After hearing Ash's request, we stopped to get some food and left the main village right away. It was a long trip to the Sister Village, and we had no intention of delaying it for longer than it had to be delayed. We reached the Brother Village in the middle of the night, but thankfully, there were a few Rodenti burning the midnight oil. Apparently, that was something that was happening ever since the preparations for the attack started. They had people always ready to send messages one way or the other in case their plans had to speed up. It would have been very nice to know about this kind of thing earlier, but then again, it wasn't as if we were going to be delayed in getting to our destination at any point.
We arrived at the Sister Village in the middle of the night and quickly headed off to bed. After all, we were all exhausted. The Rodenti who lived there made sure to give a message to Rixnala and her group so they wouldn't leave without us. I also made a point of reminding them to tell them this was Ash's command. That way we wouldn't have to worry about Rex's sister forgetting to call us when she was about to leave.
After sleeping, everybody got up, and we moved towards Rixnala's camp, a cluster of houses that was placed on the outskirts of the village. There were about 20 Rodenti there, all at least tier two, participating in this hunt to increase their level. Instead of a hi or anything of the sort, the first thing she said to us was a scoff, followed by, "I can't believe Father agreed to let you join the attack. These Eaters should be easy to kill if you're participating."
She smirked, and Rex didn't even bother with a response, and neither did any of us. Instead, I turned to another of the Rodenti, one that looked more like a seasoned hunter and whom I had seen talking with Rixnala on even ground. I believed he was likely the leader of at least part of the group.
"Do you mind telling me what exactly are we doing here? Ash just said that we are hunting Eaters but didn't specify what's going on."
The Rodenti gave a nod and explained while Rixnala just stared at me with contempt.
"Going towards north. Kill Eaters before arrival. Lessen their numbers."
I gave a nod, understanding the situation. "And do they always come from the same place?"
"No. Some from west, from north. Others from other side. But lately, most come from south."
"And do we have anyone looking on the other side to make sure that the nest is not just growing wildly?"
"There are. Strong warriors looking out that way."
Looking back at my companions, they all nodded, feeling ready to start hunting some Eaters. Even if that wasn't something I truly felt confident in doing, although that was more due to fear than anything else. I mean, I had killed Eaters before, including some versions that were absolutely horrid. So that was really not a reason to be afraid of them.
Or at least, not a reason to not believe I could take them. It was a more general fear of the idea of fighting an Eater. They still were nightmare creatures, monsters that I spent most of my life fearing. Deciding to fight them wasn't as easy as just walking up and attacking.
But the reality was that if we were fighting against one tier one Eater, and maybe even a tier two as long as it wasn't saturated, I was very confident in our chances of winning. Only if it were something stronger or more specialized in fighting against other System users we might be in trouble.
"Since you come, show what can do. You take first group," Rixnala snarled.
I turned to the smaller Rodenti, who was still calling the shots, despite clearly not being the most experienced of the group, and glanced back at the hunter I was speaking to. He just shrugged and gave a nod. It seemed that since she was the daughter of the chieftain, her words still carried some weight and allowed her to be the leader of this group. It felt strange to leave it to someone with less experience and, honestly, somewhat immature, but then again, even in the old world, at least according to Pops, I remembered how he would complain about one specific colleague that was awful at their job. But since his dad owned the company they worked for, there wasn't anything he could do about that.
Thinking about my grandfather made me somewhat sad, since it had been a long time since I last seen him. And I couldn't really have any confirmation if he was currently alive or not. I hoped he was, and in all fairness, I imagined he was. After all, he was the second person to get the System, and he got the full setup that I also did. {Body Regeneration}, Quick Tier 1 Evolution and a primer of everything that I learned about the System. Maybe by now, he even reached tier two himself, although I wasn't entirely sure about that. Especially considering that if it weren't for Riley's master offering herself to us, we might not be able to reach tier two ourselves.
Pushing those thoughts away for a moment, I agreed with her suggestion. We would be the first ones to take on anything today. Together with another dozen Rodenti, we left the Sister Village and started heading south. This group was very unlike what I expected from a battalion of hunters. It had a wide variety. We could see people who used bows and arrows, others with spears or hunting knives, even a couple of mages in the mix, with Rixnala herself carrying a spear by her side.
At the look of the weapon, Rex couldn't help but roll his eyes. I faced my Rodenti companion with a questioning look, and he just shrugged and said, "Same weapon as Father. Just much worse."
And I couldn't help but nod, understanding that Rixnala truly idolized the Chieftain, which maybe was fair and had a reason for that, but it did feel a bit unnecessary, as if she could benefit more from finding her own path instead of just following in his footsteps.
We walked for about an hour and a half, moving at a considerable pace, ending up going about 5 kilometers [3.1 miles] away from the village, and reached a valley that the Eaters were using to reach the nest. And just as we arrived, there were three of those monsters walking by. From this distance, I could loosely understand that the three were tier one, being the same type of scavenger Eater that I had faced before, just stronger versions of them. The spider-like legs shifting across the desert in a constant motion, too perfect to be considered natural, too synchronized to be from anything that wasn't a machine. Yet the tentacles above it moved and roiled around like giant maggots, faster than rotting pieces of flesh.
Even their distance seemed extremely perfect. Each of them was walking in a line with the exact same distance from each other. After a couple of seconds, we could even tell that the legs were hitting the exact same spot. When the first one took a step, the second would take the exact same step at the exact same moment the first one did, and so would the third. I truly did not believe I was looking at a living creature, even though Eaters were in fact alive.
