"Where are the Black Blade Kindred?" Raven drew both sword and staff. "Commence battle according to the original plan!"
In the direction of the swarm's advance lay several long trenches, six to seven meters wide and three to four meters deep—defenses Raven had persuaded the Claymen to excavate. However, there were no defenders within the trenches; while their width and depth might have been enough to hinder a human army, they did nothing to slow the giant ants.
The Ant Queen stretched her terrifying, massive form, treating the trenches as if they were non-existent. She crossed them without pausing, a human-like sneer playing across her face. A large swarm of guardian ants followed close behind her, leaping over the pits, their chitinous shells glinting with a cold light—clearly far stronger than ordinary giant ants.
A dense, dark mass of Claymen stood in formation, a forest of spears blocking the swarm's path. Standing in the center of the phalanx, Kueye slammed his stone spear into the ground and shouted, "Raven, I'm counting on you!"
Just as the two armies were about to collide, the Queen halted her steps and let out a long, piercing screech. The other ants immediately braked behind her, and the giant ants in the distant river slowed their offensive as well.
"A Clayman who can speak?" The Queen looked at Kueye. "Interesting. Not a priest, yet you possess speech. You must be the one commanding this army. How many more like you are there—Claymen who can think?"
"I have no reason to tell you," Kueye said cautiously. He hadn't expected the Queen to be capable of communication. "Do you wish for a truce? I cannot represent the Claymen in negotiations. If you wish to talk, perhaps the High Priest will step forward. But first, you must withdraw your troops. That is the prerequisite!"
The Queen looked left and right, her expression shifting to one of disappointment. "It seems it's just you, then?"
"Hmph, there are countless Claymen smarter than I!" Kueye didn't know the Queen's intent, but he naturally wouldn't expose the truth. "Many Claymen are working hard to become priests."
"To become priests!" The Queen's laughter was sharp and ear-piercing. "Little one, you haven't grasped the situation at all."
"Enough talk," Kueye said, tilting his head as he tried to sense Raven's location, though he couldn't find him. "Peace, or war!"
The Queen's antennae twitched. Moments later, a giant ant crawled to her side, carrying a white silken cocoon on its back. The Queen extended a razor-sharp, glinting limb and sliced the cocoon open. She lifted a Clayman out from within, holding him high in the air.
"A priest!" Kueye sensed that it was indeed a Clayman priest. "Put him down! What do you intend to do?"
Ignoring Kueye, the Queen swung her limb and carved a cross into the priest's chest and abdomen, as if she intended to flay him alive.
"Stop!" Kueye roared, preparing to lead the Claymen in a charge, but he suddenly froze in his tracks.
A humanoid form slipped out from the shell of the Clayman priest, falling to the ground and gasping for breath. His body was covered in marks of rot, but he was undeniably human.
"Do you see now? What these 'priests' truly are? Oh, you lack sight, but surely you can sense the difference." The Queen laughed loudly. "You aren't even of the same race! These humans calling themselves priests simply sealed themselves in clay shells to resist the erosion of rot. They only created you to test their techniques—and to gain a group of useful servants and guards."
"Lies!" Kueye raised his arm as if to hurl his stone spear, but he ultimately held back. "You merely captured a human and dressed him as a priest. I will expose your trickery right now!"
"You know the truth in your heart." The Queen leaned down. "Little Clayman, I hold a deep, bitter grudge against those priests of the ancient dynasty—look at what they turned me into—but I have none against you Claymen. I can liberate you from their hands. I can give you freedom."
"Those priests are too lazy; they couldn't even be bothered to manufacture you themselves, so they taught you the methods directly. Now, you have mastered the entire process of creating offspring. You don't need a priest to preside over it anymore, do you? You could become an entirely independent race!"
Kueye remained silent.
"I can also tell you that I have no interest in occupying your territory. Attacking you is merely to clear a path to the surface and to settle some old scores." The Queen's voice grew soft. "The Goddess of Rot is about to break free. Countless Kindred of Rot will surge out from the Grand Cloister. And the Goddess of Rot isn't even the most terrifying existence. She, too, is afraid."
"Afraid?"
"Yes. She is desperate to escape because she is fleeing from something. Regardless, the underground is no longer a place to linger. You can come with me; we will seize a region on the surface to live in." The Queen reached out a hand. "I offer this suggestion sincerely. Of course, if you wish to stay underground, that is up to you. Now, your answer?"
On the high tower of the sluice gate, fragments of the conversation drifted in the wind. The priests gathered at the summit, restless and anxious.
"Dammit, where did that Queen come from? How does she know so much?" one priest snarled.
"She's a Numen. I remember the ancient dynasty had biological fusion experiments," another priest said. "It seems she escaped from the Grand Cloister beneath the Lake of Rot and has come for revenge."
"Why doesn't she take her revenge on the Lake of Rot! We broke away from the Grand Cloister long ago. We're just occupying a remote ruin to eke out a living. What point is there in seeking revenge against us?"
