Blood-Boiling Mud Locusts

"Woooo—!!!"

A shrill horn tore through the night. But the sound came not from the outer defenses, but from within the allied forces, toward the rear camp.

Something was wrong. Shien frowned and immediately broke off his sparring match with Ivan.

Through Battlefield Perception, he heard a dense, teeth-grating rustle beneath his feet, as though the entire ground were boiling.

The next instant, screams erupted.

With a bang, the shallow earth around the camp split open. Countless dark shapes burst out: mud locusts the size of hunting dogs, brandishing dark-red bone scythes as they swarmed toward the camp.

Shien leaped onto a wagon to survey the situation. Alarm flashed in his eyes. "Blood-Boiling Mud Locusts..."

After learning he was bound for the Eternal Night Wall, he had crammed every relevant book he could find. He had no intention of dying without knowing what killed him.

One of them, the Red Moon Bestiary of Devil Beasts, described this very creature.

Originally, they were thumb-sized rot grubs, so fragile a farmer could crush one underfoot. But beneath the Blood Moon, their blood began to boil.

Within minutes, they devoured one another, shed their shells again and again, and swelled to the size of hunting dogs. Their soft forelimbs warped into dark-red bone scythes, while their mouthparts became flesh-grinding gears capable of shredding Refined Steel.

What chilled Shien most was where they had appeared.

Blood-Boiling Mud Locusts lived in swarms only where the Blood Moon's influence was strong. They had always been found beyond the Eternal Night Wall.

This was wilderness, but it still lay inside the Great Wall's defenses. Even the lingering light of the Most Holy Origin Furnace could be felt here. A scourge from beyond the Wall could not have hatched here out of nowhere.

"An outbreak on this scale... couldn't have happened naturally." Shien's gaze swept over the churning holes in the earth. "Unless a source of corruption comparable to the Blood Moon's light is nearby."

All those thoughts flashed through his mind in an instant.

The tide of mud locusts surged in every direction, yet none broke through the ground at the center of Shien's camp.

On the journey north, Shien had forbidden the group from camping on soft soil. He had required both the camp and the artisans' wagons to stand on compacted gravel or bedrock.

The outer wagons were also hitched end to end, with moisture-resistant hardwood planks laid beneath their wheels. Together, they offered some defense.

Shien had originally meant the arrangement as practice before they reached the Eternal Night Wall.

Instead, it proved crucial. The mud locusts could emerge only from the soft ground outside the camp, losing their chance to strike from beneath its heart.

Even so, the soldiers and knights on the perimeter shuddered at the sight of the hideous aberrant swarm.

Each bloated, dog-sized locust shrieked, dark-red fluid dripping from its scythe-like forelimbs. The sight was as sickening as it was terrifying.

Someone started to take a step back, then froze when he looked up.

Hans's head swayed on its wooden post in the wind, its empty eye sockets fixed on them.

Above it stood Shien in the firelight, silver hair streaming, his expression carved from ice.

Ivan moved at once to shield Shien. But Shien pushed him aside and drew his sword. He had no intention of hiding behind Ivan.

Silver flashed from the scabbard, and his voice rang out. "Spearmen, use the wagons as shields! Do not retreat! Stab the gaps in their lower armor! Knights, cut down anything that gets through! Church Knights, seal every breach with Lamp Oil!"

His cold voice cut through the shrieks, forcing the chaos back into order.

On the other side, mud locusts poured from the cracks in sheets. There were nearly a thousand by Shien's first estimate.

Their bone scythes slashed wildly, their mouthparts clacking like metal. Each leap carried them several yards with a piercing whistle.

Dark shapes blanketed the camp's outer ring, striking fear into every heart.

Days of drilling together, coupled with Shien's sharp command, paid off at the crucial moment.

The spearmen steadied their formation first.

Sheltered in the gaps between wagons and shield boards, they thrust their spears out and skewered the leaping locusts in midair, one after another.

Their arms trembled. This was their first encounter with aberrants. Yet not one of them gave an inch.

"Stab their bellies! Aim for the gaps in their lower armor!"

"Hold the line! Don't leave an opening!"

Spearpoints darted out like rain. A dozen locusts were pinned to the wagon sides, their fluids splattering against the wood with wet, sticky smacks.

The knights assigned to finish off stragglers followed close behind, bringing their swords down hard on anything that broke through the spears.

Dark-red insect fluid burst across the ground. Mixed with the acrid stench, it turned everyone's stomach.

Ten days earlier, these monsters would have scattered the group in an instant.

Their movements were still unpracticed and their formation far from tight, but they had held against the swarm's first charge.

That was what Shien's ten days of battle formation training had accomplished.

Meanwhile, the Church Knights rode toward the perimeter. Fabien shouted, "Holy Flame Knights! With me! Seal the breaches and leave the swarm nowhere to escape!"

They rode in a wide circle, pouring their supply of Lamp Oil into every newly opened hole.

"Light it!"

Torches fell. Lines of fire slithered across the ground, tracing a blazing net around the breaches.

Mud locusts trying to burrow up were burned on the spot, their shrieks piercing the air.

The inner ring of spearmen and knights held back the swarm's frontal assault, while the knights outside sealed the remaining breaches with fire.

Trapped in that killing ground, the insects were swiftly speared, crushed, and burned.

Within half an hour, nearly a thousand Blood-Boiling Mud Locusts from the first wave had been slaughtered. The burning Lamp Oil kept any more from entering the camp; they turned elsewhere instead.

The ground had become a blackened, foul-smelling mire. Severed limbs lay scattered in the firelight, still sizzling. The camp itself was a wreck.

Even so, only a few of Shien's people had suffered superficial wounds. Not one had died.

For novices facing their first surprise attack by aberrants, the result was almost a miracle.

The soldiers gasped for breath and gripped their spears in excitement. Some even laughed because they were alive.

An irrepressible fervor was rising on every face.

Perhaps... under Shien's command, they really could survive at the Eternal Night Wall.

Shien, however, felt no such relief.

He stood on high ground, sword still slick with insect fluid, and looked past the firelit edge of camp toward the distant lines.

His expression darkened.

Apart from his own, the camps of the other four newly appointed lords had dissolved into chaos.

Soldiers and knights fled in every direction as mud locusts poured in like a black tide.

The contrast with Shien's camp, where everyone held formation, could not have been starker.

Even the Holy City Army's main camp under Bishop Castian had fallen into some disarray.

Most shocking of all, the swarms attacking the Holy City Army and Roland's camp numbered in the tens of thousands—more than ten times what Shien had faced.

Shien spun around and raised his voice. "Church Knights, and knights of the Third Tier or higher, follow me to support Bishop Castian! Everyone else, hold this position! Keep the Lamp Oil burning!"