earth around him, but that was not what fascinated him now. The larvae born yesterday, they were becomming part of him. It was small, but he felt connected to them. He could feel what they felt, and although they could not think, he could feel their simplistic instincts and urges. Their hunger, their pain, their struggle to survive. It was background noise to his own thoughts, but he felt it all the same.


    Even more interesting were the larvae being born today, being brought into the world surrounded by his denser aura. From the very moment they were born, they were completely his. The connection was stronger than with their older siblings, but there was no question of who was in control. Their consciousness was merely part of his senses, just as he could feel the dirt and the air within his territory. Despite this connection they were still his cattle, and he continued his practiced genocide. Half of every generation met its demise as soon as they hatched. A vampyric ruby had to eat.


    He tried to force his way into the mind of the spider next, but it''s mind was either far more complex, or it''s position at the front of the cave kept it away from his direct influence. Or both. He had noticed that his power was most concentrated at the deepest recesses of his cave, and therefore the weakest at the entrance, but with each passing hour he grew more powerful. He was sure the spider would soon come under his sway.


    Damien experimented with his new found power. He discovered that he was able to direct the youngest larvae. They would crawl wherever he wanted. They would roll, flail, eat, or try and kill each-other at his command. And this discovery brought with it a wave of excitement. He had minions.

 Chapter Two: Under Siege

    Today was the fourth day from Damien''s new awakening. He had begun to mark time from the moment he last woke, as he had no way to know what the date was. He couldn''t even tell how long he had been out after wasting all of the energy he had revived with. He was still bitter about that. He had been dropped in this desolate cave with no warning or training, and somehow he was supposed to survive. Of course he panicked. But by now he was beginning to get used to his new life. The constant hunger, and fear of the world outside kept him focused. These instincts were not something from his life before, they were something new. He knew he needed more energy to survive. He knew he would wither and die, wasting away into nothingness if he didn''t feed. And he knew something from outside would be coming to kill him. He didn''t know why. He didn''t know what it was. But he had to prepare. And he knew that to survive, he had to grow.


    As he surveyed his domain, he was very pleased with what he saw. Thousands of maggots writhed around him. His flock had grown at a rapid pace. It was just a matter of waiting until they transformed into flies. Besides this, as their numbers multiplied he realized that they didn''t even have to be dying for him to gain some power from them. They released far more when they were dead or dying, but by simply existing within his domain they released a nearly insignificant amount for him to take in. Even with all of the thousands combined it wasn''t enough to make a dent in his hunger, but it was still something. Right now he needed to continue harvesting his crop to sustain himself, but he believed there would come a time when he would allow them to live out their lives. When they died was of little consequence, so long as they did it within his domain.


    On the other hand the worm harvests were dwindling. He had continued his slaughter unabated, butchering all that came in range. For now he would have to leave them be so they could repopulate, but he had enough corpses piled up to last him for quite some time to come.


    And then there was his reserve of energy. He had saved up since dominating the cave, and he wanted to dig deeper, to grow his domain. But after running out once he was hesitant to spend it immediately. He couldn''t risk being reduced to nothing again, he needed to get stronger. After long deliberation, he decided to save up today, and then he would start digging out with the new energy he gained afterwards. A day and a half''s worth of maggot harvests should be a decent reserve right? But what was this energy?


    He had experimented a bit more, and spent more time watching the spider. The energy wasn''t blood. Draining the life out of a creature did not leave it a dried out husk, it simply stopped living. And then the spider, which was a completely ordinary spider, was able to absorb the energy as well. At this point, he was forced to accept that he wasn''t normal and could do impossible things, but even the smallest creatures could harness this power too? Everything that had happened in the last four days completely defied the laws of nature, and this energy seemed to be the source. It was a supernatural force that gave him power. Magic? Damien laughed, it sounded ridiculous. But the more he thought about it, there was no other way to describe it. It was the best he could do. So the energy was magic power, or mana. It still didn''t make sense, but at least he had something to call it.


    Damien continued to ponder as he watched his minions wriggle and writhe as they ate and grew. What the hell was happening to this world?


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    Midmorning came, and brought with it something to snap him out of his reverie. An ant scout had crossed the threshold of his lair. After his experience with the flies, he didn''t immediately lunge at the new prey. As he watched the black hexapedal scavenger, he thought back to his previous life. Ant scouts find food and bring it back to their colony while laying a trail for their brothers. If he allowed this ant to find his invertebrate corpse piles, he would lead many of his brothers back here for Damien to harvest. If Damien still had a face it would be showing a devious, wicked grin as he planned to massacre countless ants to fuel his expansion.


    Expansion? Damien paused as the word came into his mind. He knew he had to grow, but expand? It seemed strange, but that word held a deep meaning for him that he couldn''t explain. He examined his domain closely, and knew that he was terribly exposed to the outside world. His heart was just sitting on the floor, not ten feet from the surface. As he watched the ant navigate it''s way down the entryway tunnel, he pondered how to go about expanding his domain. One word seemed to echo in the back of his mind, and that was "deeper". He wanted to expand out into the world above, but in his heart he knew the way to go was deeper into the hillside. After brooding over how to go about remodeling his abode for awhile longer, the ant reached the end of the tunnel. He decided to wait and see how many ants walked into his lair. If he gathered enough mana to accelerate his plans, he would worry about it then.


    Rather than inviting the ant to his maggot breeding grounds, he shuffled a few worms towards the front of the room. The ant nearly walked right past the pile he was building, but he flopped one down right in it''s path. The scout tore into the offered worm it had found, and pulled out a sizable chunk larger than itself. The ant then turned about and merrily skittered back the way it had come. Damien could only imagine the pheromone trail it was leaving in it''s wake as he watched it return home.


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    A short while later, another lone ant appeared. He couldn''t be sure, but it seemed to be a different ant than before. This ant made a beeline straight down the trail left by his comrade before him. Pulled off another chunk and made to leave. Before he made it out to the entrance, a second ant appeared. And Damien chuckled darkly to himself. All was going according to plan.


    Everything went perfectly for the next hour. The lone ants turned into a trickle, and then a tiny stream, and then a flow. At first he picked off one in every four ants, but as the tide increased he snuffed out half, then two thirds, then three quarters. Their lives were a wonderful boost to his mana reserves, but they soon exhausted the pile he had left for them. He tried to replenish it and thin the ant army, but he couldn''t move the bodies fast enough, and for every ant he smothered, a dozen more took it''s place. And then they finally broke through, rushing forwards. A hungering horde come to massacre his minions, their pincers quivering in anticipation of the battle ahead.  He was enraged at these intruders, and began a wild rampage draining as many as he could. He started to lose himself in his fury, he had to protect his cattle. He had to protect his lair.


    But he was failing. The vicious ant horde rushed forwards, indifferent to their fallen brothers. He would lose everything. He would be forced to start from scratch. The last four days would be all for nothing. But then a rolling tide of seething white flesh crashed into the black army. The maggots had charged the ant battle line.


    He had been so distracted by his battle that he didn''t notice their movements, but every maggot in the room was surging forwards to repel the intruders. The very moment he decided the ants were enemies rather than prey, every creature under his influence had rushed to repel them. He quickly took charge of the maggot conscripts, directing their war. They were rushing forwards blindly, but he spread them out to the sides. He had nearly ten thousand maggots at his disposal, and he planned to encircle the intruding forces. He formed up a full regiment of the largest and oldest maggots, and sent them charging into the ant''s left flank. As his shock troops wriggled on their marching to glory, he examined the front lines.


    Each ant could bring down three maggots before he perished, and so he sent five. His maggots were holding the line, and the ant forces were finally dwindling. And then his shock troops had closed the distance, and began their charge over the last six inches. They wriggled fiercely, closing the distance in 10 seconds. And then they hit. His glorious shock cavalry drove deep into the enemy lines, and closed off the horde from it''s reinforcements. Damien cackled with delight as he saw some of the newly arrived ants retreating.


    As his shock troops solidified their battle lines, sandwiched in between the main force and the incoming tide, he had his forces complete their encirclement of the main army. Only 200 ants remained there, hundreds had already fallen to his forces. He left one full regiment to finish them off and hold the encirclement. He would give no quarter to these invaders. His remaining two regiments worth of troops rushed to help his cavalry hold the entrance to the room. As he turned to watch the new front, a new terror gripped his heart. Hulking monsters were wading into the fray. The soldier ants had come.


    Much larger than their fellows, the soldiers were the guards that defended the worker ants from their enemies. The ants that escaped! Damien groaned. The ones that went to flee weren''t running from a hopeless battle, they were leaving a trail of pheromones to alert their colonies defenders to the danger. As the hulking behemoths brushed aside and slaughtered his finest troops by the dozen, Damien was beset by grief. The losses up till now had been bearable, casualties of war. But if he lost his oldest maggots, he would have to wait even longer for their maturation! He wouldn''t allow this! He refused! In his desperation, his mana reserves were activated, and some poured into the shock troops on the front line, bolstering their power. And he saw a sight that would reverse the fear in his heart.


    Three of his largest elder maggots bolstered with his mana had surrounded a soldier ant, and as one rushed head on only to be crushed in it''s formidable maw, the others charged into it''s sides. One bit into it''s rear leg, pinning it down. The other launched itself forward and buried it''s teeth in the top of it''s neck, just below it''s head. And as he watched, and poured more mana into the maggot, it bit down through the hard carapace and tore a chunk out of it''s neck. The soldier reared back in pain, but with his rear leg held captive, he fell backwards onto his back. He quickly struggled to right himself, but the nearby maggots swarmed the downed insect, and tore him apart in a frenzy of seething flesh.


    These monsters could be defeated! Damien cheered at the success of his minions, and readied his troops for the counter offensive. Then he poured every last bit of mana he could spare into his mighty maggots, and ordered his troops to charge.

 Chapter Three: Veni, Vidi, Vici

    With the mana infusion, his maggots had swelled to greater heights. A single lesser maggot could stand toe to toe with a worker ant, and three greater maggots could hold out against the soldiers. His seething army pushed forwards, beating back both the workers and soldiers. Once his forces had once again regained control of the room entrance, he ordered them to halt their advance. Damien laid out his army in a line, and then dug out a trench an inch deep in front of them, with gradually sloping sides. With his mighty maggots fortified atop the trench, they could hold out on the high ground. With his constant losses diminished, and the line firmly held, he tried to assess the carnage around him. Half of his maggots lay dead. Nearly five thousand had fallen in defense of his lair, and many hundreds of ants lay amongst the fallen. It was a harsh blow to his breeding program, but as he relaxed, he realized that it was not bad in the slightest.


    The ants were no different than the spider, even though they killed his minions all of that expended life force filled his mana pool. In addition to this, those expended maggot lives also gained him more mana than if he had culled them himself as they killed their attackers in return. He had also learned a valuable tool. He could pour mana into his minions to make them stronger. As he examined his warriors, he saw that they had grown larger, as if feeding off of the mana. And now that the crisis was averted, he watched the battle closely. Both of the creatures fought and died as the battle pitched back and forth, although it now generally favored the maggots. But he was able to measure the benefits of a phenomena he observed with his spider.


    With each kill, the creatures absorbed a small amount of their enemies'' life force. But as he watched and carefully examined the flows of mana, he saw that the maggots were stronger for it. Just as when he infused them himself, they grew more and more powerful with each kill. Unfortunately, this went for the ants as well. In particular, one scarred soldier had killed nearly a hundred of his shock troops, and had nearly doubled in size. He had to personally siphon it''s soul to weaken it so his minions could swarm over it and finish it off. And this brought forth another new revelation. The stronger the creature was, the harder it was for him to suck out it''s soul. This creature was a mere ant, and was able to resist being killed outright. He reaped the full reward when it was finally brought down, but it was still disturbing. Even though it was an immense ant, and dwarfed all of his own minions, it was still only an inch long. To be powerless against it without help reaffirmed his fears, and his need to grow stronger.


    As Damien continued to watch the battle unfold, the tide of ants finally slowed. It seemed the colony was running out of ants to send on the offensive. On the other hand, maggots continued to hatch and march to war, as yesterday''s eggs became today''s warriors. As the final ants were finally defeated, he dispersed his conscripted forces and they returned to their normal selves. After the battle there was no shortage of food for his warriors. The largest maggots, what remained of his glorious shock troops retreated to the corners of his den, and finally began the process of forming their pupa stage, the last stop before they reached adulthood.


    Long after the battle ended, Damien stared out into the world beyond his lair. He had watched the ants retreat into their holes, and he vowed that he would make them his subjects. Their prowess in combat combat outclassed his current minions by leaps and bounds, and if he bolstered them in the same way he had his army today they would be unstoppable.


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    Three more days passed. Mild skirmishes with the neighboring ants had continued, much to Damien''s delight. The ants continued to send small raids a few times each day. He wasn''t sure but he believed it was likely that at least one other nest had found his lair. Although he couldn''t see far outside his home, they seemed to come from a different direction than the first army. His troops had grown in strength and their numbers had been fully replenished as he no longer had a need to harvest them himself. The flies continued to plant their eggs, and nearly a thousand had survived long enough to form into pupae. He was stronger than ever and the last few days had seen some wonderful developments in his rapidly growing empire.


    The first beetles had arrived, strange black beetles with yellow crest like coloring around their head. They were just over an inch in length, by far the largest creatures to enter into his domain. And Damien happily welcomed them into his home. They killed many maggots, but they bred far faster than the beetles could eat. Despite his losses, Damien was beside himself with glee. He knew that it would take time, but the beetles would inevitably come under his sway. He would have new warriors with an armored carapace, something strong enough to fend off even the mightiest of soldier ants with ease.


    And then there was the spider. She had finally begun to submit to his will. Fattened as she was with her endless supply of victims and growing stronger every day, he had feared she would continue to resist him. He could feel the connection slowly forming, and could give basic instructions which allowed him to bring another addition into his collection. A second spider had shown up at his door, seeking to capitalize on the swarm of flies that continued to grow as the stench of rotten corpses grew ever stronger. His pet, whom he had named Sheila, was preparing to strike before the intruder could gain a foothold and steal her food. Damien intervened and sent Sheila deeper into the tunnel, almost to the room in which he and his army resided. He would not allow a precious predator to be wasted so soon.


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    All of this was truly wonderful, he was growing faster than ever before! But all of it paled in comparison to his latest discovery. He had finally found an ant colony. For the last three days, he had been digging small holes, probing out under the surface to find the ant''s homes. One tendril that went out 10 feet past the tunnel had located their nest. At that distance, and through such a narrow tunnel his influence was weak, but he forced himself through and absorbed the territory all the same. The only danger was that they might swarm down the tunnel before the subjugation was complete, so he closed it off again once he had finished his work. However the moment he did, his connection to the colony was severed completely.


    He tried it again, by simply removing the cap he had placed on the tunnel, and he was able to flow through it just as he had before. And then when he went to close it, it all disappeared. Without a continuous tunnel connecting him to the area, he couldn''t expand his domain. It was surprising, but all he had to do was station guards at the end of the tunnel. If they came, he would be ready. For now, all he could do is force his mana into the colony as densely as the thin access tunnel would allow and wait for the infants to be corrupted. But he took the time to examine the fine details of the colony. The thousands of ants swarming to and fro, a well oiled harvesting machine. And then there was the fine architecture of the structure. There were dozens of rooms in the structure, hatcheries were mostly near the bottom closest to the queen, but also spread out throughout the structure. As he watched the armies moving to and fro, he realized how truly safe the queen was. Hiding beneath a maze of rooms all filled with soldiers, she was beyond the reach of any predator he could imagine. Except himself of course.


    As he examined the anthill, he knew what he wanted for his own lair. He directed his focus into the room he had spent the last week in, and finally tapped into his mana reserves he had been hoarding since the beginning of the ant war. First, he expanded the main room. He widened it to an eight by eight, and then He dug small one foot wide tunnels three feet deep into the earth scattered around the left and right sides of the room, and each tunnel ended in a small rounded den, about four times as big around as the entry tunnel. Then he carefully moved a handful of the egg and larvae infested worm corpses in each alcove. He wanted his breeding grounds spread out as much as possible. This way if something went wrong, it would be extremely unlikely for him to lose all of them.


    Next he started to carve a hallway into the rear wall of his entry room. He only made it a few feet in before he had to stop, as his mana reserves had been drained by the ordeal. Still, as he looked at the expanded lair, he was once again bathed in a wave of pleasure. He knew he was going in the right direction. He had subjugated two species, and had two more within his domain. It was only a matter of time.