"High Priest Gibson! Your precious disciple is about to defect to the other side! Aren't you going to do something?" a priest shouted at the High Priest, who was feigning sleep in his chair. "This is all your responsibility!"
"I recall that because none of you dared to go out and command, I was the one who recommended my disciple," Gibson said slowly. "You were so desperate to save your own lives back then, and now you come to blame me?"
"Stop arguing over useless things. I'm going down now to take command of the Claymen." A priest who had been sitting in the corner, silent throughout the debate, stood up. "The rest of you, join forces to unleash a Great Oracular Bubble. Wipe out all the Claymen in that area."
The atmosphere lightened instantly; the priests voiced their agreement one by one.
"Stop, you pack of fools!" High Priest Gibson snapped, standing up from his chair. The sudden movement sent the other priests scurrying back several steps.
Leaning on the back of his chair, the High Priest gasped for breath in exhaustion before slowly walking to the edge of the tower. His voice was heavy with disappointment. "Do you truly have so little faith in your own creations?"
Kueye kept his head bowed. The other Claymen couldn't understand the Queen's words; their simple minds weren't enough to grasp the situation, so they waited in confusion for Kueye's order.
"What is your name?" The Queen didn't rush him, speaking as if they were friends chatting.
"Kueye."
"Very good, Kueye." The Queen was confident this Clayman was already within her grasp. "You can become the King of the Claymen, leading them down the correct path. Now, all you need to do is step aside."
"How do you intend to treat the priests?"
"Simple. I'll let them taste the same pain I suffered back then." The Queen curled her lip. "Perfectly fair, wouldn't you say?"
"I will not step aside."
"I am giving you a chance to reconsider."
"Regardless of the purpose for which the priests created us, we can think and live as we do today because of them. I will not hand them over to you." Kueye brandished his stone spear. "You shall not take a single step forward! If you wish to reach the surface, find another way."
"Then I shall crush you along with your priests!" The Queen laughed maniacally. The antennae on her forehead twitched, broadcasting invisible pheromones. The stagnant tide of ants surged forward once more.
"Raven!" Kueye roared.
Hearing the roar from afar, Raven reached out and made a pressing motion in the air, letting out a bone-chilling cry. Hidden beneath the incantation of a fire prayer was the terrifying power of the Gloam-Eyed Queen's god-hunting flames.
The earth shook violently. One of the trenches the ants were crossing was torn apart by fire, and pale tongues of flame stabbed into the sky like swords.
He shouted three times, and the earth shook thrice. Three walls of flame separated the swarm, and the scorched limbs of ants spun through the air, caught in the updrafts.
All three trenches had been filled with oil squeezed from the Viscous Glow-Mushrooms. It was the plan he and Kueye had devised days ago, and now it had achieved a spectacular success.
"Lansseax, it's time! Try to capture that Ant Queen alive." Raven dual-wielded sword and staff, a Greatblade Phalanx expanding behind his back.
As long as they captured the Queen, this war could be declared over—so Raven thought. But as his gaze swept the battlefield, he sensed something was wrong.
The Ancient Dragon Knight and the beastmen were nowhere to be seen. The Leyndell Knights were in formation on the high ground, but they were still waiting for the Monitor's order to charge. Only Malenia and the Cleanrot Knights were advancing at high speed, attempting to flank the swarm.
The Monitor was clearly preserving his strength. That wasn't particularly strange, considering this was a war between the Claymen and the ants. But that wasn't the point—
The river! When the Monitor had initially arranged the camp's position, the expeditionary force had been stationed far from the riverbed, and they remained there now.
"No way." Noticing this, Raven caught a glimpse of the Monitor's plan. His face paled.
"What is my sister doing?" Lansseax looked toward the upper reaches of the Ainsel, asking in surprise.
Raven looked as well. A mass of crimson lightning was moving across the water at high speed, the wind pressure it created splitting the surface like a blade, heading straight for the sluice gate.
"I remember in the dragon tongue, the name Fortissax means 'The Mightiest Rock'?" Raven asked.
"Yes. Among the Ancient Dragons, my sister's body is the hardest." As Lansseax spoke, her eyes widened. "She wouldn't..."
Bolts of electricity erupted around Fortissax. In the blink of an eye, she had transformed into a burning star. The river water was electrolyzed by the Dragonbolt, and the resulting hydrogen was ignited by the intense heat. A cloud of fire hundreds of meters long swirled into the sky, as if the entire Ainsel River were ablaze.
Folding her four wings and curling her tail, Fortissax slammed her shoulder into the sluice gate.
Everything happened in silence. The Ainsel River Sluice Gate remained standing like a mountain, as if it hadn't wavered in the slightest.
Lansseax gasped. "Fortissax..."
Then, with a sound like a thunderous crash, the high wall of the sluice gate pulled back like a curtain. The Ainsel River roared in triumph, tearing through the prison that had bound her for countless ages. The surging torrent, carrying the debris of the collapsed masonry, slammed heavily into the riverbed.
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Elden Ring: The Unborn One's Journey Through Elden Ring(250 Chapter - Ongoing)
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