I swiftly ascended the Fermas Huge legs, stopping on its back. The beast itself didn’t so much as twitch, leaving me to wonder if it even knew I was there.

From my perch on the arch spider I had a much clearer view of the shining creature above me. Though most of its features were obscured by its own luminescence there were a few things I could make out before I had to close my eyes to the blinding light. Its body was very similar in size and shape to the demolisher, with the same long, broad body and comparatively small head.

I stood there for a moment, deciding the best plan of attack going forward, when I suddenly heard a new voice, presumably whatever was making that light, speaking in my head “Kihi, so the mighty Lord has come to meet me himself? That’s quite brave of you considering you’re landlocked, kihihihi.”

“How could I resist such a tempting meal? Especially when it's doing everything in its power to get me to notice its presence?” I asked, unperturbed.

“Ha!” the bug laughed, causing its lights to flare up even brighter for a moment “Now, now, don’t go getting ahead of yourself. After all, there’s not necessarily any reason for us to fight…we could even work together if you like…”

“I might believe you if it weren’t for all of that killing intent you’re letting ooze out of you.”

“Kihi, fair enough. I am hungry, after all. But I think you and I could work something out. Listen, my kind are called Beacons, and our duty is to patrol the perimeter of her Majesty's lands and mop up any humans leaving…or entering. Now that phase two is ending, you’ll find us covering every inch of land around the firmament. That means that, no matter where you go, you’ll always have to fight at least one of us off when you want to pass by there…”

“…Your point?”

“My point is-why go through the hassle of doing that when you could simply…oh, I don’t know…give me a human or two? Just pay a little toll and you’ll be able to pass underneath me without a fuss. It’s a win-win, you get easy access to a way out, I get a meal, nobody gets hurt. What say you, my Lord.” the Beacon said, dimming its lights and flying down to meet me.

Now that I could finally make out its appearance I saw that it wasn’t a roach, but rather some kind of beetle. Its whole body was brown, save for two spots on it back that were a shade of pale green. It was from these two spots that the Beacon’s blinding lights shone from.

Though I had never actually seen one before, I suspected that this beetle was a Headlight Beetle. Their larvae were apparently quite popular among bug enthusiasts.

“Well now, that does sound like a decent deal…” I said

“Excellent! Then why don’t we begin right away, I’m quite happy to let you pick the humans you want to give-”

“But…” I interrupted “There are two parts of it that I take issue with…”

“What…?” The beetle said, instantly becoming wary.

“I rather dislike the idea of being made to pay a toll, especially to an enemy I could beat. But that could be tolerated if it weren’t for my second problem.” I said.

“Don’t get arrogant, my Lord, just because you killed a few lousy Cleaners doesn’t mean you have what it takes to-”

But I swung interrupted him, raising my arms and firing my spikes, already primed for battle, into the beatles body.

The beetle anticipated this though, and quickly moved his head out of the way of my spikes. His body however suffered the full brunt of my attacks, getting pierced in several places.

“And the second problem is that I’m hungry too!” I screamed

“PSHAAAA, you fool! You think you’ll be able to fight me when you won’t be able to make out my head from my backside? At this range I’ll blind you!” he shouted, turning around and shining his lights at their fullest intensity. My eyes were practically fried in their sockets, and I was completely stupefied by my enemies attack. Truly, I was a fool to challenge an opponent with such superior powers to mine, and with this attack the Beacon deftly took the victory!

…is what he thought would happen. But when the Beetle tried to light up its ‘headlights’, it was shocked to find that neither of them would glow.

“Wh-what!? What have you done to me!?” he yelled, flying out of my attack range and trying to figure out why his lights wouldn’t shine.

“Kukuku, take a look at where my spikes pierced you…” I said, laughing.

He couldn’t look down far enough to see the spikes sticking out of his underside, but he could feel where they pierced him. In particular, two of them were particularly long and had managed to poke out of his backside.

Right through his head lights.

I could sense that his previously enraged emotions were calming down now that he had lost his primary weapon.

“That was the correct move.” I thought, nodding my approval. There was a clear difference between the Beacon almost every other enemy I had faced up until now. This one had real strategic abilities beyond ‘Overpower my enemy with strength’, he was able to make use of a ‘non-combat’ type ability in battle and he was even willing to forgo a fight completely in exchange for an easy meal.

Besides Shiron, who was an aberration, and Ember, who was designed with encyclopedic knowledge, this creature had been the first to show me the true intelligence of the bugs.

“Which means, if you're consistent, your next move should be…” I thought.

“Very well, I have no intention of risking my neck against a Lord. But know this, you haven’t seen the last of me!” he shouted, turning tail and flying away.

“As expected, Kukuku, but you won’t get away from me that easily!” I shouted.

I still had one more trick up my sleeve.

****

Headlights

“Curse him…” I thought, my pride severely wounded. Perhaps it was my own fault, challenging a Lord who had managed to evolve already. Thinking back on it, it was incredibly foolhardy and arrogant of me to assume that I could negotiate with such a creature.

