Becoming a Monster

Chapter 239: Chapter 239: I’m Not Running Away

”Another Queen?” The snake initially thought as it scrutinized the last creature. The creature lacked the size of the Queens that it was knowledgeable of, not only that, the snake began to doubt itself further as it looked behind the individual figure that lacked the necessary body part that clearly defined its role as a Queen.

It wasn’t just the threatening aura emitting from the creature that brought about its scrutiny, it was the insects’ regal authority that its body actions and posture held that made the snake question its origins. The new presence stood confidently, hovering in the air, if Noah were to see the creature now, he would undoubtedly associate the creature to the current ant beings that Eve had turned into one of her zombified puppets. The creature’s body frame retained the muscular like build, including the fact it had two sets of appendages. But that was where the similarities ended.

The dense exoskeleton that enveloped its body retained the metallic like exoskeleton common to their ant colony, however, the finer parts of its armor was layered with a thin elastic material that was yellow, almost golden in color. Its yellow material contained small fine tune hairs in the areas of its joints.

Its head was that of an ant, and yet its eyes were that of a bee, making its eyes the most noticeable feature about it. And last but not least, were its two most dangerous features, one being its pairs of arms. The upper set was firm, muscular even, its arms longer than normal, almost reaching its knees if it rested its arms to its side. But the second pair of appendages started off as two nubs, attached to them were two elongated black blades moving restlessly.

One glance would make one mistake the dangerous objects as swords, but as one continues to travel down towards the ”blades” tip, the sharp object becomes thinner until it reaches an extremely fine point, showing its true identity as its stinger.

The snake’s gaze lingered on those stingers, with its size, injuries with such small, pointed weapons proved to be a small itch, but the snake was awfully aware of the potent danger within its needles. It didn’t become a partial ruler of the forest before just because of its size. All of the creatures once fought for control of the forest; it had its fair share of exchanges with both the ants and bees under the Queen’s leadership. The searing pain would create phantom pain just thinking about it. And as it could instinctively sense the danger radiating from the creature’s stingers, the snake could already assume that its venom was more potent than even tens of bees stinging it at once.

Despite its vigilance, the snake still believed that if it wasn’t the two Queen’s themselves, then it had nothing to fear. Its body slowly began to coil, the darkness of its figure obscuring its cautious movements within the shadows of the night. It was ready to strike at a moment’s notice if the creatures were determined to not allow it to leave. Yet, there was still an air of unease as it watched the floating figure dangerously staring it down, almost as if it believed it had a chance to defeat it.

”Come.” The hybrid figure stated in a somewhat commanding essence. Communication between the two species was rudimentary, limited to brief exchanges due to the vast differences between them. Yet, the hive-mind traits of the bees and ants allowed them to establish a primitive but functional means of dialogue with the dominant species of the forest. For evolved creatures, this connection ran deeper, almost as if nature itself willed for these beings to bridge the gaps between them, drawing distant species closer together in understanding for a specific purpose.

The snake’s eyes glinted dangerously towards the authoritative tone the creature used to speak to it. Hierarchies were tantamount when it came to the creatures within the forest, especially so when it came to colonized species like the insects in front of it. For the creature to speak to it in such a way only served to say that the creature felt that it was superior.

The snake thought about attacking outright, but it was unsure if the creatures in front of it were the only ones. it couldn’t be sure after suddenly being confronted by the abnormal combination of the two species. The creatures in front of it were already matured, and it has only been half a day since Noah had made changes to the forest. It couldn’t be sure if the two species have been coordinating such a merger all this time, and there were more of these particular creatures waiting in ambush, or if these were the only creatures the two species were able to create together within the small-time frame. Because of this, the snake decided to play it safe, its body slowly creeped backwards as it responded.

”If your Queens want to meet, have them come here.” The snake responded with a heavy pressure of its own, giving no leeway for any compromise. Within its answer, its meaning carried a warning for the creatures not to overstep their place.

Meanwhile, the hybrid leader remained unmoved, its antennas twitched every fraction of a second, silently communicating, to who was obvious. Finally, after what felt like an eternity, the hybrid’s antennae stopped moving, its arms unfolded as they slightly lowered to its side. However, its arms remained tensed, the intensity of its wings began to beat even stronger. Its followers began to grow even more reckless; sound was barely audible over the aggressive clicking of the mandibles that filled the area around them.

