Chapter 1429 – Breath of the Beast

Sometimes it’s nice to have so many brains. Also, it’s occasionally useful when those brains are capable of thinking in many directions at once. As the scary wave comes racing towards me, my newly empowered ability to think divergently kicks into gear. In no time at all, I spin together a force shield and start to sink down into the rock, even as it raises up before my head to protect me.

Can I make myself blast-proof in a few seconds? Of course not, but I can absolutely make things a little bit more stable!

Only the lower few feet of my carapace are embedded into the stone when the blast hits. As much as I want to see it happen, my eyes are my weakest point, so I absolutely ensure they’re buried in rock when it arrives.

With an audible THWUMP that hits deep and rattles all the way through my carapace, the wave washes over me and blasts back my antennae.

Wait… what the heck?

[Crinis, did you feel any of that?]

[I did, Master.]

[What do you think it was?]

[It felt like… air?]

[That’s what I think as well.]

Feeling confused, I drop my shield and pull myself out of the rock, taking a good look around as I do so. Nothing has been destroyed as far as I can tell, but a lot of things have certainly been disturbed. It really does look like a singular, powerful blast of wind just came through. It was so dense and concentrated it looked like a literal shockwave.

Who or what is out there generating enormous blasts of air that go through hundreds of kilometres of enormous tunnels?! That makes no sense!

[Crinis,] I say, not for the first time, [I hate this place.]

[I can understand why, Master.]

The rules down here just don’t seem to make any sense. What’s going on?! What’s the system? Vents are spitting out mana, from where? Why? How? Now this stupid air-blast rolling through the tunnel is making me ask those questions all over again!

Is it only going to happen once? Does it happen regularly?

If only we’d managed to capture a Krath and get them to talk. Well, we don’t actually need them to talk, we can read information straight out of their minds if we get enough time….

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Which is probably why they refuse to be captured.

I’ve little else to do but sit on the spot and wait for news, since I’m responsible for guarding this tunnel and can’t exactly leave until a literal army comes to replace me. I don’t have to wait long for news; only five minutes pass before a scout rushes up to me from deeper in the safe-zone.

“Hello, Eldest. Command wants to know if that wave came through this tunnel as well?”

“Sure did. Wait, so it hit everywhere?”