“After all, we are meant to devour each other. Why on earth would I think I could use him when he’s clearly never skipped a meal before now?”

As I thought this, my belly started to rumble.

“Ah, right, that’s why.”

Hunger was an ever present thing for me these days. Before the queen deployed me I could have just feasted on the low borns until we were satiated. Cleaners, Scouts, Soldiers, Nesters, all of them were fair game and there was nothing any of them could do about it. But now…

My stomach rumbled again, causing me to falter and lose altitude for a moment.

“Gah, it would almost be worth it to go back and try and scoop a human up. But I dare not, lest that Lord give me a whole different type of ‘empty stomach’. Perhaps I could find a Cleaner lying around somewhere…” I contemplated for a moment, wondering at the best spot to find one of the delicious spiders.

I was about to look for the remains of a nest I had happened upon a while ago when I suddenly felt an excruciating pain in my back. Turning my head I was stunned to see the Lord, crouched down on top of me and impaling my abdomen with a stinger that he presumably absorbed from a Scout.

The pain was intense, but I managed to stay in control. Deftly, I began performing aerial maneuvers to shake the Lord off of my back. Loop de loops, aerial cartwheels, barrel rolls and even furling up my wings mid flight, diving down and then unfurling them again, all of it to shake this monster off of me. He managed to hang on for quite a while, but eventually his grip loosened and-!

“Yes! Enjoy the plummet, fool!” I shouted, watching his body disappear into the fog below me. I didn’t stick around though, as I doubted a mere one and a half kilometer fall would be enough to kill him.

“Still though…” I thought, wondering how he had managed to grab onto me without my noticing.

“He must have done it right after I ran away. With his strength, it would have been possible to make up the distance between us with a hard jump…right? The only other way for him to catch up with me would be if he already had the ability to- AHHHHHHHH!” I screamed, once again feeling searing pain, this time in my head.

I looked up and , sure enough, there he was with stingers on both arms injecting what must have been acid into my skull. And as I thought there, on his back, were a pair of black, gossamer wings that glittered like starlight.

I had been outmaneuvered.

****
Forminus

At this point there was very little the Beetle could do to stop me from soaking its brain in acid. We were losing altitude quickly, the creature's body turning into a nosedive as we plummeted to the ground. I Waited until we were only a few dozen meters away from impact before I retracted my stingers and hopped off, quickly flapping my wings to slow the fall.

I landed gracefully, a hundred meters away from one of the Ferma’s legs. The Beacon on the other hand was not so lucky, crashing head first into the ground and leaving an impact trail the length of a city block.

I lifted up my arms, not giving my opponent a chance to recover, and shot a dozen four foot long spikes directly into its abdomen. I expected it to react, but nothing. The Beacon didn’t so much as twitch while being impaled by my spikes. I was taken aback, as I hadn’t thought the impact from falling would be enough to kill it.

“Perhaps the acid weakened its skull and its brain was crushed by the fall?” I thought, but…“Best not take any chances”

I raised my arms up and hosed the Beetle down with more acid, but again nothing. It appeared that the Beetle really was dead.

Or it was an exceptional faker.

I approached the Beetle and stopped just outside of its melee attack range, raising my arms and aiming my spikes directly at its head.

“If you weren’t dead before, you’re certainly about to be.”

But then, as I had thought, the Beetle finally stirred. I jumped back a few feet and was about to fire my spikes when the Beetle let loose a flash of binding light from its headlights.

This time I really did get caught up in it. I had thought that my spikes earlier had destroyed the lights, but it seemed that the Beetle had some kind of regenerative ability, just like I did.

He managed to play me this time, but I wasn’t as green as I used to be. Using my feelers, I sensed the beetle charging at me and quickly fashioned a simple web to tangle the thing up in. It worked like a charm too as, even though the creature's lights made it difficult for me to see, the same was also true of the beetle.

It was only stuck for a second, but that was all I needed. I dashed under the beetles body and stuck my needles underneath its head, once again pouring my acid into it.

“This has to be it.” I thought. No other enemy up until now had managed to withstand this much acid going into its body. But-

“GOOOOAAAAHHH” it roared, rearing up on its back legs.

I knew what was coming, it was the same attack they all used as a last resort. I jumped back, ready to move in again as soon as it came down and pummel its head into much, but before I could-

WHAM

Something huge came flying in out of nowhere-right into the Beetle. It knocked the thing the entire one hundred meter distance separating us from the Ferma’s leg, causing it to smash against the gargantuan beast. Its lights flickered for a moment, but then went dark for the final time.

I tried to see who had assisted me, but I was still partially blinded and could only make out the blurry shape of this newcomer. Whatever he was, he stood a good ten feet tall and his body was massive. I was about to ask who he was, but the newcomer spoke before I could.

“Hope I…didn’t keep you…waiting for…too long.” it said, and I could have sworn I heard a jovial tone in its broken speech.

Keep me waiting? Just who the hell are you?