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    On the eighth day, his crop finally bore fruit. The first fly eggs planted a week before had fully transformed into flies. It would take more time before they were mature enough to breed, but it was still an important milestone. Because more fly eggs were laid by the wild flies every day, he would have a constant stream of flies maturing from now on. As the first flies emerged from their pupae, and flapped their wings, he felt the joy of a farmer who had raised his crop to maturation, and was merely waiting to pluck the fruit. He watched them fly around, and join the maggots in their feeding. And then one landed next to something new that had snuck inside his perimeter without him ever noticing. It was a patch of moss growing on the floor of his lair.


    He hadn''t noticed because it was a different form of life than he was used to, but once he knew it was there he could feel it. It''s simple existence had been fully indoctrinated by the ambient energy flowing through his lair, so he tried to control it. It was even simpler, but he found he could control the direction of his growth just as he could direct the maggots. Only it was far slower, being a plant. After toying with the colorful addition to his collection, he turned back to the tunnel he had started yesterday.


    He plowed out another two feet, using up the entirety of the days energy collection in the process. As he stared at the now five foot deep tunnel burrowing deeper into the hillside, he groaned inwardly. This was going to take a long time.


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    Over the next few days, he finished the tunnel he was carving. Ending it eight feet in from the first room. From there he had started to carve out a new second room. His power had grown enormously from when he was desperately digging for worms, although he still hunted them for his minions, but at the end of the day all he had were insects. Their meager souls simply weren''t enough to fuel his excavations. There was still hope for growth however, his first flies had finally laid eggs! With this final stage of their life cycle completed, he could rest easily knowing the population would finally sustain itself even if he were somehow cut off from the outside world. He could only hope they continued to multiply so he could dig deeper into the wall.


    Days continued to pass quietly as he continued to dig deeper and deeper into his lair. And on the 14th day, he saw his first reptile. A lizard stood at the doorway to his domain, and Damien quivered with anticipation.

 Chapter Four: Rex Tyrannus

    A/N: Probably only one chapter today, will still try for two.


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    The lizard was a magnificent specimen and the largest creature Damien had ever seen, at least since his rebirth in this cave. He was a mostly tan reptile, with scattered patches of darker and lighter browns. At nearly a foot long from nose to tail, he was truly a monster. Thick jagged scales covered his legs, and spikes studded out at the base of his broad triangular head and down his sides. There was not a single weakness in it''s defenses. It was a lizard Damien was familiar with. He had found a bearded dragon. "Yes! Yes! Yes!" He screamed in his heart. Even before he had dominated the ant colony, a titan had wandered into his domain.


    As Damien watched, the reptilian beast slowly descended into his domain. And with it came a rush of strength. Merely accustomed to feeding off the mana of insects, just the aura of this mighty being filled him with awe. Before, he had been proud of his maggot legions, but one look at this lizard showed how naive he had been. This single being could wade through his armies without a second thought, microscopic maggot mouths fruitlessly bit down on armored scales. It was a humbling experience, but such thoughts were drowned out by greed. With every step the ambient mana this creature released was worth a thousand maggots. He taunted the creature with his flies. Damien gleefully sent them to their deaths to lure in this rare treasure.


    As the bearded dragon marched onwards down the tunnel, Damien ordered a platoon of maggots forwards to meet him. Onwards they wriggled, all for the glory of their lord. As they neared the mighty dragon, their tiny squeaks and squeals sounded their fearless charge. But it was all in vain. The lizard slaughtered them. First he lunged forwards and it''s tongue shot out to grab the leader. As he chewed the maggots swarmed, but with every step his massive foot snuffed out another maggot. His shifting body pulverized the helpless creature and his tail knocked them around simply by his movement. In a matter of moments, all lay still except for the intruding reptile. And he ate his fill. Feasting on the guts of the fallen fighters. Damien cheered. The destructive power of this mighty creature was truly awe inspiring. But just as he began to celebrate, the lizard turned to leave.


    "Wait!" He tried to call out as panic gripped him. His heart''s glow flickered as he cried out. But the mighty behemoth continued his trudge along the tunnel. He sent his flies to tempt him into returning but the majestic beast would not be swayed. Soon he had crossed the threshold of his den, and wandered off into the light. Damien began to despair, but the lizard was gone. There was no brining him back. All of that mana, gone. All of that strength, gone. He had a chance to infinitely increase his power, and he had allowed it to walk right out of his lair. As he was sulking, lost in self pity, a faint tapping brought him out of his reverie. Something was tapping on his heart.


    He looked up, and saw Shelia standing at his side, gently tapping on the flickering ruby gem in the middle of the lair. And all around him, his maggots were swarming, leaving a respectful circle around their master. Even the flies and a few ants had come. They had all sensed his distress, and they had all rushed to him. To protect him, to save him. They couldn''t understand the meaning of his emotions, they were far too simple for that, but they were still his minions. They were connected to him. A part of him. As he watched the seething masses of maggots, the buzzing squadrons of flies, the few young ants who had felt his pull, and his mighty huntress Sheila, he found strength in their unwavering loyalty. Even if they were all insects, he would work with what he had. He would grow in time, and the mightiest lizards would fall under his sway.


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    The reptilian invader had proven just how feeble his defenders truly were, however he had already begun to absorb a far more fearsome force. The ant colony still rested within his domain, but only a few ants had begun to submit to his rule. The youngest ants, the oldest, the crippled, and the eggs were the first to come to him, those too weak to resist. But he needed more. He widened the tunnel into the lair, making a broad passage. As he did, he forced all of the mana he had gathered from the reptile into the colony, and held it there. Over the course of the coming days, the concentrated energy began to change them. The newly hatched larvae came out larger, although many were deformed or died. Some would have extra legs, or larger pincers. Those who survived were far stronger than their older brethren, and were completely indoctrinated under his rule. The grown ants fed off the mana as well, and more and more of the grown ants began to bend the knee to their new sovereign. Those who submitted grew more quickly, as the ambient energy recognized them as part of the lair. At first they mingled with their siblings, but as the changes became more pronounced, the wild ants turned on them.


    As the newborns were corrupted by his power, and those who accepted his rule grew stronger, the ants sensed they were not a part of their colony. Whole hatcheries full of larval ants were slaughtered as the ants tried to purge the invaders, and so began the second war. A mere quarter of the ants had accepted Damien, but none of the soldiers had come and the queen still resisted his influence fiercely. He organized his ants into squads, and systematically blocked off as many paths as they could. Those which could not be held, he collapsed. Every tunnel they could use to escape to the surface was sealed. This resulted in large sections of the colony being cut off, both from his influence and the heart of the colony. As his ants slowly fortified the colony sections around the tunnel to the lair, he ordered his maggot troops to march, and thousands of his mightiest maggots rippled along the tunnel.


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    His black airborne cavalry squadrons swooped overhead of the seething column to quickly reinforce his ants, however they were too large to fit into the ant tunnels. Knowing there would be no room to fly, and that most of them would fall in battle. He ordered them to land and allow their wings to be torn off by teams of ants loyal to his cause. The flies screamed, but bore the pain as ordered. It would be cramped, but the flies could now wage this subterranean war.


    Damien''s first priority were the eggs and ant larvae being slaughtered. Despite their enhancements, ant larvae were utterly powerless and only survived by being fed by their colony. His ants secured a few of the hatcheries, and with the sacrifice of hundreds of ants and wingless flies their escape path was secured. Ant workers rushed past the fiercely pitched battle lines to grab the young and whisk them away. Despite their efforts, the soldier ants blasted through every defensive position they tried to hold. As the enemies swarmed down the tunnels, his troops were unable to gang up on individual enemies like the had before. The flies were mighty, but their size and lack of pincers left them grossly inferior to the soldiers. Everywhere they fought, his troops were pushed further and further back. They only served to stem the tide by choking the pathways with their corpses. That never held them for long, as the ants quickly dug around or hauled off the bodies.


    His valiant troops held the line at all cost as he directed, however halfway through the evacuation of the young the full cost had been paid. The enemy hordes swarmed over fierce battlefields littered with the corpses of his loyal servants. As tunnel after tunnel was abandoned, soon his rescuing troops and the young still remaining were cut off. As the enemy swarmed over their positions, they were slaughtered to the last man. In the darkest hour of this war, his new nemesis arrived.


    The great lizard hadn''t appeared for three days, but at this moment of crisis, the monster rushed down from the world above. As countless of his troops fell to hold back the wild ants, the brazen scaled beast crashed through the line of ants carting the young. The casualties to the rescuers were minimal, but that was not the lizards target. He had spotted the marching column of maggots as he entered the cave. Even as the first maggots were nearing the front lines to join in the defense his rear guard had been scattered by the unassailable beast. For the many ants who survived, he ordered them to drop their precious cargo and rush to the aid of his maggot army.


    Any other time he would have allowed the beast to take it''s fill, but now he was at war. He couldn''t allow it to run free at the peril of his army. Even as the wild beast thrashed around and gobbled up the helpless maggots, the tiny ants raced to climb up it''s legs. Hundreds of maggots were crushed, pulverized, bitten or eaten but the ants charged on. As if climbing a walking mountain they were blown aside by the slightest movement. But with each step of his armored legs, the ants rushed to grab on to the foot before it moved. As the first few grabbed hold, the lizard payed no notice. Soon his back was covered with dozens of ants, and still he payed them no mind, but then they reached his head. They went for the eyes, they crawled into his ears. A recent wound had left a cut across his face, and they crawled into that too. The lizard flailed, and scrambled to escape, slamming his head into the ground to crush the attackers.


    He couldn''t dislodge them however, and quickly bolted for the cave exit. Satisfied, and not yet ready to kill his future minion, he called the troops back. But the damage had already been done. The lizard had drawn his focus away from the battle, and all of his forward troops had been slaughtered. Not a single ant remained aside from the workers carrying the infants, and all of his fly cavalry he had sent had fallen. But now the maggots had finally arrived. Their march was slow, but their numbers were endless. Drawn out of their narrow tunnels, the ants had lost their advantage. Just as in the first war, his casualties would be high, but there was no hope for victory for the ant colony which had already suffered so many casualties.


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    The battle dragged on for hours. The ant workers and warriors valiantly defended their home and their queen, and made full use of the energy they had absorbed during his efforts at conversion, but his maggot horde knew no limits. The lizard had not dared to return since he was run off, but he was still wary. A full brigade was sent to the tunnel entrance to stand guard. Though they would be powerless, they would serve as fodder to prevent him rushing off to war again. With each passing hour, fewer and fewer ants remained to hold the line. Tunnel after tunnel was collapsed, leaving only a single path to the queen. And soon only the last soldier remained. It was a mighty warrior, and he had slaughtered thousands of his troops and with every kill had grown stronger. His armored hide had grown too thick for his maggots or his ants to bring down, and his rampage ran unchecked even after his brothers had long since been trampled into the dust. And it was then that his trump card finally made her appearance.


    Sheila had watched the battle from above as ordered, nestled in the roof of the tunnel. And as she eyed the rampage of the greatest ant, Damien finally allowed her to strike. She released her hold on the dirt, and plummeted down to the battle below.

 Chapter Five: The Eight Legged Champion

    A/N I managed to finish! A bit short but packed full of action. I don''t know how long I can maintain 2 chapters per day, but expect at least one for the foreseeable future.


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    Shelia landed gracefully directly in front of the giant ant, her long legs absorbing the impact of the fall. She reared in challenge, her front legs menacingly striking out at the last defender of the ant queen. As Damien gazed upon the pair, he saw that they should be nearly equal in strength. Relishing in the chance for his pet to prove her worth, he ordered his other minions to form a circle around the pair.


    Sheila''s hunting for the past two weeks had paid off. The little brown spider that he had nearly squished not so long ago had undergone a shocking transformation. As a predator, her entire day was spent hunting and killing every fly she could. And for every kill she made, her strength grew slowly but surely just as his own did. She had reached a menacing two inch leg span, and her color had darkened to a rich russet with red-brown highlights accenting her back in a striking pattern. Her fangs had scaled with her body, and wickedly jutted out from her mandibles. As she taunted the ant with her thick, sturdy forelegs she let out a hissing screech, she had waited hours for this moment. Her chance to feed on something more filling than a tiny fly.


    The ant had accomplished an equally amazing growth over the course of the battle and the infusion he had received in Damien''s bid to control him before. He was a pure black armored behemoth at a full inch in length. This was cause for concern, as Sheila might be larger, but most of that size was in her legs. The ant on the other hand was solid, muscle, chitin and mandible. In response to Sheila''s challenge, the ant''s mandibles gnashed so harshly it was audible. It tensed it''s powerful legs, and began to charge at the teasing spider.


    Sheila danced around the rushing foe, using her long legs to keep her just out of reach. She darted from side to side, striking an taunting with her front two legs. Using them as a boxer would in the ring. But her claws scraped harmlessly across the oversized chitiinous armor. She would strike or feint with one leg, and then dart in to try and land a bite. However every lunge was received by the fiercely gnashing mandibles. The ant was not politely waiting for her to find an opening either. He kept charging straight ahead, aiming for her body. As she frantically scurried around, he would bite at anything that came close. Sheila was wary of those fierce weapons, as she knew that anything that fell into their grip would be lost.


    She waited until he charged straight at her, and then she leapt over the ant, whirling to try and strike his rear, instead she was met with a stinger mid strike, and he nailed the side of her face. She leapt back and released a painful hiss as the weak venom coursed through her body. The ant was not about to let his wounded foe escape, and renewed his charge with fearless confidence. Sheila continued to dance away, dodging the ant''s furious advance, however her wound began to slow her down. Once again, the ant charged in and as she danced away she move just a moment too late. The ant''s mandibles caught her in the middle of her second left leg. She angrily screeched and pounded on his head with her other left legs, but it was all in vain. In a single heartbeat, the ant bit clean through the leg and Sheila''s blue ichor spouted from the crippling wound.


    She stumbled back, her second leg cut off just above the second section. As the ant charged forwards, she reared up, exposing her stomach. The ant did not waste the opportunity, and latched on just above her abdomen at the narrowest part of her body, biting through and causing severe damage. Then, using her full weight, Sheila threw herself down atop the ant, burying both of her fangs deep in the ant''s thorax and released all the venom she had stored in her body. The ant released her from his maw, reeling and screeching in agony. He writhed and flailed trying to escape the horrible pain coursing through his body. As he was unable to escape and felt his body beginning to succumb to the fatal dose of venom he turned his gaze on the one who inflicted that terrible pain. Sheila lay bleeding and crippled, and the ant did not intend to leave this world alone.


    Before he could charge, the maggots swarmed in front of Sheila and surrounded the ant. He screeched again in rage at being denied his final victory, and violently thrashed through the maggots. But Damien had no intention of letting Sheila fall. Her dying was a calculated risk, but she had fought well. She would serve him well in the future if she survived. The maggot hordes swarmed over the ant. They were unable to harm him, but their job was merely to hold him in place while the venom did it''s work.


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    As the ant was secured, Damien focused on his wounded pet. He poured mana into her body, and it accelerated her healing. The energy wove together her cuts, purged the venom, and even started the process of regrowing her leg. It was a miracle, but the cost was staggering. The act of healing his favorite pet rapidly consumed more energy than he had gained from the entire battle. A thousand ants and thousands of maggots had fallen, and mending this single spider consumed all of that power. But she was worth it. She was his most powerful pet, and his fiercest warrior. The second spider would fall soon enough, but for now she was his only predator. He had seen the tremendous growth a predator would have in his realm, and she was worth more than half of his legion. Soon she might even grow to contest the great bearded dragon who currently raided with impunity.


    There was a limit to how much of his raw mana she could take. The healing process was demanding, but there was still a limit. She absorbed a chunk of the overflow directly, and her body trembled with power. After that, the rest of the energy he poured into her dissipated into the air. The infusion had an immediate effect on her size and strength on top of healing her terrible wounds, she grew a half inch in mere moments. Just when it seemed like she had reached the limit of her new growth, the monstrous ant ant finally reached his limit and expired, his organs dissolved by her wicked venom. Amazingly, she swelled in size again after his essence flowed into her, reaching over 3 inches from foot to foot! This brought with it another pair of very important lessons. Intense battles between strong creatures brought greater rewards for the fighters, and the energy absorbed could go over the limits of what he could grant a creature himself.


