Chapter 82: The Looming Horde
The Abyssal Taint,
Sunlight filtered through the canopy.
Holden "woke up" when Renna kicked his sleeping bag.
"Rise and shine, sleepyhead! Lyra said you took the whole watch, which is nice of you but also means you’re burning breakfast duty. Emric is already cooking, and there aren’t many sausages left. Hurry up before they’re all gone!"
He sat up, rubbing his eyes to pretend he was still half-asleep. The Shadow-Weave boots were already hidden under his pack. His jacket, with the ancient map tucked inside, lay beside him.
"Coming," he said.
Breakfast was quick. They finished off the last of the sausages and their field rations. Lyra smiled at him across the fire, still warm from their quiet night together.
"Did you sleep well?" she asked.
"Like a rock."
"I checked on you twice. You were barely breathing."
"Just tired."
She seemed satisfied with that.
Emric stood and brushed off his uniform. "If we maintain our current pace, we should accumulate approximately forty additional survival points by midday. I suggest we move east toward the rocky terrain. The geological features will provide better tactical positioning for larger prey."
"Lead the way," Holden said.
They packed up camp, collapsed the wards, and headed into the forest.
The footprint was wrong.
Emric crouched beside it, frowning. "This doesn’t match any standard species in the regional database. The depth is excessive for the width. And the spacing between prints is irregular, suggesting an uneven gait pattern."
Renna peered over his shoulder. "So it’s limping?"
"Or its musculature is deformed in some way."
Holden studied the ground. The track was deep, almost a crater in the dirt. Whatever made it must be heavy. Its claws had torn up the dirt, showing that it had been dragging its feet as it walked.
"This way," he said.
They followed the tracks for twenty minutes. The forest grew darker as they moved deeper. The trees here were twisted, their bark discolored with strange black patches. An unpleasant smell hung in the air, like rotting meat mixed with copper.
Renna wrinkled her nose. "What is that smell?"
"Bad news, probably," Holden muttered.
They found the Razor-Boar in a clearing.
It was massive. Easily twice the size of a normal Razor-Boar, with a bristled back and tusks that curved forward like scythe blades.
Purple veins covered its body.
They ran across its hide, pulsing faintly with dark light. The boar’s eyes were clouded and unfocused. Foam dripped from its jaw. When it saw the team, it charged.
"Scatter!" Holden yelled.
The team split. Emric planted his shield and braced. The boar hit him head-on.
Crash!
The impact lifted Emric off his feet and sent him sliding backward across the clearing. But the shield held. The kinetic-absorption runes flared blue.
Lyra thrust both hands forward. Frost raced across the ground and caught the boar’s back legs. Ice locked around the joints, slowing it.
Renna’s arrow flew true. The storm-arrow punched into the boar’s shoulder, electricity crackling through the purple veins. The beast squealed, a sound like metal scraping stone.
Holden moved.
With a thought, he summoned his sword from his inventory and activated Asura’s Ignition. Red-gold energy blazed along the edge. The boar twisted toward him, tusks slashing. He stepped inside the arc and struck downward.
Swish!
The blade went deep into the boar’s neck. The creature convulsed once, then collapsed.
Thud!
Then something dark and foul-smelling dropped from the wound cavity.
The monster core.
It was wrong. Normal cores glowed with clean energy, blue or green or gold depending on the beast. This one was black. And the smell coming off it made Renna gag.
"That is disgusting," she said, covering her nose.
"Nobody touch it," Holden said. He pulled out his academy radio and tuned it to the Base Camp frequency.
Bzzt.
"This is Voss. I need to speak with Maeve. Now."
Three seconds of static. Then his sister’s voice came through.
"What’s going on holden?"
"We just killed a Razor-Boar. Rank 2, one-star. But something’s wrong with it. There are purple veins everywhere, and it was behaving strangely. The core that dropped is completely black and has a toxic smell."
There was silence on the other end.
Then, Holden heard Maeve typing at a crazy speed.
"Describe the veins more precisely. Are they raised or flat? Pulsing or static?"
"Raised and Pulsing. The light moves through them in waves, like they’re pumping something."
He heard more typing.
"Holden. Do not touch that core with your bare hands. I’m cross-referencing the Ashen Bestiary with the academy’s classified Abyssal records." Her voice had changed. The professional tone was still there, but underneath it was something urgent. "The purple veins are consistent with Abyssal Taint. The same corruption that leaked from the rift during the arena disaster."
Emric, Lyra, and Renna had gathered close, listening to the radio.
"Abyssal Taint?" Emric said, his voice tight. "That’s extremely concerning. Abyssal energy doesn’t occur naturally in the borderlands. If it’s spread this far from the academy, the infection zone is much larger than what the official reports are admitting."
"I’m pulling up seismic data from the camp’s monitoring network," Maeve continued. "There it is. I see movement patterns in the eastern sector. Multiple contacts. Dozens of them. All showing the same irregular signatures."
She stopped typing.
"Holden, listen to me carefully. Those aren’t normal beasts anymore. The Abyssal Taint drives them into a frenzy. They don’t hunt. They stampede. And based on the trajectory data, that stampede is heading toward your position."
Renna’s face went pale. "How many beasts?"
"There are at least forty of them. I don’t know how many more there could be. The seismic readings are too cluttered to count accurately."
Emric pulled off his glasses and cleaned them with shaking hands. "Forty Abyssal-tainted beasts moving in a coordinated stampede. Our probability of surviving a direct attack is approximately three percent. I strongly recommend immediate retreat toward the base camp."
"Running won’t work," Holden said.
"The base camp has Rank 4 instructors and energy barriers," Emric argued. "Statistically, that represents our highest survival probability."
"They’re stampeding because they’re fleeing something worse. If we run, we lead them straight to the camp."
The radio crackled. "Holden is right," Maeve said. "If you lead a tainted horde to the base camp, the instructors will have to divert resources from the perimeter defense. That could compromise the entire expedition."
Lyra gripped her spear. "So what do we do?"
Holden looked at his team.
He rested his sword on his shoulder and smirked.
"We stay. If we can find a tight space to catch them in, we can set a trap and take them on."