”For the Queen...” Just one statement became the start of a battle that the snake wouldn’t forget. The hybrid’s subordinates approached it with a quickness that was comparable to its original self.

But the snake was prepared, striking faster than what the creature could attack too, swallowing its first prey within its massive jaws before clamping down with a power to crush its body thoroughly.

It was a simple strategy that never failed, using its mouth instead of its tail because of its awkward position above the trees. The first creature went down effortlessly...though that was what it seemed beneath the surface. The creature died and yet it was the snake that hisses widely in pain, its head flicking so strong that it smashed against a nearby tree nearly shaking it down to its roots.

The snake’s moment of vulnerability wasn’t wasted by the other group of hybrid counterparts, each creature continued to advance forth unabated by the death of their kin. These creatures weren’t only synchronized in their attack, but their intelligence in their attacks were also a scarily shared feature as the creatures whose mandibles and claws should appear to be their strongest feature, instead resorted to using their stingers, each puncturing into different areas of the snake’s body.

Simultaneously, during the beast coordinated attack, the leader of the group also attacked with them. Its cooperation betrayed any last notion that it too was a queen. Unlike its other counterparts who repeatedly struck an area repeatedly with their stingers to breach through the snake’s fortified scales, the leader secured itself on the snake’s back, piercing both of its stingers through the flesh with one attempt. After securing itself, it only strove to prevent itself from being removed as its stingers remained inside the snake without any attempt to resubmerged them. Each second, the stinger pulsed, releasing a mix of the bee’s and ant’s venom within it continued to flow through.

The venom coursing through it seared at its insides, however, the extent of the damage wasn’t as much as the damage done to its mouth. With the way things were going, the snake knew that as long as it remained in the tree’s it was going to be at a disadvantage. It fought through the pain, moving the rest of its body to uncurl itself from the security of the tree’s branches, allowing it to free fall to the ground at an astounding height.

The fall was too sudden, the creatures atop of it were too focused on their relentless attacks that as soon as the snake began to fall, the only thing they could do was instinctively clutch onto its scales to prevent themselves from falling off, given the fact that their size made seemingly impossible for them to regain stable flight during the fall.

Only the leading hybrid was able to adjust its position mid-fall. As the snake’s massive body collapsed to the forest floor, its crash no less than the combination of the snapping of the hybrids clicking off their mandibles from before, four of the five subordinate hybrids were crushed during the impact, while the last creature was flung away. The instant the snake stabilized itself, smoke began to release around it, a dense fog that absorbed all light quickly enveloped its body, and within seconds, its body blurred, melding with the shadows themselves. Or so it would seem, its abilities were no different than an advanced version of camouflage.

With its new advantage, it thought about taking the chance to strike at the leader, however, the pain coursing through it still made it resign on the impulse. If it failed, the consequences could be dire. Instead, it used this chance to strategically retreat. Now that it learned its prey’s attack methods and was aware of the sudden hostility between it and the two Queen’s, it wouldn’t allow itself to be caught off guard now.

As it slithered away, heading towards the only area that it believed to be the safest, it was surprised to come about the wall of roots that wasn’t there previously. Hesitantly it approached, in the end it was only a wall, it couldn’t prevent it from climbing over it. The snake wanted to rest first, but it believed that Noah would want to know about what happened, not just about its failure, but more importantly, the implications of the merger between the two species. And yet, before it began to climb the tree’s, a figure materialized in front of it. It was then that Pandora began to communicate to it through their special bond, informing Pandora all that she needed to know so she could pass it on to Noah.

Meanwhile, the leader of the remaining hybrid insects looked in the direction of where the snake disappeared to. It wasn’t able to see it, even a hint of the snake’s figure was invisible to its enhanced eyesight, however its size made it unable to hide the sound it made as it traversed over the ground. It wanted to give chase, not because it believed it still had a chance to defeat the snake with just one itself and one subordinate, but because the Queen had ordered for it to do so. But the moment it almost crossed the invisible border that separated the forest, its antennas pricked, halting its advance. No one knows what it was told, however, the hybrid only took one last look in the direction of Noah’s base, its mandibles clicked once in acknowledgment before retreating back to its hive.