    As Sheila stood finally, her body scarred but the bleeding stopped, Damien had one final task for her. He turned his gaze on the queen, cowering on the other size of a maze of tunnels choked with corpses. She had tried to escape time and time again, but the way was shut. With the battle over, Damien grinned wickedly, and began quickly carving out the dirt that lay between him and the helpless queen. The ant that had reigned over her own kingdom, reduced to a helpless peasant against his wriggling hordes. He widened the tunnel to a full six inches from end to end, and in the queens chamber he carved out a two foot wide rounded hall. And then he sent Sheila.


    She marched down the path, slightly awkward with her new size and still healing leg but as she neared the queen, the queen scrambled against the rear wall. Having faced the mighty warrior ant before, this queen posed no threat. Sheila steadily walked forwards, and when the queen tried to bolt past her to the side, Sheila pounced, and pinned her down with her forelegs. She continued to keep her pinned with one leg, while she excreted her spider silk and drew out the strands with her free fore leg. She wrapped a single loop around the queen gently and as soon as she was secured, she picked up the queen with her claws. The queen flailed and flailed, but Sheila firmly held her in place, and carefully wound her strands around and around until all that was visible of the queen was her head and her fiercely clashing but tiny mandibles. Sheila grabbed onto the silky cocoon with one of her rear legs, and dragged the queen behind her.


    The maggots did not know the meaning of their victory, or even truly that there had been a battle. But they felt their master''s excitement and pleasure, and the wriggled with glee as they basked in his euphoric energy. Screeches of delight taunted the vanquished queen as she was publicly humiliated and dragged down through the middle of the maggot army column that was marching back to their favorite worm piles. Sheila continued her laden trudge the entire 20 feet back to the middle of the cave, and she gently lay the queen down atop Damien''s heart. She then drew more strands and anchored the captive queen to her master. The vibrant ruby pulsed and shined with a radiant light reflecting Damien''s delight at his latest acquisition. His heart was the source of all the energy in the cave and the air around him was the most densely concentrated part. She would soon submit to his rule, she had no choice.

 Chapter Six: Welcome to the Horde

    Just one today, though I will get a head start on one for tomorrow. Happy reading!


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    With the queen captive, it came time for Damien to clean house. He tasked the surviving ants with hauling off all the maggot and ant corpses they could find from the battlefield to the corpse piles. They were a valuable resource to feed his ever growing hordes. While he waited for the ants to complete their work, some new guests arrived. A cluster of beetles had wandered into his domain. Their shells were half black, the rest covered in a vibrant metallic green pattern which lay in stripes and spots across their backs. Each was just less than an inch in length.


    Unlike the carrion beetles, who waged a one sided war with his feeding maggots, these were herbivores. Though the last beetles remained in the first stages of indoctrination, these new arrivals were far more important. Although their pincers were shorter and their carapace thinner than their carnivorous cousins, they were vital to his ecosystem. Currently everything he had relied on the worm harvests, however as time progressed, all those within range had been hunted into scarcity. The maggots and flies fed off the worms and the accumulated dead from his battles. The carrion beetles ate the maggots and the spiders devoured the flies. The worms were the base of his food chain.


    The moss he had nurtured however had grown rapidly, quickly spreading in large patches across the floor and walls of his cavern. The addition of a new herbivore would allow for a second pillar to support his rapidly growing food chain. A herbivorous mammal would prove even more useful, as it would be food itself but also convert it''s meals into refuse which the flies and maggots could thrive in. But that was a dream for a distant day. For now, he had to make those beetles his. As they crawled across the dirt of his entry tunnel, he called out to his wonderful Sheila once again.


    She deserved time to rest and recover, but this new larger food source was more important for her growth than any other creature in his army. She was nearly too massive already to be content with flies, even if they were twice as large as they would naturally be. Without this new prey, she would likely starve but at the very least her growth would stagnate. She happily responded, quietly creeping along the ceiling from her post. Half of the lost leg had already healed, and while it was an unsightly stub it did not slow her down. As she passed over head of the beetles, Damien ordered her to drop.


    She dutifully plunged through the air, landing roughly as she adapted to her rapid growth. The less than graceful impact shocked the peaceful beetles, who jumped away from the giant spider into a seemingly defensive posture. Their heads lowered to the ground, and they raised their rears into the air, straining on their toes to make themselves seem as large as possible while presenting their armored carapace to the enemy. Just as before she raised her forelegs, rearing up and screeching fiercely at the the unfortunate nomadic beetles. Their wills shattered at that moment, and they fled. The beetles scattered in pairs and dashed to the corners of the room, those who found moss patches stayed there while the rest cowered in whatever dark crevice they could find.


    Every so often, a beetle would attempt to return to the light and the world above, however Sheila remained at her post. Every time one grew bold enough to challenge her, she charged, scaring them back into the dark. Damien rewarded her with a steady supply of flies to keep her fed while her web stood vacant. As the ants finished their work, and the honored dead had all be hauled from the field of battle, he set about filling in the tunnels. In the same way that he could remove dirt to dig, he could fill it back in. He started back at the queen''s lair, and packed in the tunnel he had carved through the center of the old colony before filling in the long tunnel he had used to find them and march his maggots to war. Filling in material was actually far easier than it was to excavate it in the first place. It seemed what he carved out of the hillside was somehow stored in his heart.


    With the ants vanquished, the tunnels filled and new livestock penned in, there was nothing to do but wait for the queen to break.


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    It took three days for the queen to submit. She was by far the oldest creature he had corrupted, having ruled her colony for 10 years before the war began. The youngest creatures were the first to succumb to his influence, it had been that way for the fly maggots, the ant larvae, and even Sheila had been a young spider as he brought her under sway. Had the queen not been bound to his heart and bathed in the full glory of his power it would have taken far longer. The ants had brought her food to keep her well fed, and they had started digging out a new colony into the front wall to the side of the entryway. Despite her resistance, she continued to lay eggs throughout the ordeal, and these were brought to the first storerooms of the colony.


    When Damien finally felt her mind enter the fold, he called out to Sheila''s comrade. The second spider and the carrion beetles had joined his legions as well. This spider was a fine match to the carrion beetles, his black body accented by a fierce yellow pattern resembling a horrific mask. He skittered to Damien''s side when called, and did his best to free the queen. Still less than a half inch in size, the new spider struggled with Sheila''s thick webbing. It took time, but he soon extricated Damien''s latest minion. With telepathic approval, the black and yellow spider raced away towards his roost. Despite coming under Damien''s influence, the spider had yet to grow comfortable with Damien''s rule.


    The queen however, had been utterly broken. She had spent the first two days violently flailing in her attempts to escape as Damien violently assaulted her mind. He grew impatient and nearly shattered the weak insect''s soul, but she had endured. After the end of the second day, she stopped fighting. And now, she had willingly joined his army. Damien could have simply killed her. He had sensed two potential queens among the eggs that he had saved. However they would need time to grow and mature. Damien did not wish to wait. The ants were his only defense against large intruders. Even a grown man could be brought down if enough ants swarmed over him. Until he mastered larger animals, they were the most reliable option for protection aside from his spiders. He had secured the queen. And as she marched off to her new colony, Damien knew he needed more. Damien prepared for war


    Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.


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    Over the next week, Damien expanded aggressively. He crafted a large hall at the end of the rear tunnel. It was twenty feet long and ten feet wide, more than double the size of his first room. Just as he had added crevices and dens along the walls of the first room, he did the same in the second, although larger to allow for growth. He scattered his strongest maggots, flies, and beetles amongst the various holes, using the freshly opened floor for a renewed holocaust of the worms to fuel his ever increasing minion''s needs. The strongest were sent to the rear, because as soon as he could find a creature strong enough to move him, that hall would be his new lair. He needed to put more distance between himself and the surface. He wouldn''t truly feel safe until he did. But there was far more work to be done. His troops were ready to march.


    The raids from the dragon continued. The beast had found a reliable food source, but Damien knew it was still out of his reach. He could be killed with his ants, especially as the young matured and replenished those lost in war, however he still believed the great lizard could be tamed. He was too large for Sheila to scare as she had the grazing beetles, and there was little hope of Sheila winning even with her venom. Damien had other targets in mind.


    He had dug more searching tunnels, even narrower than before he sent the probing tendrils of his will far out in every direction. He had found another four ant colonies. Three common ants, and one nest of giant red ants. Two were around 10 feet away, the same range as the one he had conquered. One of these was the red one. The other two were over 30 feet away from his cave, and the closer one of these was truly massive. His count made over eleven thousand ants inside it''s winding halls. The rest held between one and three thousand ants. He selected the closest colony of black ants, and surveyed his troops.


    He did not need to muster his entire forces as he had in the past, leaving most to roam and feast as they pleased but still ready to defend should anything enter his domain. Most of his troops came from his majestic maggot hordes, a full five thousand of his strongest hulking maggots stood at attention. These were not the common maggots he had used in his previous battles. Many of his maggots had begun to mutate due to the continued exposure to his mana miasma. Most grew stronger, larger than ever before forming their pupae to emerge as flies. Others changed in more drastic ways. Some changed color, spots of brown, gray and black dotted the white fleshy horde. Some grew wider mouths, larger teeth, or thicker skin before they too transformed into flies, but many more hatched deformed or crippled and died early deaths. But a select few had become something greater.


    A handful of maggots, only 200 out of all his tens of thousands, never transformed into flies. They grew far larger than even their mutated brethren instead. They reached a length of a full inch. These massive maggots became his new shock troops. Flies were airborne and maneuverable, but for these battles in the tunnels the mighty maggots were far superior. Next came the beetles.


    Six carrion beetles bolstered the strength of his armies, half of those he had tamed. Each was only slightly longer than the mighty maggots, but they were far thicker and taller. Their armored carapaces would be his shield should he be on the defensive, and their mandibles his mightiest weapons.


    Then came the ants. A mere fifty had been drafted from the fledgling colony, but continued exposure to his influence gave them an edge over their wild counterparts in size and strength.


    Finally came his champion. Sheila would lead the army to glory.


    Damien did not know his purpose in this world. He did not know why this power coursed through his body, or even why he was alive. He could not understand what drove him, or why he was afraid. But nothing was ever enough. Every time he saw his own progress, he celebrated before hungering for more power. For every cubic yard of dirt he hauled out he cheered as his territory grew, before he realized how exposed he was to the outside world. With every new creature he conquered and every minion who grew stronger he rejoiced, until he remembered that there were far more terrifying things than lizards in the world. He needed more. He needed more and power power to sustain himself. He needed more and more minions to keep him safe. He needed to dig deeper to hide from the world above. All of this could be secured through war. Every death fueled his power, every kill strengthened his soldiers, and every captured creature bolstered his armies.


    This second colony would be the proof of his power. He had learned, he had grown. There would be slaughter and mayhem, and he would secure a second queen.


    He widened the tunnel to a full foot, and sealed off every exit to the colony. This time he would not convert some to his side or collapse unnecessary tunnels. He had waited until the world above had surrendered to the darkness, and all ants had returned home to endure the cold night. All three thousand ants were at home in their nest. There would be no tricks or subterfuge. He would meet the entire colony in battle, and crush them utterly. He would prove his strength, and the strength of his armies.


    "March!" He ordered, and the seething horde marched to war.

 Chapter Seven: Let Slip the Grubs of War

    A/N: Thank you to all my wonderful readers, especially those of you who continue to leave wonderfully supportive comments. If any of you wish to help me, please leave a critique or review. This story is in it''s early stages, and so any comments you have could influence the quality or direction of the story in the future. So please, post a review and let me know where you see me struggling and what you see me doing well. I appreciate it. Please enjoy.


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    As his troops reached the end of the tunnel, the first ants scouting out the new path encountered his forces. Through his ant''s antennae, he detected a panicked release of pheromones sounding the alarm. His troops formed up, and awaited the colony''s frantic response. One hundred of his mighty maggots stood at each flank, lining the walls. Their massive, bloated flesh completely dwarfed the rest of his maggot army. Then there were his beetles. He had spaced them out, one of their vibrant yellow and black bodies resting every two inches just behind the front lines. They would act as cavalry charging in to take the pressure off of his forces should they be pushed back. Then there was his champion Sheila, who stood at the head of his forces. She would roam the battlefield, scattering enemies for the maggot legions to pick apart. It did not take long for the ants to come bursting forth from the colony to protect their home, a black tide of fury and mandibles.


    There would be no battle in the cramped maze of the colony as there had been before, no desperate attempts to rescue eggs and larvae spreading his forces far too thin. The ants surged out onto the open plain of the tunnel, where Damien''s army awaited them. The ants wildly charged forwards into battle, seeing before them simple enemies they had warred with countless times before. But this was no ordinary gathering of maggots and beetles. The first foe they reached was Sheila. As she stood at the head of her army, her brown and red body a titanic presence amongst a sea of lesser beings, the ants swarmed her. No spider could survive hundreds of ants, they had brought down many before her. But as they charged, she danced. Every step of her legs brought a clawed limb crashing down on an ant. They were too small for her fangs or mouth, so instead her legs were her weapons. They sought to climb her legs, to crawl over her body, biting eyes and tearing into eyes and flesh, however she was prepared. Her legs were bound in spider silk.


    Damien had expected the ants to climb her, and had taught her to bind her legs with her sticky webbing. The white of her silken threads contrasted sharply with the rich russet of her body, and it was the ultimate defense against the swarming ants. As they climbed, they stuck. The more they flailed, the more they stuck. They had been deprived of their only way to reach her, so she danced through their ranks with impunity, stomping down on hundreds of the enraged insects.


    The ants still surged onwards, undaunted by the spider''s rampage. They had been backed into a corner and fought desperately to save their home. As the wave of ants crashed upon the maggot lines, the maggots were pushed back. The ant warriors and workers frantically bit and chomped every maggot they could reach, relishing in their success. But it was not to last. A chorus of furious chirping echoed across the battlefield, before something crashed into the ants and they were sent flying. The beetles had charged into battle. The carrion beetles had waited for the lines to fall into disarray before they charged through, scattering friend and foe alike. With fierce gnashing pincers and hardened shells they were impenetrable, biting fortresses of chitin. The ants were pressed in and cramped by the behemoths settling amongst their front line. Then Damien''s offensive truly began.


    Dozens of maggots leapt off of each beetles'' back, throwing themselves from their perches into the fray. They had ridden the beetles for just this moment. Suddenly the ants in the fore were under attack from all sides. The maggots who had so far yielded to their assault surged forth. The immense fortresses that were the beetles did not simply stop and hold their positions, they shuffled back and forth, plowing the helpless ants back and forth.


    To deepen the confusion, his flies dive bombed into the harassed enemies, attacking from above. Claws scratched and legs stamped, but the flies bore a far more important task. Half of the airborne squadrons carried maggots and as they swooped over the enemy they dropped them in the thick of the fighting. The maggots who landed were doomed for slaughter, but the enemy''s already shaken formations were completely shattered. Attacked on all fronts the ants were helpless before the onslaught. But then there was another crisis on the battlefield.


    Sheila was finally in danger. So many ants had attacked her that they had formed a bridge of corpses across her silken armor. Before they could make use of it, Damien gave her the order to retreat. She quickly bounded across the mass of warring bodies to the rear lines of Damien''s forces where he had his loyal ants slaughter the survivors clinging to her body. She rested for a moment as she stripped and re-bound her legs before wading back into the sea of flesh, once again causing an explosion of mayhem across the battlefield. Just as she had, the beetles retreated when the ants had swarmed atop them, and as soon as the tiny attackers were cleared they loaded up with new maggot riders and waded back into the lines. This was Damien''s war.


    The maggots filled his ranks, but the valuable beetles and Sheila disrupted the enemies before retreating so the maggots could swarm and surround their foes. This gave him the greatest benefit from his limited supply of beetles and his champion without much risk. Throughout the whole battle, his flanks pulverized the enemy. His mighty maggots stormed through the enemy ranks without faltering. The giant inch long maggots crushed, bit, and smashed through the helpless ants. Both worker and warrior alike were helpless before their might. What had begun as a fierce battle was soon reduced to a one sided slaughter.


    Wave after wave of desperate ants were ground down into a chunky, bloody mush. The tunnel floor was soaked with blue insectoid ichor, and the maggots who stood at the front of his armies were soaked in the blood of a thousand slain enemies. Still onwards they charged, climbing over the corpses of their fallen brothers to repel the invaders. Then, the two flanks finally met. Every last ant except their queen had entered the tunnel, and the rampaging mighty maggots had cut a bloody path to meet up behind them. The ants were surrounded. They tried to flee, tried to escape. However there would be no escape for his enemies. His minions needed to grow. The maggots, beetles and flies pressed in from all sides. The beetle charges and fly dive-bombs continued unabated. Soon, all that was left of his once mighty enemy were empty halls and a lone queen.


