Clever Git grinned happily. He had been the first to follow Boss Slick. Back aboard the Humies' warship, when Cleverhead Boss had praised Boss Slick, Clever Git had already felt that this boy was something special.
Sure enough, that boy had become such a mighty boss. Following a boss like him sometimes left Clever Git feeling down. Boss Slick was too strong, too Waaagh! He could never lend a hand.
Now, with the boss's pet mount accompanying him, he could stay by the boss's side and Waaagh! with him.
"Boss Slick, we wanna follow you... Boss Slick, watch yer back!" Before Clever Git could finish, he let out a piercing scream. His shrill voice stabbed like a needle, alerting Cheng Mingrui.
An intense sense of danger surged through him, unlike anything he had felt throughout this long battle. Cheng Mingrui immediately ducked, making an evasive move.
What was that?! How had it slipped past his senses?!
Dozens of thick, spiked tendrils answered Cheng Mingrui. In an instant, they engulfed him, Clever Git, and Hols. The dust they stirred up concealed all three, leaving creatures with ordinary vision unable to see what was happening inside.
But the attackers, the Norn Brutes, did not fall within the definition of "ordinary." Not only could they turn invisible, they could also clearly see that two of the three targets remained, and the most important one was still alive.
The spiked tendrils retracted, hanging behind the Norn Brutes. The blood coating them showed that they had indeed inflicted severe injuries on their targets. The Swarm Consciousness had assessed their combat capabilities fairly accurately.
This is a Norn Apostle, a unit created by the Hive Mind specifically to eliminate enemy commanders. The Norn Brute is a melee-enhanced variant I made up.
From the moment those sharp,