They ate, they bled, they acted like animals in a strange way. And more importantly, people had already theorized if those were actually machines, but we were able to confirm that wasn't the case. The Eaters were not robots made by someone, just nightmares that came from the depths of the Earth or outer space. No one knew which one. Maybe they had been here the whole time, just waiting for their moment to emerge again and reclaim the planet.
"You go with group. Your group kills those. Show if you strong," Rex's sister said with a smirk.
She wasn't even pretending to believe in us and was basically already accepting that we were going to lose or be killed by this creature. Never mind the fact that we were able to win against her group. But I guess even with different species, some people just never learned their lesson.
Glancing at my companions, we all nodded and stepped forward. The Eaters didn't seem to be able to notice us, or they were not looking for any living organisms, instead fulfilling a mission of going to the nest. They had no will, as far as anyone could tell. So maybe this distance was enough to hide us away from them, and their other senses were unable to notice us when we were downwind.
Before anyone started to seriously charge the monsters, Riley pulled me and Michael to the side.
"I have a plan," they said.
I raised an eyebrow, and Michael notched an arrow just before Riley started to create some silk from their hands. The silver string seemingly coming out of their sleeves wrapped around the edge, the tip of the arrow, which was a piece of rebar that Michael sharpened to the point of becoming an actual danger. Once Riley almost finished with the tip of the arrow, they started to put strands of silk following the spiral of the rebar, making sure that the entire thing would have the same girth. Once that was over, they stepped back and turned towards me.
"Just ignite it."
I froze for a second. "You're asking me to use fire when there are Eaters around?"
"Right now we're going to kill them anyway, so if they come towards us, it's easier. Besides, it's going to be worth it. I promise."
I shook my head, but Michael said, "Come on. Trust us. We haven't tried this with an Eater, but we've tried this before."
"If you say so," I shrugged and triggered {Firestarter}, igniting the strands of silk.
Funnily enough, the fire didn't spread to the entire thing instantly. Instead, only the ball near the tip of the arrow was ignited while the rest still remained perfectly still, unbothered by the flames. But just as I triggered the skill, the three Eaters snapped their tentacles in our direction. They stopped moving and dashed towards us at a speed much greater than they were using so far. Even if they were not able to see us before, it seemed like a source of Energy like fire was too much for them to pass up.
The monsters quickly approached, crossing 100 meters [328.1 ft] in a matter of seconds. But before they could get any closer, Michael let his arrow fly. Being true to his class, the Silkbound Archer, together with the silk that the Novice Silken Witch had created, had created a very special form of attack. The moment the arrow connected with the Eater that was directly in the middle of the group, all those silk strands snapped out, forming almost a web in the air before snapping into the creature, causing it to force its legs to crash into each other, almost as if it was being hogtied by something much more powerful than it was.
The tentacles suffered the same fate, and the strength of the silk was so beyond anything the monster could do that even from this distance, we were able to see those threads digging into the creature's skin. Some of the charred black pieces of shell cracked and broke, the sound echoing in the distance. Only then, when the entire contraption managed to trap the Eater, did the fire that was located on a very small group of the silk quickly spread everywhere, covering the entire trap.
I had to admit, it was a pretty impressive display. And even if it wasn't enough to kill the Eater, it was obviously more than powerful enough to hold it in place.
The other two Eaters continued moving in our direction, and they were now just a bit over 100 meters [328.1 ft] away. With a quick glance at Astrid, the two of us rushed the monsters. The Huskcarver reached her target before I did. With a swing of her axe, I recognized the activation of {Frost Chop}, which cut three of the creature's legs cleanly in a single move. But of course, the Huskcarver wasn't done. As it fell to the ground, she brought her axe down directly from the middle of its body and bisected the creature, splitting it into two pieces, killing it almost instantly.
For my part, I did something different. Remembering back to the first time I killed an Eater, I decided to try to see if I could replicate that by myself without using the monster's leg against itself. Using {Compression}, I jumped into the air, making a jumping pole out of my staff. To follow it up, I triggered {Compression} again to reduce the size of my weapon and aimed one of the metal edges directly into the third Eater's mouth. The creature almost started eating my weapon. Luckily, the metal that Michael reinforced was more than enough to make it hold for a few seconds.
Activating {Elemental Imbuement} with fire just to make sure any sort of soft material of the Eater would be weakened by the flames, I activated {Compression} one more time. But instead of making just my staff grow, I told the skill to make the base of my weapon as wide as possible, and I focused on the tip of my weapon to be sure that this attempt wouldn't have ended up destroying it. After all, I didn't want to go after a new weapon right now. Unless I was given something much more powerful, it wasn't worth it to lose the best weapon I had just before we attacked the Eater nest.
To my surprise, not only was my staff able to withstand the grinding mouth of this scavenger Eater, but I could see the cracks begin to form around its body as the size of my weapon grew larger and larger. There was a brief moment of struggle between the two forces: the metal of my weapon and the metal body of the Eater. Until, with a crack and a crunch, a piece of the Eater snapped, and the creature unraveled itself, opening up like it was a ball of yarn that had just been ripped open.
The last Eater, the one that was captured by Michael and Riley, was still alive. But Rex, all the way in the back, had his hands on the ground. With a smirk, he opened a hole underneath the Eater, making the ground shift to the side. Then, the walls of that opening slowly started to close. We all heard the crackle and crunch as the pieces of the monster's body shattered with the pressure. About a minute later, the particles of that last Eater flowed towards me. The other two had already done the same, and with the third, we confirmed all of our kills.
But we were not done. Before getting here, we all gathered a few waterskins and rushed to fill them up with the Eater's blood. After all, that was the equivalent of an Energy potion and maybe a damn good cooking ingredient.