    This battle had been different than his last, and out in the open he showed the full extent of his advantage. Ants worked well in a group, but there was no strategy. There was no plan or complex communication. In addition, only he was able to unify the different species to allow their varied potentials to be combined and utilized. He had won, completely and utterly. And now it was time for him to loot his prize. To the victor go the spoils.


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    A thousand eggs, larvae, and pupae were gathered by his ants and carried by the flies back to his lair. They would build a second nest on the other side of the entrance from the other, but first the new queen would have to be broken. She was roughly cornered, bound and dragged back along the tunnel back to Damien. This was his total victory, and he was just beginning.


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    The other colonies did not sit idly for long. They quickly scouted down his exploration tunnels, and skirmishes quickly broke out. All of these were one-sided slaughters except for the giant red ants. These ants were truly monstrous, and he was nearly helpless against them. The smallest workers were half an inch long once they had fully matured, and their soldiers were nearly a full inch. Against ants this size, his maggots, ants and even his beetles were powerless. His only option was to swarm them with maggots while Sheila and Ajax darted around and picked them off.


    He had finally settled on a name for the second spider, and the Greek hero renowned for his strength was a name that suited him well. Sheila hunted with cunning, dancing around her enemies and waiting for the moment to strike. Ajax was the complete opposite. He charged head on into the battle, diving in and wrestling with ants just as large as he was. He attacked with his claws, his fangs and slammed them with his body. He was the most ferocious spider Damien had ever witnessed. Yet even with the addition of Sheila and Ajax, they were costly battles.


    While his spiders held the line against the fearsome red ants, his troops easily crushed the second small black ant colony. Just as before his troops has surrounded and slaughtered the enemy on the field of battle. He now had three queens in his arsenal, but it would take time for the captured young to mature, and then longer before the newly laid eggs hatched to boost their numbers to their full potential. As he examined the two remaining colonies, he knew he would need something more. The last black colony had far too many defenders and the red ants were far too powerful for him to consider conquest. But during his battles, a plan had come to him.


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    The lizard wandered into his cave around mid morning, just as it had every other day. It would come in, eat it''s fill, and then find a rock to sun itself and snooze the day away. It would not go that way this day. As he crept into the cave, he gazed around at the dark room. It''s walls were covered in moss and the stench of death was as delicious as ever. There were fewer maggots than usual. Normally as he came in, he would see that the floor was covered in the delicious treats. But today the cave seemed to be almost deserted. But just ahead, there was one large pile of juicy, wriggling maggots just waiting for him to devour.


    He didn''t pause to think and dashed forwards towards his daily meal. Just as he reached the maggots, the ground gave out beneath him! And he and the maggots all fell into a pit. As he fell down, he fell through layer after layer of webbing, nearly completely covering him in it''s sticky silky threads. When he hit the bottom, he flailed and flailed away, desperate to escape, but nothing he did could set him free. Hours passed before he finally stopped struggling, and when he stopped a massive spider dropped down to finish binding him. He struggled and writhed, but the more he tried the more tangled he became. He was powerless before the eight legged brown monster, and on this day his captivity began.


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    Damien celebrated the success of his first trap. After watching the monstrous red ants come rushing out of the narrow passageway, he wished there was a way to trap them and kill them without risking his spider''s lives. Their predictable movement and the lack of any side paths made this wish into reality. This led to Sheila spreading out webs in front of their only entrance into his cave. But when he realized he needed something far more powerful if he was ever to storm their colony and capture their queen, his first thought was of the bearded dragon who continued to raid with impunity. But how to snare the great beast in enough web that he couldn''t simply break free? And this, the pitfall trap was his creation. The roof was constructed of a sturdy web topped with moss and dirt. And below that rest a two foot deep hole. Every few inches Sheila spun another complete web. It was such a wild mass of silk he feared the lizard would get his head covered and suffocate. However after witnessing it''s flailing and attempts to break free, this was barely enough to keep it contained.


    As he gazed at his prize, he ordered maggots to crawl down to feed it. He would not bear to have his greatest beast die of starvation while he waited for the indoctrination to take hold. After his experience with the queen, he was prepared for this to take quite some time.


    There was nothing to do now except wait. His queens and lizard would need time to accept their new master. His ants and beetles needed time to multiply, and all could benefit from some evolution before the next war. He would expand his lair while he waited, and send out new tendrils to search for new colonies or anything else that might be lurking beneath the surface. It was on one such search that his world would change forever.


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    Five days had passed since the war, and three since he captured the mighty dragon. He had found a few more ant colonies, even conquered a few more of the smaller ones and had also begun to add side rooms to either side of his hall. He dug a thin path through the soil, just like he had hundreds of times before. And then he broke through into a cave. The tunnel was open for only a split second, and then he frantically filled it back in. Terror gripped his heart. The greatest fear he had ever known.


    His heart pulsed rapidly, all of his creatures froze. He scrambled to seal the hole. He crammed pile after pile of dirt into the tiny tunnel, packing it harder than it had ever been before he dug. He mustered every last minion he had. From the lowest maggot to his champion spider he summoned them all, and all of them swarmed to the southern wall. He had found another one. Another creature like himself, a blue essence to his red. He came upon it''s lair. He sensed it was far larger, and far stronger than himself. And as he tried to see into it''s depths, the owner of the lair turned it''s gaze upon Damien, and Damien felt one emotion that radiated out, that rippled across it''s mana so fiercely he felt it in his very soul. It hungered.

 Dungeon Map

    This took me far longer than I am willing to admit, but I have put together the tools I will need to keep this map updated. This is the floorplan for Damien''s dungeon. As a teaser, I have put our new blue enemies dungeon floorplan here as well. Our protagonist''s Dungeon is the one on top, and his enemy''s is down on the bottom. Green is grass, chopped green and brown is moss, and the off-colored ground in the small alcoves are the maggot/beetle breeding dens. A 1x1 grid is one square foot. Please enjoy!


    The entry way into Damien''s dungeon is 2 feet, the rest of the dungeon is four feet high except for the dens. -Thanks to Isiaki, I completely forgot about the height!


    Love this novel? Read it on Royal Road to ensure the author gets credit.


    If bbc code does work use this link:


    http://i.imgur.com/pzSJere.png</a>


    Map will be updated every few chapters, particularly when there is a large change. If you ever have questions about something described in a chapter (particularly something that could be pointed out on a map) Feel free to ask, and I may attach an annotated map to the chapter!

 Chapter Eight: Enemy at the Gates

    A/N: Sorry for not updating yesterday. Life occasionally gets in the way. Tags updated to mature for gore and violence.


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    Day 33


    Damien''s red heart pulsed with a hard, jarring light. As the immediate panic subsided, he formed his minions into ranks. Twenty thousand maggots formed the front line, all across the wall from which his terrible foe would emerge. Five thousand flies lay at the ready near the center of the room, prepared to launch at a moments notice. His beetles were scattered amongst the maggots, prepared to strike to break up the enemy formations. His mighty maggots were his reserve, their bulging bodies lay behind the main formations, and they were bolstered by his newest additions. The carrion beetles first eggs had finally hatched and grubs now bolstered his maggot army. He had never wanted to risk losing them as he had precious few beetles at his disposal, but this was far from normal circumstances.


    Then there were his spiders and his ants. He sent both up the walls. The only ants he kept in reserve were his queens, of which he now had four. Hundreds of his ants scaled the wall, all poised to rush down and ambush their intruders from behind. Fifty soldiers had grown amongst his newest generation of ants, however they were not yet fully mature and were barely larger than their older brothers. His champion spiders lay in wait in the roof.


    Next he dug trenches, small inch deep ditches to allow his horde the higher ground.  He was prepared. Whatever this sapphire foe would throw at him, he was ready. But he was wrong, oh so very wrong.


    The tunnel he had tried so hard to close burst wide open, now expanded to a full three feet. From the darkness the armies of his foe emerged. Damien had expected spiders, roaches, rhinoceros beetles, wasps or lizards. But what came out were mice, rats and rabbits. Nearly one hundred brown field mice rushed out at the front of the enemy wave followed by ten gray rats and two very angry brown rabbits. He was not prepared for this.


    The rodents wasted no time, charging head on into the sea of seething alabaster flesh. With every step, hundreds of maggots were trampled and squished beneath the mammalian force. The maggots surged, and pressed in against the mice, but their mouths grasped only hairs and the outermost layers of skin. Then the giant rats charged past, through the maggot holocaust unfolding around them. The rats leapt and targeted his beetles. The massive animals grabbed onto the mighty beetles with their paws, ruthlessly tearing them from their footing. The rats then slammed them over on their backs and tore into their soft underbellies with their wickedly sharp teeth. His beetles were being slaughtered. His maggots hopelessly annihilated. He ordered his ants to charge.


    They swarmed down the walls, they would surprise the unsuspecting mammals from behind. These ants were his best hope against these mighty foes, but they were far too few. He possessed four ants for every enemy, and there was only so much they could do. Still they surged onwards, silently creeping along the moss strewn floor of the cave. As they reached the rabbits standing watch in the rear, they slowly climbed up their backs starting with their fluffy tails. They didn''t make it more than an inch up their spine before the two great beasts felt their movement across their fur.


    The hares leapt into action, whirling around to see an army of ants. As they saw this large army suddenly appearing behind them, they hopped forwards into the foe. Their long legs heaved them up into the air before they landed atop the ant armies. Their wide bodies crushed dozens of ants with each impact, but still some managed to grasp their fluffy hairs and climb on. Those already on their backs continued their aggressive climb, and the rabbits reared, kicked and flailed trying to drive them loose. Even in the throws of panic they still crushed countless minions of Damien''s glorious army. As they were distracted, Sheila and Ajax dropped down from the ceiling.


    Sheila had landed gracefully in front of her target. This rabbit was the larger of the two, although only slightly. As soon as it saw her land it charged forwards and she quickly skittered aside. As the rabbit passed she lunged out at it''s rear. Before she could close the distance the hare whirled around and squeaked fiercely, barring it''s teeth. He hopped up and pounced down on where she was sitting, and she barely managed to scramble out of the way. She wasn''t ready for his rapid turn and the beast buried it''s teeth in her abdomen. She screeched and flailed desperately to get away but the monstrous beast held her tight in it''s maw. It strained for just a moment before it bit clean through, tearing into her soft flesh. She threw herself away as soon as she was free, but the damage was done.


    Ajax aimed right for the other rabbit''s body as it flailed to escape the ants. He landed right on it''s back. The fierce rabbit screeched in rage as it felt the spider''s weight and started to buck. Ajax clung tight to the beast as it kicked and spun and reared back and forth. As it failed to dislodge the brave spider, the rodent rolled. Ajax scrambled to stay on top, but soon the rabbit''s entire weight crushed him down into the floor. Two of his legs snapped under the pressure, but still he held on. As the rabbit leapt up, he gripped as tightly as he could with his remaining legs and sunk his fangs deep into it''s back. He poured every last drop of his potent venom into the fearsome beast. The rabbit shrieked in agony as the corrosive venom soaked through it''s veins, before falling to the ground as it writhed under the excruciating onslaught.


    Sheila hemorrhaged precious ichor from the terrible wound. Her opponent''s body was stained with the blue of her blood. She could stand and she could fight, but it wouldn''t last for long. Then the battlefield shook with the dying shriek of the other rabbit, and the battlefield descended into chaos.


    The enemy finally realized that their greatest fighters were in danger. One was already dying, in the most excruciating way imaginable. The spiders became their biggest priority. All of the rats surged to the rear to help their allies, leaving the mice to their one-sided slaughter.


    Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.


    The ants had waded into the fighting, quietly creeping up the backs of the mice and rats just as their fellows had the rabbits. They crawled up while their victims trampled the maggots into the dirt. All was quiet and peaceful, but as they all gathered on their target''s backs, Damien gave the signal. And they all climbed into their ears. If he had allowed them to battle freely, the enemy would have learned the danger. But by allowing the ants to all attack at once, it was far too late before the enemy realized what had happened. The ants burrowed into the soft tissue of their ears, and slowly dug through a torrential flood of blood as they carved their path to the brains.


    All at once, mice and rats screamed but they were not alone. The rabbits shared their agony. Ajax''s foe was already mortally wounded but had risen to exact his final revenge. Ajax would be trapped between the hare and the charging rats, but then the beast collapsed, shrieking as an even worse fate befell him. With this one and only chance Ajax fled the battle, returning to his roost on the room of the cave. He had done his part. The other rabbit spasmed mid leap as it''s ear drums were being torn apart by the fearless ants. Sheila too, used this opportunity to limp away as her blood continued to ooze from her horrible wound.


    All around the battlefield, rodents collapsed. And once they began to writhe and scream, they never rose again. Twenty three mice and six of the rats died slowly as their brains were devoured from the inside. But still, far too many remained. He had inflicted terrible damage upon the enemy, yet still they pressed in. He mustered his mighty maggots and they charged forwards into the fray and combined with all his other maggots they only brought down a dozen mice. Thousands and thousands of bites slowly wore away the fur and flesh, but their casualties were impossibly high. The outcome seemed bleak.


    There was only one advantage he still held over the rodents, and that was his air corps of flies. They could take to the skies and harass them, but he feared they could do little damage. He wished to save them for breeding but now there was no choice. He released them into the batle, and they swarmed though the air. Thousands of flies blocked the light from reaching this forsaken corner of the cave. And then they dived.


    They bit, clawed and slammed themselves into the rodents. Their meager weapons left pitifully little damage, yet thousands and thousands of attacks added up one after the other. The rodents bit at the air, whipped them out of the sky with their tails, and rolled on the ground to brush them off. But for every fly they swatted a dozen more would take their place. The flies bit at their eyes, their genitals, their noses, their lips. Every weak point was found, and every soft place despoiled. The rodents were hardly subdued by this slow death as tiny bite by tiny bite they were devoured. They were enraged. They surged forwards as a wave of hairy fury. They rushed at his core.


    The enraged rodents charged at him even as the flies devoured their bodies. They knew their deaths would come, many amongst their number began to succumb under the onslaught. A single bite meant nothing, yet thousands of mouths took piece after piece away from their flesh. The worst were the eyes. The flies bit and clawed and tore into the soft defenseless flesh. Mouse after mouse released horrific wails as their sight was forever taken from them. They flailed around, desperately trying to flee from the now unseen foes. A few of those blinded turned and fled, returning to their master. The rest ran terrified and helpless until the flies brought them down. Slowly, bite by bite. And once they fell the few remaining maggots burrowed into their flesh. Bite by bite they were eaten alive.


    His forces were winning, yet Damien saw none of it. All he had eyes for were the mice still charging on through the storm of flies lead by the largest rat he had ever seen. The flies sensed the danger, and swarmed even more furiously than before. So many mice fell, one after the other. Yet still they charged on. When they were two feet away, thirteen rodents remained. When only one twelve inches remained, five still charged. With six inches left, only the monstrous rat and a lone mouse remained.


    Their eyes had long since been devoured, the mutilated remains in the sockets wept tears of blood. The skin of their bodies were mottled masses of oozing bites and tears. Most of their hair had been torn off and their skin was pitted with large chunks missing. Still they charged onwards like demons, possessed by their insatiable rage.


    Sheila saw the charge, and as the flies furiously swarmed, she raced across the ceiling. Her wounds gushed as she strained to make it in time, raining blue blood over the soaked battlefield below. At the last possible moment she launched herself from her perch, throwing herself between the rat and her master. Before she could gather herself, the rat blindly slammed into her, and they tumbled together across the floor and away from Damien''s heart. But the mouse got through, and as it''s feet touched his heart, it knew it had reached it''s goal.


    Teeth slammed down into Damien''s core, and the surface of the precious gem gave in. With a single bite, a piece of his soul had been torn off. Damien screamed. It was pain beyond comprehension. His mind, his heart and his soul were shrieking silently, yet every creature in the room felt that pain. Every last minion of his had long since swarmed to him, but his pain became theirs. Only the mouse was immune, instead it drew strength from his pain as his raw life force poured into the creature from the jagged gaps and cracks in his heart. Again and again the mouse tore into him, oblivious to the flies swarming around him. Piece by piece, Damien''s soul was torn apart.

 Chapter Nine: Give Me Back My Legions!

    A/N: Thank you all again for your kind words, please leave reviews! I would greatly appreciate it. Good or bad, it helps me learn.


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    Anders watched as his baby rabbits grazed on the grass which covered the final room of his cave. The brown balls of fluff hopped and flopped around. An empty nest rested just a few feet away, their mother was out grazing as well. They were taking their first bites of the rich grass in the open room, their eyes had just opened for the first time that morning. As he watched them frolic, he fondly remembered the moment he had discovered the rabbit warren just a few short months ago.


    He had awoken in a barren room, his body gone. It had been replaced by a beautiful magic sapphire. Memories of a full life and a horrifically violent end sent him into a panic. He had frantically dug out to the surface to escape into the light, but after just a few short movements his digging revealed a den of newborn rabbits. The discovery had shocked him, as soon as he reached them a wave of power washed over his body. He quickly flew through the tunnel to the surface, reaching out into the world through a tunnel not his own. As he continued to explore, he found it was a proper warren, with six different nests of cute fluffy bunnies, each discovery bringing with it a new surge of power. That evening as he watched, the mothers returned to nurse and sleep.


    The adult rodents put forth even more energy than their babies had. He was in bliss. And somehow, he knew what to do. He began a new tunnel from his home to the world above, wider than the tunnels of the rabbit warren. Next he widened his home, and dug deeper into the hillside.


    The rabbits had thoroughly explored this cave behind them, despite it being bereft of life they hopefully searched for blades of grass from time to time. With their visit, they left their droppings. Insulting pellets left behind by his tenets. But what began as a rude poop soon blossomed into something wonderful. Tiny grass seeds had found purchase in his domain, and with the soft light of the sun from the entrance, they thrived in the damp ground. As he watched the new life growing in his cave, another adventurous rabbit wandered into his cave, and devoured the infant stalk.


    In his frustration he had tried to save the blade of grass, pouring energy into it. The infant blade of grass recovered it''s damage and grew. It took time but with his help it lived out it''s full cycle before dispersing new seeds into his realm in a matter of days. He had discovered a wonderful secret.


    He quickly funneled the energy from the rabbits into the grass, spreading it around his cavern. Soon the rabbits all found their new source of food and no longer left his lair. His daily power supply doubled.


    With the explosion of grass had come mice. They dashed through the tall grass which filled the entry room, tunnel and the area outside his lair. He quickly expanded, adding on new rooms. All with their own grass fields. Soon, the young in his lair began to connect with him. It was gradual at first, but as his strength grew they came one after another, and he welcomed them with open arms. He protected them from insects, and predators. Countless insects entered his lair only to be drained before they could get a foothold. He would allow nothing to harm his pets. He had nearly driven out the first rats that came, and had the poor mother not been on the verge of death he would have. Soon they too joined his pastures. He sounded the alert every time a fox stalked by, or grew curious and entered. All of his pets fled into the holes with plenty of time, but they still lived in fear.


    Everything was going wonderfully as he reminisced, but he hungered for more. He was digging deeper and deeper, and then something surprised him. A tiny hole had appeared in one of his warrens, and through it he felt another of his kind. He was so small, still an infant. But Anders would allow no one to threaten his flock. A red, hungering presence loomed through the tunnel, and he felt those starving eyes scanning his territory, and so Anders flexed his formidable power. He thought of all the grass he could grow with this being''s wasted power. His territory was so small, the life force circulating large in quantity, but so pathetically weak. He would be easy prey. His flock had lurked in the shadows long enough, this was finally an opponent they could fight. The prey would become the predator.


    Anders summoned his two oldest and strongest rabbits, half of his rats, and one hundred mice. It was a force that completely eclipsed the feeble strength of the being who had fled from the slightest glimpse of his power. He burrowed into the wall, chasing after that smallest glimpse of his first prey.


    He ordered his creatures to bring back the heart of this lair or destroy it. They were simple, but they understood. And then the crossed the threshold into the darkness that was not his own. And he waited. Anders grew excited as he felt despair wash over the other lair''s energy at the sight of his forces. He swelled and stressed as he felt the rise and fall of the other dungeon''s emotions. But then seven of his mice returned, frantically scrambling through the border. Their eyes were bloody holes in their skulls, and their bodies were covered in countless wounds. He tried to ask them what had happened, to read their minds, but all he saw was pain, terror, and suffering. Nothing else remained.


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    The torturous agony burned like a blazing inferno. Every corner of his soul screamed out for salvation and yet it seemed impossible for him to survive. The mouse''s gnashing teeth crunched off piece after piece in rapid succession. The pain had started as unbearable excruciation, and then it only got worse with each successive chomp. It was unimaginable, incalculable anguish. He was going to die. But then a dark shape slammed itself into the mouse, knocking it from it''s prey.


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    Ajax stood over Damien''s ruptured core, vibrant ruby light bathing him in it''s glow. His front two left legs little more than stumps. The mouse rose, it''s body half eaten, bloody and malformed. It''s body was a seething mass of massive black flies, each biting and clawing away. The beast shrieked out it''s furious determination. It''s face was an eyeless visage of pain, but still it charged forwards. By smell or by sound Damien couldn''t know, but the beast knew where it''s wounded prey lay. The dying rodent mustered it''s final charge, and threw himself into it''s final battle. Without it''s sight, it slammed into Ajax.


    They tumbled around, the mouse was a flurry of gnashing teeth and wild scrambling. Ajax desperately tried to pull away, to separate, but the blind rodent continuously drove him into the ground. The black and yellow spider furiously stabbed down with his fangs, piercing in and out of it''s side, but it''s venom glands were empty. They tussled, bit, grabbed, clawed, all the while Damien choke down his utter agony to focus on the battle. The mouse crushed another of Ajax''s legs, and the spider bit down into it''s face, tearing through it''s left nostril. Two of Ajax''s eyes were torn from his skull, but he returned the favor by burrowing his teeth in the rodent''s soft belly. And then the rodent slammed into Ajax''s final two left legs, snapping them like twigs. With a final surge of strength Ajax lurched and threw himself atop the mouse, and buried his fangs though the empty eye sockets. His terrible foe twitched and spasmed as it''s last breath wheezed out of it''s lungs, finally bringing the battle to a close.


    "It''s over... Its actually over" Damien whimpered, his power hemorrhaging out through the cracks. All the power he had earned in this battle was washing away into nothingness. One side of his heart had countless bites and scratches missing, but as the minutes passed the leak began to close. As the pain slowly subsided, and lessened to a soul crushing ache the cracks sealed, leaving sharp, jagged edges where once smooth rounded edges decorated his flawless core. "I''m alive..." He weakly moaned as his senses returned to him. He was surrounded by what little remained of his minions. A few hundred maggots, seven hundred flies, fifty huge ants, ten beetles, thirty grubs, and one heavily wounded spider. "Is this all that''s left?" Damien cried, his last months work shattered in thirty minutes. But then something clicked. One spider. There was only one spider.


    He stared at the yellow spider in front of him, so many shattered legs failing to support his bruised and bloodied body. The torrential flood of power unwillingly released from Damien''s core had stopped the bleeding, but he was in bad shape. But without pausing to check on Ajax he roared "Sheila!" And a weak response pulsed through his mind, and he saw what had befallen his treasured spider. She lay amongst the dead piled around his heart. The rat had torn her apart. Legs lay mangled, her abdomen torn open in a dozen places, and half of her face was chewed and shredded, dragging on the ground beside her. She had desperately crawled closer to Damien after killing the rat. Her foe lay dead far behind her, his body frozen in his final throws of venom induced agony. She had felt his pain when he was attacked, and had hauled her failing body to him, to protect him. With only one leg remaining she had used her stumps, leaving a trail of blood as her wounds released the last remnants of her vital ichor.


    "No!" He cried, his champion. His pet. His treasured spider lay dying. Weak as he was, he poured mana into her, desperate to save her. But her broken shell could not hold the mana. He tried and tried, but her body was too frail to put it to use. What he gave her only sped up her heart, and she only bled out faster. Still he poured in every last ounce of strength he had. He was utterly spent. But he felt her slipping further and further away. He sobbed, crying in his flickering core. His brilliant ruby core faded to a dour purple. As he choked back the tears of his broken soul, he felt a pain more terrible than anything that worthless rodent had wrought.


    There was a gentle tapping on his weeping heart, and then she moved no more.


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    The beginnings of fear began to course through Anders'' mind as he felt the terror inside his flock. then he felt the dungeon''s great pain. It''s throes of tremendous agony, and he once again grew excited. Eager to feed. Energy surged out from the lair, and he drank it up as fast as it came, but then his rabbit came through. Blood welled from it''s ears, and as he examined it, chunks of it''s brain were missing. Something terrible was happening on the other side of the barrier. Something in there devoured eyeballs and ate his creatures from the inside out. These terrible beasts rested in this tiny lair before him, and he had poked it with a stick.


    And then he felt terrible anguish and loss from the red lair, its color changing to purple. It grew weaker and weaker, almost faint. Anders considered sending what was left of his rodents in to finish the job, but just as he began to summon his remnants, everything changed. The pain and despair was replaced with rage and hatred the likes of which he had never felt. And that fury was all pounding against the thin barrier between their lairs. He didn''t know what had happened, what had gone wrong, but he knew he had woken something terrible. He bid his creatures to flee, and he filled in the tunnel behind them.


    Fear had found it''s home in Anders'' heart. The rodents were prey once again.

 Chapter Ten: Aftermath

    Day 34


    Untold fury swirled within Damien''s heart. His unknown foe had come to destroy him and while Damien had emerged victorious, the cost was beyond the count of grief.


    They were insects. They fought and died every day. Some became food for his other minions, others died in skirmishes with the ants. It was natural, they could only grow stronger through these fierce trials. His minions fought for the sake of the lair. But this was wrong, a twisted perversion of their endless struggles. The troops who had died valiantly defending his home had been obliterated, the sacrifice of their brothers rendered pointless. Because of one single enemy, his minions had been annihilated. They were his minions! His maggots! His flies! His beetles! His ants! His spider!


    She should have just been another bug in his collection but she had been so much more. She had led his troops. She was his most powerful pet. His prided champion. And of his minions she had been the brightest, the most sensitive. She had been there to comfort him. But she had been taken by this unknown enemy. Damien had failed her.


    He was too weak to protect his minions. Too weak to protect himself. He had to change. He had to grow stronger. He had to evolve. He had to destroy this blue villain. But what could he do?


    He had lost all of the power gained from the battle. His army was in shambles, and his only other fighter was crippled. As he surveyed his troops, there were only two things gained in the ordeal. The survivors were stronger, and they had grown considerably. And then there was the battlefield itself. With a mountain of corpses at his disposal, he didn''t need to worry about food for quite some time.


    Every last creature in his army had grown in some way from the ordeal, whether through valor or feeding off the tidal surge of mana from Damien''s wounds. Most experienced small growths in size and strength, as even the lowly maggots participated in bringing down the greatest foes the lair had ever known. Two of his minions had grown exceptionally in the ordeal.


    Despite his injuries, bringing down that rabbit and mouse had caused Ajax to undergo an extensive growth spurt. His leg span had increased to a miraculous six inches. His remaining leg and stumps had swelled, growing far stronger and beginning to heal. He now resembled a tarantula more than the common spider he had once been and the yellow mask on his back had begun to glow ever so slightly. It was a truly formidable appearance.


    Next were the surviving ants. Little more than fifty had survived the battle, but those that did were unimaginably huge. After burrowing into the brains of the mice, these tiny and utterly insignificant creatures had brought down foes five thousand times their mass. All of that power from the dying creatures had coursed through their little bodies, and they had each swelled to an inch in length. Even with only fifty survivors, they would prove a powerful force in the battles to come.


    Ajax and the ants would lead his troops to glory in the future, but he needed time to replenish his forces. Time he didn''t have. The rodents could return at any moment. The blue lair could send a new wave of foes at any time, and he would be powerless against them. He needed new troops. Damien hungrily eyed the red ant colony beside him, and cast his gaze upon the bearded dragon. He knew what he had to do.


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    Three days passed in quiet as Damien gathered his strength, however he had heavily fortified his position. He had dug dozens of very deep pits all along the southern wall, with multiple rows of the traps. He had dug straight down, with sheer cylindrical sides and a rounded bottom. Each was two feet deep and a full foot wide. He wanted to lay spikes in the pits, however he had no wood to use. As his minions desecrated the battlefield, he had discovered an alternate resource: Bones.


    He had gathered the bones of the fallen beasts, broken them and sharpened them into stakes before lining the bottoms of his traps with them. Except for the rabbit bones, they likely wouldn''t be long or large enough to cause serious damage, but they would bleed and impede the enemy advance. He directed his two newest queens to abandon their nests, and to take up residence just below the ranks of traps. The tunnels of the new colonies would connect the bottom of all the traps, allowing the ants to quickly rush from one to the other to annihilate trapped and wounded foes. Later, as soon as Ajax was healthy the traps would be covered in a thick webbing and topped with moss and dirt to conceal them. For now, they remained as basic pitfalls.


    Absolute desperation had given birth to a cunning plan that he should have come up with long ago. Except for the energy spent digging, every last bit of his energy was poured into the red ant colony. He had corrupted a little over twenty of the great red monsters. Though he only commanded their youngest and weakest, he was not planning for a war, and he would not wait until the ants turned on their corrupted brethren. His ants began to smuggle out their eggs and larvae by the dozen.


    They first gathered the oldest and most mature pupae, bringing them back into the rear wall of the second and largest chamber where a new colony was being prepared to receive them. They continued to make trip after trip, and as another two days passed the colony had been completely emptied of eggs. By now he had successfully corrupted thirty ants. Now began the hard part. He needed the queen.


    He quickly sealed off all access to the queen and sent his ants to retrieve her, however the red ants were excellent diggers. Each time he sealed a passageway, the ants would swarm to excavate their trapped queen. Before he could begin to whisk her away, they had restored the passage and seethed around her before returning to her duties. Damien was forced to resort to other methods. He sent half of his spies up to the surface of the colony, and ordered them to release the danger pheromone. As all fifteen ants released it in unison, the colony quickly became a seething frenzy as each ant that received the message released their own pheromones and rushed to the surface to do battle. It was then that Damien struck.


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    As the ants emptied the bowels of their colony, the other fifteen ants rushed into the queen''s den. They approached as friends but as they encircled her, one took hold of each of her legs and they bit down hard. The queen released a barely audible screech as all six of her legs were amputated all at once. She poured out all the pheromones she could muster, but no other ants were around to smell it. The six traitors took hold of her stumps just as before, and began to haul their frantic mother back down the deep dark passageway. The nine ants watching formed a rear guard to hold off any pursuit. The war was over before it had even begun.


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    The addition of the red ants was not Damien''s only success of the past four days since the wholesale slaughter of his armies. The great lizard had finally succumbed to his will, and two new species had entered into his domain. Massive flies even larger than his mutated flies had wandered into his domain. They were monstrous horseflies, each a full inch in length and they all had wicked teeth around their mouths. They must have smelled the bodies of the rodents, as they made a rush for the battlefield as they entered into Damien''s lair. They weren''t the only ones to come sniffing around the carnage though.


    Hornets had swooped in, waging a war with the giant flies over the corpses of the rabbits and mice. Unlike the flies, they were unable to lay eggs, but Damien welcomed the feast of energy as Ajax caught them in his web. His legs were healing slowly, but he was able to set up and tend to his own webs now. The hornets seemed to be nesting a short distance away from his lair, but they were out of his reach for now.


    Of course the greatest prize was the bearded dragon. The mighty lizard was finally allowed to emerge from his pit after eight days. After reaching his level of power, no other creature had been able to hold out this long against his concentrated influence. The beast had grown fat and powerful as he was force fed countless maggots over the past week, and Damien knew exactly how to put him to work. The great beast was sent to the entrance of the tunnel to the red ant colony. As the ant''s came rushing out with their queen hostage, a horde of red ants were sure to follow. Her pheromone trail of distress would lead them to Damien''s lair, and his dragon would be waiting.


    Sure enough, as soon as the frenzy of the false alarm attack subsided the ants quickly discovered the queen''s trail. A renewed frenzy swept over the hive, and they surged forth into the breach. As the passed through the tunnel and emerged out of the other side, they were greeted by a small army. The great lizard stood in the middle, surrounded by the fifty oversized war veterans and their 30 newly welcomed red brothers. Scattered amongst them were the surviving beetles to hold the line, and one hundred young ants. New insects were birthed every day by the thousand, they would be replaced in time. What Damien truly lacked was quality, and this battle would fuel the growth of his most powerful soldiers. He feared for his losses, but he soon realized it was a foolish thought. It was a complete slaughter.


    The bearded dragon''s gullet blackened in anticipation of the battle. It had been far too long since he hunted. As the red ants surged out, he launched himself forwards. The first ant''s head was bitten clean off, the second smashed with a flick of the dragon''s neck. He stormed forwards into the thick of the enemies and stomped, bit and crushed everything in his path. The enemy ants made to flank him, to surge over and tear him apart from all sides, yet he was not alone. Damien''s ants dashed in and out, tearing apart any enemy which tried to harm the mighty beast. The beetles would rush forwards, slamming into the enemy from the sides and as they toppled over, the small ants would swarm over and efficiently put them to rest.


    His veterans were a well oiled fighting machine, and with a titan like the dragon leading their forces there was no opportunity for the enemies to get a foothold. They were mercilessly slaughtered as soon as they emerged from their tunnels. Four hours later, the last wild ant had been slaughtered. As Damien gazed upon the battlefield, he knew what the lizards name would be. He had slaughtered nearly a thousand red ants with his own strength, he was covered in clear ant plasma and horrific bite wounds yet he stood tall. His body had swelled to fourteen inches from nose to tail, and nothing could stand before his might. His name would be Rex Tyrannus, the tyrant king of the battlefield.


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    With the red ants brought into the fold, his queens, beetles and flies laying, his eggs hatching and larvae devouring everything in sight there was nothing more that could be done for his troops. They would continue to replenish, and there was no way for him to speed up the process. All he could do was hope and pray his enemies would wait just a few more days before they attacked again.


    In the meantime, there was one final thing to do to prepare his defenses. He needed to move. He called down Ajax who limped his way down to the gem. He spun countless threads into a sling tied around Damien''s heart, tying them together into one single strand for Rex to pull with, and Damien''s heart was gently dragged across the floor into the hall of the second room. He finally had a beast capable of moving him, and at last he was further from the accursed light of the world above.


    As he watched Ajax limp back to his web, something tiny caught his eye. Nestled up in a small hole in the earthen ceiling above the remains of an old abandoned web was something truly wondrous. A tiny ball of spun silk was nestled into this little crevice, looking down upon the entrance tunnel. As he brought his focus to bear, he sensed the tiniest beginnings of life squirming around inside. Sheila had left a parting gift behind, it was an egg sac.

 Chapter Eleven: Of Mice and Men

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    Day 39


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    Legend:


    Red - Damien''s heart


    Yellow - Ajax''s web


    Orange - Rex''s den


    Blue - Hostage pit (mice)


    notes: removed breeding alcoves from map. Assume every wall is riddled with holes and nests.


    Always taking requests for things to be marked! I can''t promise all requests will make it onto the map, but they will definitely be considered!


    higher res: http://i.imgur.com/8oTOWxj.png</a>

 Chapter Twelve: Maginot Line

    WARNING: The chapters of this story have been rearranged, the comments below may not properly reflect the content of this chapter. The order has been changed due to accurate constructive criticism, and these changes will reduce the jarring back and forth between perspectives. Thank you to all of my readers whose feedback allowed me to make these changes, please enjoy the chapter.


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    Damien felt fear growing within his cerulean nemesis. After the first battle, there had been a short period of fear yet the blue energy soon transitioned to a mix of hatred and greed. Damien could understand that instinct. With each loss his enemy''s desire to possess whatever power had defied him would grow. It had been the same for Damien and Rex, even his ants. Rex stormed in, slaughtering his maggots and leaving, taking Damien''s hard earned mana time and time again. The ants had nearly destroyed him, but in the end he captured their queen instead of destroying her. The more ferocious the enemy, the more desperate he was to subjugate them. But after this second battle, the fear festered. Damien knew that he would win so long as he could continue to endure.


    As he repelled the rodents he saw one single thing in the enemy who sent them, and that was weakness. His enemy had found a much weaker lair, and completely underestimated him. Had he sent even one more mouse, Damien would have died. Even when victory was within his grasp, he still held an army three hundred strong in reserve. But there was far more to it than that. His minions were immense, at least for their species. They fought and died, devouring one another, spending every day in an endless struggle for survival. But these rodents were fat and spoiled. They raced to their death''s at their master''s command, but they were novices on the field of battle.


    They were all the size of their wild counterparts. They spent their days lazily nibbling on grass, and it was clear they had never had a real fight before. This blue lair had it far too easy, it had grown far too complacent. Damien couldn''t allow that. He could not suffer the thought of the villain who killed Sheila being some lucky bastard who hadn''t worked for anything he had. Just because he was stronger and older he thought Damien would roll over and die. But Damien was patient. He would endure these attacks as long as it took. He would build his forces and bleed this enemy dry. And when he had marshaled an army mighty enough to lay waste to his foe, he would destroy him.


    As this plot simmered in his glowing heart, he began to prepare for the next wave. The coming battle would be more one-sided than the last. He was learning the ways of war. This was not some glorious battlefield of honor and justice, his life was on the line, and he would use every dirty trick he could to win. The next three days were filled with constant digging and trap laying, as fast as his mana reserves would allow.


    The first order of the day was to control the battle line. After this second encounter, he had learned much about the point of contact between him and his foe. Through the access tunnel, there was an invisible wall. This wall was the end of his own crimson domain and the beginning of the enemy lair. Beyond this wall, all he could see was a deep black void. By expending his mana he could push this barrier away, driving out the enemy influence, however it worked both ways and the blue force could push back. At first Damien was winning, it wasn''t even a close match, but as he grew closer and closer to the blue''s lair and further from his own it grew harder. More and more energy was required to drive away the enemy. He wouldn''t be forcing blue out of his own lair anytime soon, however there was an important lesson to be learned here. This worked both ways, and the same applied to him. The energy required for this enemy to crush him in a battle of mana would be astronomical.


    Now that he knew he could safely maintain his own territory, he expanded south towards the blue. He dug a tunnel out of the side of the cave entrance leading due south, further than the southernmost boundaries of his rooms. Then from the end of this tunnel he expanded east and west, one end stopped just short of opening a new path into the world above, the other ran the entire length of his existing territory with the other. The result was a barrier in the form of the tunnel completely protecting his exposed side from attack. As his enemy burrowed out to attack, it would reach this section first. Because it was impossible for the enemy to dig outside of it''s own domain, it would be forced to either drive out Damien''s influence at great expense or follow the existing tunnel which would leave them at the proper entrance to Damien''s lair. With this, traps could be focused around a single approach instead of spread out along the entire southern wall. Damien intended to take full advantage of this.


    The tunnel connecting his cave entrance to the southern barrier would become a ruinous hell for the next wave of rodents. Before he had dug cylindrical pits, to catch enemies unawares or simply hope they were knocked in. This time, he dug trenches. Deep trenches three feet deep and one foot across with sheer cliffs dropping down. Again he took the bones from the wreckage of the battlefield, crafting stakes and spears from femurs and ribs. Soon the cavernous trenches were filled with the macabre stakes, ready to receive the doomed charge of the enemy. As the old fortifications were rendered obsolete, he directed one of the two ambushing ant colonies to begin the arduous process of moving into the new fortifications. He dug line after line until he reached his main tunnel. From there he returned to traditional pits, this time with a special twist.


    There were no spikes, however these pits were four feet deep and a full foot wide. Their unique ability was something he had actually used before, Ajax had finally recovered enough to web the pits. Just as the pit he had used to catch Rex, these ones were lined with two dozen layers of thick, sticky webs and then topped with a tightly woven web which was then covered in a mixture of moss and dirt. The meticulously disguised pit wouldn''t cave in to anything smaller than a rat, that is of course unless there was a swarm of mice passing overhead. Damien was well prepared for a long drawn out war, and to that end he desired mice and rats of his own. He had captured a few in this last battle, however they were not as simple to breed as his multitude of insects. The more adults he secured, the faster his new army would grow.


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    His captives seemed far more difficult to penetrate than even the mighty Rex had been. It was one thing to indoctrinate a wild creature, but to dominate a being which was already imbued with the mana of another master was a different matter entirely. He could feel the blue influence slowly fading away, but it would be a long struggle. The overworked Ajax had bound them in oversized cocoons to wait out the ordeal without doing irreparable harm to Damien''s lair. They screeched and squealed, but they were not going anywhere. The ambient energy they released was also a pleasant boost to Damien''s reserves. It was yet another reason why he needed to dominate more of the warm-blooded beasts.


    Before moving on to the inner defenses of his Lair, he expanded north. A tunnel now jutted east, out towards the open sky from the north eastern wall of his first room. After a few feet, he turned north, running parallel to the hillside. Every few feet that he dug out, he shot a small side tunnel east, widening to a small cave before opening a small tunnel into the world above. He continued his northward digging until he had four such tunnels. He had realized that his best hope for gathering new exotic beasts was to give them more places to enter, and the small caves were placed in hope something might take up residence. Small prey animals seeking shelter, or a predator looking for a new den. It cost him nearly nothing to dig and maintain, and yet the benefits were potentially enormous.


    With the front additions completed, he passed over the first room, leaving his insects to their own devices. At the hallway to the second room he lay down another series of defensive lines with the same sheer trenches and stakes. The only difference would be that these trenches would be covered as soon as Ajax recovered from his extensive webbing work. The finishing touch was placing the second ambushing ant colony here, as long as everything went well these ants would not suffer heavy casualties. Their job was to act as skirmishers amongst the deadly stakes, retreating if they came under direct attack. In this way, he could divide the two ant colonies safely.


    The final round of defenses were laid in the tunnel connecting his current throne room and the second hall. Here was where his final defenses rested. It might seem strange, yet being so spread out in the last few battles had taught him the value of choke-points when outmatched in a fight. In this case, laying traps increased the value of these halls an immense amount, as all the enemies had to be funneled into a small area. And this was the most vital hall of all, as after this nothing lay between him and the intruding armies. Here was where he placed his mighty red ants. These ants were naturally gifted with a size and strength only the mightiest heroes of the black ants could boast of. To allow them to make the most of their strength he built large mounds throughout the hallway.


    The mounds were all a foot tall, gradually slopped on each side, and riddled with countless ant passageways. Their purpose was to force the mice into choke-points where the ants could surround and slaughter them before retreating through the passageways to set another ambush. He had run out of bones, but soon the mounds would be covered with stakes to create a more daunting obstacle and further funnel the enemy mice into the kill zones. The final touch on this fortified hallway was that Ajax took up residence on it''s roof, spreading his webs across the passage.


    With his defenses laid, it was now time to decorate. On the fourth day of renovations, he brought several moss patches over into his boss room and scattered them around to foster their growth. Then he hollowed out dozens of the same alcoves he had placed in the first two rooms and spread them out along every wall in the final room and along every hallway as well. His cave walls were riddled with cozy spots for his minions to squabble over, although unless he placed food for the maggots and grubs in them, their only occupants were beetles. Next he examined each and every last creature in his domain, selecting the largest and strongest of each species to propagate.


    Several of his mighty maggots had somehow gained the ability to mate despite never transitioning into mature flies, and these were among his first choices for his new room. By now the greatest among them had grown to a full and bloated two inches, mostly from cannibalizing their lesser cousins. His best flies were keeping pace, with the mature adults nearly the same size. Of his insects however, the carrion beetles showed the greatest growth. Their constant devouring of the maggots allowed them to swell up to three inches. The predators truly showed the most formidable growth, although even his scavengers were becoming aggressive predators at this point, all except the moss eating beetles. They were brought into the next room as well, but only as a source of food for Rex and the other beasts. Then there were the captive mice.


    After being bound in silken string, they were dumped in a freshly dug and very deep pit at the rear of the room. Escape would be impossible, and down here in the throne room they would be corrupted faster than anywhere else. He made sure to leave plenty of room for new arrivals in the pit.


    As the final day of renovations wound down to it''s close, he felt movement atop his heart. His entire world stopped for a moment before the egg sac ripped wide open and two hundred baby spiders swarmed out of the breach.


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    Legend:


    Big Red - Damien''s heart


    Red - Traps


    Yellow - Ajax''s web


    Orange - Rex''s den


    Pink - Ant colonies


    Blue - Hostage pit


    High Res: http://i.imgur.com/fynNY4L.png</a>

 Chapter Thirteen: Blitzkrieg

    WARNING: The chapters of this story have been rearranged, the comments below may not properly reflect the content of this chapter. The order has been changed due to accurate constructive criticism, and these changes will reduce the jarring back and forth between perspectives. Thank you to all of my readers whose feedback allowed me to make these changes, please enjoy the chapter.


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    Day 44


    Damien was covered with baby spiders. They were quite a varied bunch, some bore their father''s striking colors, some their mothers original simple brown and most were somewhere in between. There were a select few however who had inherited Sheila''s adapted colors, deep russet bodies with red-brown striping. The first thing he did as he watched the cute eight legged infants was to give a command to every creature in his domain. These spiders were not to be harmed. If the spiders attacked and it came down to a fight, the other beasts in the cave were to simply lay down and die. At least for now. When they grew he would leave them to their fates, however Sheila''s loss was still heavy on his heart and it would be shameful to lose his spiders before they had a chance to grow.


    He allowed them to disperse across his throne room, casting webs across every corner and over every den or tunnel in the walls. Having spent the last week feeding off his mana atop his core, they came out far larger than would normally be possible and were ready to spin webs within minutes. It didn''t hurt that their mother was a humongous spider when she laid them. It would take some time, but Damien knew they would quickly become a vital part of his Lair. He directed some of his weakest flies to throw themselves onto the tiny little webs. The weak were culled and his new favorite minions got an easy lunch. But now Damien was in a difficult situation.


    Damien was fully prepared for the next battle, there was nothing left for him to do. He wanted to search for another ant colony to pass the time and bolster his growing ant hatcheries, but that could be a terrible mistake. If he mobilized his troops and sent them away just when the blue villains attacked, he would be stretched thin. In addition to this, there was always a risk of running into another lair.


    He knew he would need to expand eventually, but he was hard pressed as he was and had nearly died already. He couldn''t afford to run into another powerful foe until his current enemy had been vanquished. All Damien could do was wait. Wait and dig. He began to expand two of the other side passages out of his second room. If he was attacked, multiple paths would force the enemy to either divide their forces or risk walking into a dead end. He was reaching the max capacity he could sustain with his current livestock, but with his territory doubled it wouldn''t be long before his minions multiplied. And that also didn''t count the bounty from skirmishes or the eventual domination of the mice.


    Damien worked through the night to lay his false paths. He stretched out the western most passage out into the depths of the mountain. It exposed a vulnerability without the southern bastion, but he would expand that soon. Next he extended the north-western tunnel deeper into the mountain for a short ways before shooting up north beside his throne room. As he slowly worked on the second tunnel, the third wave arrived.


    Just as suddenly as ever, the wall burst open and two hundred mice swarmed out. They had breached the barrier passage to the south just as Damien had planned, and as they swarmed into the tunnel they charged out in both directions. Those that rushed to the left quickly found the dead end and they surged back to the east. In less than a minute they reached the tunnel linking the southern bastion to the entryway.


    It was time for his finely crafted defenses to be tested in the crucible of war. As the stampeding mice charged into the first menacing bulwark, Damien believed his plan to be a failure. The first mice leapt clean over the treacherous trench. He had never considered they could leap the distance easily, however the following mice were not so lucky. With their vision obstructed by their brothers in the vanguard, they never saw the danger ahead. They tumbled helplessly over the edge, dropping three feet into the jagged bones of their predecessors. Agonized screeches echoed across the lines as more and more mice tumbled into the pit, but soon the stakes were covered in a seething mass of fur and flesh. The newly fallen mice were spared a terrible death as they landed atop the bodies of their comrades, forcing the unfortunate beasts deeper down onto the macabre spikes. With one trap filled with mice, the second line saw the same effect. The mice in the lead leapt across, and the first ones to crawl out of the pit cleared the gap but once again those running to close fell into the open jaws of death.


    The casualties the mice suffered were staggering as the ants set about their bloody work. They were well trained at burrowing into the intruder''s gray matter as they lay helplessly impaled or pinned by the weight of their allies trampling them. The dungeon was filled with the constant screams of the dying. The mice were being exterminated, however the first active defensive line awaited them at the next hurdle.


    Hundreds of ants stood atop the far side of the third trench. The first mice cleared the gap as easily as they had the first, but they landed in the middle of the waiting ant army. The damage to the ants from the impacts were significant, but their job was not to win a drawn out battle, it was to stop the advance. The mice continued to charge forwards, heedless of the battle ahead, and as they leapt across the gap the had nowhere to land, their allies still stood on the edge. The doomed mice frantically scrambled and clawed as they slid down the edge, even biting onto the backsides of their allies, yet there was no escape. They tumbled down to their torturous ends with a final cry of terror. As the pit filled up, the ants dispersed to regroup atop the fourth trench. A mere two minutes had passed and half of the mice were dead or dying. Still the mice charged, their lord''s command overriding their fear.


    Damien planned to grind them down by half once again before allowing them to pass into his webbed pits. He had called out the two ant colonies guarding the entryway to herd the surviving mice into the carefully laid trap. If he cut down the invading force to fifty mice, he could waste resources in the efforts to capture them alive without any danger to himself. As he watched the continued slaughter, he thought back to the first real battle where he had nearly died. He had grown so much since then. He swelled with pride at his growth and this proof of his power.


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    Then a second hole appeared in his lair, and mice poured out. While he was focused on the initial incursion, his foe had burrowed underneath his outer defenses and into the floor of his second room. The blue bastard had completely bypassed his carefully planned bulwark and four of Damien''s five ant colonies. As he watched, paralyzed in shock another two hundred mice poured out with the support of fifty rats and five rabbits. They poured out into the room and slaughtered the nearby maggots. As they butchered his helpless larvae, Damien prayed they would take the wrong path, and he would be able to gather his forces. Then the mass of rodents did something he had never expected. They scattered.


    Rather than choosing a path as a group, each rodent ran for the nearest enemy or closest path. Half of the mice rushed towards his throne room, the rabbits took the western passage, and the rats the northwest. The other hundred mice chose the eastern tunnel which would take them out to the tunnel entrance. He desperately summoned the ambusher ants in the second bulwark and his gatekeeper colonies. The nearby ants should be able to catch the rampaging rodents charging towards his heart if he was able to slow them down, but the others had little hope of contributing to this first phase of the battle. He could only pray they would arrive before the other rodents realized they had taken the wrong path.


    Damien chose to order his minions to ignore the mice going out to the tunnel exit, they had to cross the second bulwark and even if they succeeded they would only be stuck on the other side. If they returned to the second room they would suffer even more severe casualties. His minions would be far more vital rushing to the defense of his jewel heart. As they charged over, it was even more terrible than the gauntlet the diversionary force had charged through only minutes before. As the mice surged across the tunnel floor, suddenly the ground gave out beneath them. The first two lines of mice were swallowed by the collapsing false floor and plummeted to their grisly deaths on the spikes below.


    The next mice behind the leaders tried to stop, but the frenzied horde behind pressed them forwards. They scrambled and clawed at the dirt beneath their feet, but they were quickly thrust out into the maw of the pit. Soon they began to pass over the treacherous obstacle, yet Damien knew they would not last long. Thirty mice lay dead or dying, and three more trenches lay ahead. As they charged headfirst into the second trench, Damien watched as his minions rushed to deal with the other intruders.


    His mighty air corps had quickly responded to the new incursion, and they swarmed over the rats and rabbits. The veteran pests along with the new horseflies dived at the rampaging rodents. Flesh and fur flew as they were swarmed by the overgrown insects. As the flies harassed them with impunity, the beasts charged onwards, desperate to keep ahead of the swirling storm of buzzing fury. Soon they reached the dead ends of their respective tunnels and turned to face the coming swarm. Trapped with their backs to the wall, only one option remained. They charged straight through the flies, desperately rushing back the way they had come.


    As Damien observed all of these attacks all at once, there was of course a single theater of the battle which occupied the majority of his attention. The assault on the final bastion. His wicked red ants were deployed into multiple battle lines, each one stretched across the narrow tunnel. The first line stood behind the first two mounds, waiting in the valley where the slopes met the beginnings of the mounds behind them. The mice naturally flowed into the valleys between the hills, taking the paths with the least amount of climbing although many still swarmed over the top. As the bulk of the rodent force passed between the hills they were met with an encirclement of giant red ants. The mice heedlessly charged into battle with the waiting army, which was exactly what Damien wanted.


    The mice were much larger even than the great ants, however his ants had a huge advantage in numbers. Drawing in the enemies allowed him to surround them, allowing him to take advantage of his numbers in a non-linear battlefield. They formed a phalanx of gnashing pincers, forcing the mice to bleed every time they lunged forwards to attack. For every ant that perished, a mouse was left with deep lacerations. Despite their perfect formation, the ants were still being pushed back by the sheer weight of the advancing horde. As the mice pushed into their lines, the ants gave way until the individual mice pushing through found themselves surrounded. They had just enough time to panic before they were torn apart from all sides. Still, the ants could only be pushed back so far. Just when the lines seemed ready to break, the ants bolted for the nearby tunnels and within moments not a single living ant remained.


    The mice were shocked by the sudden disappearance, and paused for a moment while they searched for the foe. With no sign of the enemy, they charged forwards once again. As they rounded the second set of hills, a new company of ants were arrayed before them. Just as before, they waited just beyond the opening of the pass between the hills, ready to surround the enemy. Inch by inch Damien would bleed these rodents dry. And then the second piece of this plan silently landed behind the embattled rodents.


    Ajax hungered for battle and glory, but Damien firmly ordered a change in tactics. The great spider crept up behind the oblivious rodents, and one by one he butchered those standing at the rear. By the time the mice noticed, six had already collapsed, frothing at the mouth as Ajax''s wicked venom coursed through their veins. Just as Ajax was about to engage the enraged mice in battle, Damien ordered a retreat. Ajax quickly leapt to the wall and scrambled away to safety, returning to the shadows on the roof, waiting for his next chance to strike.


    He was slowly getting a handle on the battle despite the setback of the surprise attack, and then the rabbits and rats broke through the swirling storm of flies. One rabbit had succumbed to the incessant attacks, and a few of the rats joined it on the painful path to oblivion, but the rest charged back into the main room. They quickly set their sights on the path to the heart of the lair and rushed forth once more.

 Chapter Fourteen: The Best Laid Defenses

    WARNING: The chapters of this story have been rearranged, the comments below may not properly reflect the content of this chapter. The order has been changed due to accurate constructive criticism, and these changes will reduce the jarring back and forth between perspectives. Thank you to all of my readers whose feedback allowed me to make these changes, please enjoy the chapter.


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    Damien had only just begun to whittle down the invading mice, he had cut down a mere dozen between Ajax''s assault and two rounds of devious guerrilla warfare with the ants. But then the other beasts had emerged from their poorly chosen paths practically unharmed. The rabbits bounded across the open room, covering the twenty feet in a matter of seconds as they fled from the persistent flies. They neared the fiercely flowing battle and Damien expected them to wreak havoc on his carefully planned layered defense. Bringing down the four great beasts could cost him dearly, but he would gladly sacrifice his finest ants if it meant victory would be assured.


    But the rabbits didn''t join the battle. They ran to the top of the hill just in front of the battle lines, and proceeded to leapt clear over the battle below. They landed on the empty hill behind the battle, and the next layer of ants waited down the hill ahead of them. But once again, they leapt clear over the prepared insectoid formations and raced down the tunnel. There were no ants left in their way. There was nothing to stop their charge.


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    The rats followed behind the rabbits as they raced through the second room of Damien''s lair. They scurried along as the rabbits bounded ahead, but as the rabbits rounded the turn into the hill covered tunnel a new army of ants blocked their path. The ambusher ants from the second bulwark had arrived too late to stop the rabbits, but they would battle the charging rats. The ambushers were the smallest of Damien''s ants, they had been specially chosen for that trait. Those two queens bore the smallest offspring, and that was not a bad thing in this case.


    They fought with stealth: Waiting for enemies to fall into their trap, menacing their foes from the top of a cliff, or sneaking up behind. They would crawl into every nook and cranny they could find and tear the enemy apart from the inside. Every orifice and every wound was fair game to these ants. However their weakness lay in open combat. It was one thing to sneak up on embattled foes to stealthily climb onto their backs, it was another thing entirely to stare down creatures thousands of times larger and beat them into submission. Three hundred tiny ants stood against a pack of over forty rats covered by the various wounds they had suffered at the mouths of the flies. Most had suffered minor bites, although large patches of fur were missing, but the rest had large chunks bitten out of their bodies where the flies had successfully held on long enough to do real damage.


    The ants stood their ground as the rats closed, and then the enraged rodents were upon them. The great beasts trampled through the ants, charging through as if they weren''t even there. Dozens upon dozens of ants were cruelly crushed under the weight of the rats, but as the rats crashed through the ant army, the survivors latched on. Even as their fellows were pathetically squished into the earthen floor, the other ants leapt and scrambled to get a grip on the stomping feet or dangling hairs. The ant casualties were absolutely horrendous, but the survivors set about their gruesome work.


    Using the methods Damien had refined in his past battles, they aimed for the ears. It was the easiest orifice to crawl into, and the safest to hide in. As soon as the ant crossed the threshold into the ear, that beast''s fate was decided. No amount of shaking or flailing could dislodge the insect, and it was only a mater of time until irreparable damage was wrought.


    If the ants were struggling to reach the head, there were countless other options available. A large fly bite was all an ant needed to start digging down into the flesh, and if there was a large chunk missing then the end would come even sooner. The screams of dying rodents had become almost routine in Damien''s lair by now, but their mortal throws were a testament to their ferocity. A few of the rodents attacked their brothers in blind rage as their ear canal was torn apart by unseen foes. Despite all of this beautiful violence, a handful of the rats successfully slipped through.


    With the closest reinforcements nearly annihilated Damien urged the gate guardians on, however their paths were blocked. A lucky few mice had survived their heroic journey across the second bastion, and they had blindly charged forwards to engage the desperately needed ants. These two ant colonies combined numbered over six hundred, however it was not a matter of who would win the engagement. The mice would halt their advance, and that was just as dangerous for Damien now as their deaths could be. Damien searched elsewhere for his salvation.


    The swarm of flies that had pursued the larger rodents across the lair were about to reach the battle line in the hilled corridor, they would speed the intruding mice and surviving rats to their doom. But they were not fast enough to catch the rabbits. They would never make it in time.


    Damien abandoned the hope of outside help, and in the seconds before the arrival he assessed his elite troops guarding the entrance to the throne room. Rex stood at the front in all his glory, his neck flushed a dark shade of black as he readied himself for battle. Behind him stood the mighty maggots, the largest grubs, and their parents, the carrion beetles. The larvae and the beetles would be tragically useless despite their size if the rabbits launched over top as they had before, but behind them buzzed the flies. The greatest common flies, and the behemoth horseflies were kept in reserve. If the rabbits could be held off long enough, they would bring them down. And so his hopes rested on Rex and the flies. Their foe had arrived.


    The rabbits hopped out of the tunnel just as quickly as they raced through it. It was an impossible speed for his insects to match, but Rex was quick to action. He leapt at the beasts in a heroic, yet graceless maneuver. The great lizard threw himself forwards and bit down on the side of the lead rabbit''s face as it tried to rear away from the menacing reptile. Tiny teeth bit down into the rodent''s soft flesh, but rather than biting through the great dragon simply refused to let go. The rabbit screeched and flailed, but it was anchored by it''s face to the immovable lizard.


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    Rex did not waste his lucky grab, and began to slice and gouge with his claws. As the helpless rodent struggled, it''s face was shredded over and over by the flurry of deep scratches. The rabbit screeched once again, and with pure desperation pulled hard enough to get away, but Rex had not released his grip. The deep cuts from the claws had weakened the flesh of the rabbits face. It''s right cheek and most of the nearby skin tore clean off, dangling from Rex''s maw. It reeled, stunned by the terrible pain that shook it to it''s core, and Rex lunged forwards once again.


    This time he caught hold of the mammal''s side, exposing the rabbit to another inescapable flurry of cuts, this time directed at it''s soft belly. The tortured rabbit was finally able to fight back. It threw itself onto Rex and tore into his back with it''s sturdy front teeth. The two beasts tumbled and rolled on the ground as they tore each-other apart, yet the rabbit''s existing wounds did not leave enough blood for it to win this battle of attrition. The rabbit''s onslaught slowed, and Rex tore into it time and time again, but the other rabbits had long since charged past.


    The great flies tore into the charging trio, desperately biting at their eyes. Another rabbit succumbed to it''s wounds, falling to the ground blind and half-eaten. Still two rabbits charged on.


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    The delay in the entrance room had turned into a complete mess. Just under fifty of the original mice, those who were obviously meant as a distraction, had survived the first bulwark. They rushed out into the room and attacked the already engaged gate guards in the rear. Damien should have seen them coming, but trying to run four different battles all at once was pushing his limits. Individually all of his minions knew what to do, but none of them had the mind for large scale tactics of any kind. No one could help him in this task. They were all simplistic creatures: they fought, they ate, they mated, and they slept. But still they served admirably. Despite the surprise attack, his gate guardians successfully whittled down their attackers while the first ambushers rushed from their hunting grounds to catch those who had escaped their traps.


    Further in, the red ants were dominating their battlefield. The flies swarmed overhead, tearing into any rodent that tried to focus on the dangerous red foes ahead of them. Blind mice stumbled through the battlefield and they bit anything they came into contact with, unable to tell if it was friend or foe. The mice continued to be ground down as the red ants slowly retreated. They ants had only given up half of the tunnel in their strategic retreat, and suffered minor losses compared to the dozens and dozens of mouse corpses. Ajax continued to stalk this battlefield as Damien had realized it was an impossible task for him to catch up to the leporid assault. All he could do was guarantee this skirmish was contained, and that no more surprises would pass through the hallway.


    He dropped down into the fray, first targeting the surviving rats and then slaughtering all the mice in his path. Damien had finally given his permission for Ajax to throw himself properly into battle, and he dove into it with reckless abandon. The last war he had been forced to fight as a coward, hobbling on his mangled legs as he darted in and out, using his allies to shield himself from danger. Then in this war Damien had held him in check up until now, to increase his effect and chances of survival. But now he was free. The massive spider released all his rage, all his pain at the loss of his mate onto the unfortunate foes. These mammals had left him crippled, and taken from him the only being in this world he cared for. When he caught a mouse, he didn''t simply inject a normal dose of his corrosive venom. He released just enough to cause terrible pain, but not enough to kill. At least not quickly. Dozens of mice lay writhing in agony as their flesh and organs slowly dissolved into a murky red soup. This theater of battle was safely contained. All that remained were the rabbits.


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    The flies weren''t enough. They couldn''t stop the rampaging rabbits despite their terrible wounds. Damien would once again be forced to endure the pain of his soul being torn apart. He would die. But then salvation rained down from above. In a tragic reenactment of the first war, all two hundred spiders rained down from the ceiling.


    "NO!" Damien cried out, but it was too late. He had ordered them to hide there. They would be safe there. The beasts couldn''t climb walls or walk on ceilings. But just as their parents before them, in his time of need they threw themselves into the fray. But they were young, far too young. Many legs shattered and some spiders died as they hit the ground below, they lacked the coordination to absorb the impact. Those that survived the landing were not safe either as the rabbits blindly trampled any in their path. His precious baby spiders were pulverized by the weight of the hopping fiends.


    Through dumb luck, or more likely through sheer numbers, a few had hit their mark. They landed atop the loping rabbits and they burrowed down through fur or found the best patch of exposed skin to attack. Then they bit down as hard as they could. They barely punctured through the thick skin but as soon as they broke through they emptied every last drop of venom their tiny bodies held. The berserk rabbits screeched with rage, and forgot their goal of crushing Damien''s heart. Instead they stomped around, crushing as many spiderlings as they could find. The baby spiders fearlessly charged forwards leaping at their foe, and for every two that were crushed one got through and deposited their venom into the stumbling brutes.


    Soon the concentrated onslaught of spiderlings and flies brought down the final beasts. Damien had survived another day, but he was filled with a renewed rage as he surveyed his throne room, now littered with far too many tiny bodies. The day was fast approaching when he would have his revenge. Revenge for his pride, for his minions, for Sheila, and for these treasured gifts that gave their lives to protect him. All of it would be repaid tenfold.

 Chapter Fifteen: Thrill of the Hunt

    WARNING:The chapters of this story have been rearranged, the comments below may not properly reflect the content of this chapter. The order has been changed due to accurate constructive criticism, and these changes will reduce the jarring back and forth between perspectives. Thank you to all of my readers whose feedback allowed me to make these changes, please enjoy the chapter.


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 Chapter Sixteen: Dont Feed the Animals

    WARNING:The chapters of this story have been rearranged, the comments below may not properly reflect the content of this chapter. The order has been changed due to accurate constructive criticism, and these changes will reduce the jarring back and forth between perspectives. Thank you to all of my readers whose feedback allowed me to make these changes, please enjoy the chapter.


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 Chapter Seventeen: A-Hunting We Will Go

    WARNING:The chapters of this story have been rearranged, the comments below may not properly reflect the content of this chapter. The order has been changed due to accurate constructive criticism, and these changes will reduce the jarring back and forth between perspectives. Thank you to all of my readers whose feedback allowed me to make these changes, please enjoy the chapter.


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 Chapter Eighteen: Resolution

    Day 45


    I will call you Shae, hethought.The rest would have to prove themselves before they earned names but just this one, the strongest, the one with her colors, he would allow himself to dote on.


    Day 52


    Attack!he thought to his troops, Rush on and slaughter them all! Kill everything that lives in the sapphire bastard''s lair! Leave only the heart alive and return to me, his end shall be neither fast or merciful, we shall pay him back for all our pain! We shall have our revenge!

 Chapter Nineteen: The Other Guy

Day 52 (from Damien''s rebirth)


    Day 34


    Day 45


    Day 52

 Chapter Twenty: The Ants go Marching

    How could it have known? Anders thought, How could it have known that I was going to send these last few pets of mine to escape?


    Is this war? Anders wondered, Is this what I sent those poor creatures into? Is this what awaited them on the other side of that black abyss? Horror was too weak a word todescribewhat was unfolding in front of him, inside of him. This lair was his own body, and he saw everything, felt everything. The deepest concentrations of the enemy were beyond his sight, but his own pets broke through the fog. He watched, heard, and felt every helpless cry and every agonized death. He tasted the blood in their mouths, and smelled the blood, piss and death around them.


    So this is despair... he thought.


    Kill. Escape. Never Return.


    Run. Please run, Anders begged,theres no point.

 Chapter Twenty-One: Into Darkness

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 Chapter Twenty-Two: The Den of the Beast

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    Fuck.


    Fuck. Now, of all times.He had never had a misfire with this gun, but his luck had run out. He quickly ejected the dud, replaced it, aimed, and pulled the trigger. It clicked uselessly once more. The rats were charging closer as he fussed with his weapon. After a third failed shot, he dropped the rifle and readied his shotgun, but as he did he saw the rest of his men.

 Chapter Twenty-Three: A Man and His Whale

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 Chapter Twenty-Four: Red vs. Blue

Day 52


    It doesn''t matter.''he thought, ''No matter how much stronger they might be, they cannot reach me. They will be trapped just like the others. They will be mine.''


    No!'' he roared, ''After them!''


    Day 53

 Chapter Twenty-Five: Lost Love

    Day 53


    ''Light!?Grass!?'' Damien thought, ''How? How is this possible?'' As he stared at the impossibly warm and vibrant cavern, his mind slowly processed what was before him.The grass wasn''t actually that strange, it was simply able to grow in the environment that it was provided. But the crystals, they were something far beyond his comprehension.


    ''Are we truly the same?'' he wondered, ''Are we all unique? Do we have different abilities and powers? What are the rules?''He racked his mind, searching for answers he didn''t have. It was important. If he was to survive, he had to know what his limits were, and that of his enemies. He just didn''t have enough information. Without meeting more of his own kind, he couldn''t tell the difference between a lack of abilities and a lack of talent or knowledge. ''Where there is one there should be more, right?'' Is this whole world covered in lairs like me?''


    ''Would they be stronger or weaker then us?''. It was another impossible question to answer. ''Would they all be human?'' he wondered as he stared into the new threshold at the opening of a tunnel diving deeper into the enemy lair. ''Was it human once too?'' Damien''s vengeful fury was touched by doubt, but it was nowhere near enough to stop him. Damien remembered that first, fateful day he had explored too far hunting for ants. He remembered the hunger his foe had felt as it saw a weaker lair wander into its path, that the enemy had come for his life, and that it had killed his beloved Sheila. Damien remembered the excitement it had felt as he panicked and mourned, enjoying every minute of his suffering before it was turned to fury. It had been so long ago, but that was only the beginning of this war, and that wound still festered in Damien''s heart.


    ''Why?''


    ''But why? Why am I doing this?This isn''t me.''


    ''I used to be different.'' Damien sighed, ''Before this, I''d never killed anything before except the occasional mouse that got caught in a trap. I got angry occasionally, maybe drank a little more than I should, but it never got violent. Not like this. I was painfully average. I had a blue collar job, and a decent life. I worked hard, hung out at the bar with my friends, and loved my wife. I did the best I-''


    ''What?'' Damien''s introspection suddenly came to a screeching halt.


    My wife? I had a wife!'' He hadn''t had time to think, or he had been focused on other things. Ever since he had awoken he had been fighting, growing, planing or panicking. Damien''s thoughts were sluggish, and his memories distant, but it was all there. ''I forgot. I forgot her...'' She had been there every day for the last thirteen years of his life. She had inspired him and driven him onwards. It was absurd that he had simply forgotten about her.


    ''Is she still out there? Is she still alive? Is this really earth?'' Damien was torn, between his old life and what lay before him. He missed the people, his friends and his family, but not the life itself. It was a dull, purposeless existence. Compared to the power and potential he had now, it was truly pitiful. Here his hard work was rewarded. Every small action he took made him stronger, and everything he built was entirely his own. There were seemingly endlesspossibilitiesas his creatures mutated and evolved, and his menagerie continued to grow. He had only one big regret, and that was losing his wife.


    ''I''m not human anymore.''He had been, but despite having a "body" his heart was a glittering gem. There was nothing he could do. He couldn''t go back, and he couldn''t stop or waste time trying to be something else.


    ''What choice do I have?'' Damien carefully examined his dying foe. The grief, depression, fear, and despair were in an endless, wild cycle. Each emotion flared out or crushed inwards as each swelled up and took control before being exhausted and overtaken by a more powerful emotion. Damien could tell it was trying to be satisfied, content with its end. It tried to accept its death and find peace, but life is not so fickle a thing that it would allow itself to go quietly, especially not if its new instincts were anything like his own.


    ''I can''t end up like that. I won''t.'' Even as he reflected on the changes that allowed this to happen, the wild emotions of his cornered foe rippling across the threshold confirmed the results of his arduous deliberation. ''This is the cost of failure, the cost of losing.''


    ''This is my reality now.'' he sighed, and returned his focus to gathering his mana while he brooded on things lost, and things that would never be.


    ''He was human.'' Damien pondered once more about the morality of what he was doing, but he had made his decision. His rage was no longer something that could be held back by reason and compassion.


    ''Something is wrong. Very, very wrong.'' Damien thought as he felt his enemy shifting. It had been only an hour since Damien''s last assault, he had not yet gathered enough energy for a fight. The foe''s emotions had run wild circles, but he hadn''t moved. It hadn''t taken tried to fight back. But now, as Damien watched, sensing all he could through the threshold, it had started to writhe. The barrier between them convulsed, as if the being on the other side was in unbearable agony. The energy was directed in towards Damien, scratching against the surface. It wasn''t a coordinated attack, but his foe seemed to be reaching for something. Damien froze, trying to understand what was unfolding before him, and he sensed something through the barrier.

 Chapter Twenty-Six: Veni, Vidi, Vici

    Day 53


    ''I won. I survived.'' Damien''s heartflutteredat the realization. The sudden collapse had distracted him from the moment of triumph. His foe was vanquished, his survival guaranteed. At least for the moment. His crafty plan and the strength of his insects had overcome a seeminglyinsurmountablegap between them, and now his domain had more than doubled. He had added nearly a thousand mammals to his lair, gathered new plants, and his core throbbed with power. As he gazed upon the corpse of a valiant foe, satisfaction and confidence swelled within him, and then an idea sprang forth. He knew just how to celebrate.


    Day 54


    ''Keep going.'' Damien urged, his pets were absolutely obedient, but they were growing impatient. The more they resisted his will, the larger a strain it was on him to maintain order. Without his authority, all of these creatures would tear each-other apart. It was the natural order of things, and it served to empower the strong andextinguishthe weak. Ajax continued to chip away at the crystal, yet it was agonizingly slow.


    ''Go and help him. Tear that crystal apart.'' he called to one hundred of his mightiest red ants.


    ''Fuck'' Damien cursed as the gem raced to the ground below, and Ajax sensed his master''s distress. He leapt out into the air after it trailing a strand of silk, desperate to stop its fall. Ajax hurtled through the air after the doomed gem, gaining on it ever so slightly as they came closer and closer to the jagged crystals strewn over the ground below. Ajax stretched out his forelegs, and touched it with his claw before the silken thread snapped taught, bringing him to a jerking halt just a few inches short of the jutting shards of crystal. The glittering sapphire gem slammed into a large crystal fragment at full speed.

 Chapter Twenty-Seven: Unnatural Selection

    Day 54


    thoughtof this plan.


    counting. He could get no higher than four, but he was trying to count the number of enemies that surrounded him, thinking about how many he could crush at once with his gargantuan form. It was absurd, all of it. His insects were thinking. His lizard was counting. He was so absorbed with the discovery, he almost missed it.

 Chapter Twenty-Eight: There can be only one

    Day 54


    ''That''s enough! Don''t even move!'' Damien roared into the minds of his minions.


    ''Stop! No! Stand down!'' Damien furiously threw his entire telepathic weight onto the defiant lizard, and it paused, ever so briefly with each magic-infused command. However each time Rex was forced to halt, it didn''t hold him down as firmly, or as long. Each time Damien''s authority grew weaker. The beaten spider crawled as fast as he could, with his right side dragging on the ground behind his grasping and pulling legs. Rex stomped slowly, but steadily after the pathetically broken spider, furiously shrugging off Damien''s frantic demands.


    ''Wait...'' he pondered, ''Another power?'' He looked at the energy radiating from his bloodthirsty reptile, and it was almost entirely blue. He had devoured far too much raw mana from the sapphire shards scattered around the room, and as Damien checked, Ajax, the spiderlings, the ants, the beetles, and every other creature that had consumed the shards held some of the foreign blue mana within them.


    ''Don''t just stand there! Stop him!''


    ''Fuck.'' Damien cried, ''Not her too!''


    ''Please Shae. Please stop.'' He begged.


    ''St-op?''


    ''What?!'' Damien shouted, disbelief taking hold of him.


    ''Stop it?'' And once more a now quivering, timid mind reached Damien.


    ''Yes, please. Stop it.''


    ''Yes, stop it.'' The mind no longer quivered, instead it was soft, happy, and... loving?


    ''No! What are you doing?'' Damien shouted.


    ''I stop it. I end it.''


    Christ. Damien groaned to himself. He was so shocked that she had answered him, he had forgotten that she was less than two weeks old, and a spider communicating for the first time. He was so used to his thoughts carrying a magical, binding weight that carried out his will, and not his words. He didn''t even have to give "voice" to his thoughts. He could effortlessly direct them, but using words in his mind felt more natural. It was obvious this spider wanted to please him, unlike that ungrateful beast Rex, he just needed the right words. He would deal with the reality that his spider could talk later.


    ''Stop hurting the lizard.''


    ''Lizard?'' she asked, unable to process the thought of a name.


    ''Yes! I stop!'' she cried out her comprehension and stood happily at attention.


    ''Back away.'' Damien ordered, still not trusting the delightful creature who he could not control.


    ''Yes!'' She answered, as she scurried all the way to the doorway of the room. But she stopped and looked up expectantly.


    ''....''


    ''Good girl...'' Damien sighed.


    ''Yes!'' She cried delightfully, and scurried back to her nest near Damien''s core.

 Chapter Twenty-Nine: Fallen Heroes

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 Chapter Thirty: Tainted Rewards

    ''Would a quarter be enough?'' He wondered, panic tugging at his enhanced heart. ''If we share it, the four of us together would be stronger, but will they fight? Can I trust them not to leave with the power they have? Can I risk the lives of everyone in Greendale on their courage and good nature? Are they as enraged as I am? Would rage drive them to do what needs to be done?'' Pike''s dark brooding took him to a place he had never been before, but a shout from Bill turned his musings to planning. He had to decide, and quickly. Before the others used too many shards.


    will work. It hasto."

 Chapter Thirty-One: Might and Magic

    "It worked..." Lana mumbled. The green shards had finally worked. She didn''t know what had changed, but it didn''t matter now. She had saved him. The green light would restore him to full health. She had seen the others. The tears she had suppressed ever since Bill brought her crystallized, emerald hope spewed forth once more. Joy mixed with grief. One would live, but the other was still cold and dead. But then the light began to fade.


    <div>

 Chapter Thirty-Two: Accounting for Growth

Day 54

 Update: The wheels of fate begin to turn once more.

    To all my readers, you have my most sincere apologies. And to those who have continued to comment your support, ask for me to continue, and the poor people who subbed to me on patreon, (no-one had subbed, so i never thought to disable it. I am so sorry.) you have my most sincere gratitude. I have spent much of my life battling illness, both physical and mental, and getting the cocktail of drugs to line up just right is an immense challenge my doctors have done their best to meet. Unfortunately, most anti-psychotics and anxiety medications tend to cloud your mind, and once a shift in my physical health resulted in a medication incompatibility, I was sent on a two year spiral of trying every medication they could throw at me. Those that worked took my mind, which was unnacceptable, and those that didn''t work left me quite insane. I have finally found a balance of all my medications that leaves me sane enough, clear headed, and the side effects are bearable. It feels like for the first time in a long time, I have my soul back.


    Now, enough about that, and back to the part those of you still reading are interested in. I am once again working on Gaia Awakens. As many of you might remember, Pike''s side of things was not the strongest side of my story. The Sheriff is getting a moderate reboot. I''m stretching out the chain of events over weeks rather than a 2 day weekend of berserker rednecks immune to fear debuffs. I am a good few chapters in, and have a better outline made than I ever had with the original draft. To anyone who doesn''t wish to re-read, I am adding, not taking much away. There will be minor changes, and much more character development, but they will end up in mostly the same place.If you find this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the infringement.


    As for Damien, I did a fair bit more research on bugs, and I''m going to be adding a few cousins of existing species early on for the sake of realism, and likely adding a few chapters of tiny scale war and adventure. Again, he will end up in the same place, although the last few chapters will likely be re-done. I had tried to keep writing durring my decent into madness and my clouded mind, and they were not up to a standard I was comfortable with.


    I may end up creating a new "book" on here for the re-write, as the chapters will not match up and I already butchered the chapter order with my first set of revisions and re-orderings. That is to be determined. I do not know how long this will take, but I will not be posting anything on RR until the new draft is complete and I can begin to write truly new content, and continue Damien''s adventure in the earth you know, but changed in ways you will never see.


    Thank you all for your support. You have been the light in my darkness, and believing that you would still be here when I became whole again, and that I could share this story with you once more is the only thing that stopped me from giving up.


    -Skaeger

 Update: Progress, Pictures, and a Side Project

    I hope some of you enjoy this. I figured it was better than total silence as I plow through the new draft.


    I wanted you all to know I am still here, I am about halfway through the new draft, and I caught a tarantula the other day. I had bought a cheap little prop ages ago, and so now I may finally have a stand-in cover for Gaia Awakens. (It''s about damn time!) We are going to do a vote, for those of you still following to determine the cover photo. Finally, I needed a side project.


    I can only bear so much editing without fresh creation, and I''ve had an idea simmering in my head for a few years but it''s been boiling over the last few weeks. It has absolutely nothing in common with Gaia Awakens except that it''s mostly fantasy and the core feature is that I have taken Earth and molded her into what I needed her to be. Beyond that, it''s gamer fantasy with skills and stats and such, and the system I am building for it should be able to work with minor tweaks for my first story on here, Valheim, which broke down when I realized the mechanics were broken beyond repair and I didn''t have it in me to start from scratch. But that project will wait till Gaia is alive and well, this is just a little side fun. I''ll binge for a few weeks and get back to the coal mines. I''ll likely pick it up again later.This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.


    https://www.royalroad.com/fiction/25473/sleeping-through-the-apocalypse</a> for anyone so inclined, but now back to the contest.


    Angry tarantula abducted from my guinea pig pen, delicately prodded into position with a stick, and then released:


    And we have a second entrant into this contest (although she cannot be trusted without her purple battle harness, and doesn''t like the soft bare soil that would match better) is Sugar. She is not very easy to photograph, as she does not like to be on open ground and objects heavily to my phone getting anywhere near her, but if she wins I will get more photos.