Defiance of the Fall: A LitRPG Adventure

by TheFirstDefier

  All three, especially the teenager, carried an angry energy as they approached him, and he could only helplessly shake his head.

  “Hello, the three of you look lovely today,” he said, preemptively trying to avoid whatever trouble was coming his way. It was a trick that had usually worked on Kenzie back in the day. Unfortunately, it seemed to have quite limited effect, as there was barely any change in expression on their faces.

  “These two are crazy! I want to learn cultivation from you instead,” Emily angrily huffed.

  “This child has a great talent for the elements and would become a great mage, healer, or poison mistress,” Alyn interjected. “But she is very rambunctious and keeps demanding to learn how to use axes. It would be a waste of her talent.”

  “And also very unladylike,” Alea added on.

  “So we have been trying to correct her ways, but she is very stubborn,” Alyn said with a frown.

  “So what do you want me to do?” Zac asked.

  “Punish the child. Hanging naked in the town square for a few days should make her temper milder,” Alea said.

  “Don’t be absurd. She needs to get married in the future. Just a public whipping would do,” Alyn retorted with a slight frown.

  “I told you, they are crazy! They have tortured me constantly since you left me with them. Let me train with you instead. You saw I learned quickly,” she said while glaring angrily at the two demons.

  “How do you know what talent she has?” Zac curiously asked, ignoring the teenager for now.

  “I had a few warriors contribute some of their Nexus Coins to buy a simple testing device from Calrin,” Alyn simply answered.

  Zac was starting to understand why Ogras thought Alyn would make a good slave driver. He felt it wasn’t as easy as the warriors simply willingly gave away their money after risking their lives. He could only nod and focus on Emily.

  “Why do you want to fight with axes? You should be happy that you have the option to become a mage. You can just blast the enemies from a distance,” Zac exhorted. “Poison isn’t a bad idea either. Have you heard about our contribution quest? Alea is on the third spot there with her poison attacks.”

  When Alea heard the comment, she smiled proudly and looked down at the teenager with a triumphant face, but she only rolled her eyes.

  “But you are number one, right? Much better than that stupid old hag. And you can blast enemies from the distance as well,” Emily said grumpily, drawing an angry glare from Alea.

  “I’ve bled over every inch of my body the past months. There’s almost not a single part of my body that hasn’t been wounded and scarred from my battles. Fighting in melee range is to constantly put yourself in harm’s way. A single mistake and you’re dead. You should think long and hard before you decide to follow in my footsteps. There are innumerable paths to power, and mine is just one. Try to focus on yourself, and think about what would suit you,” Zac said with a sigh.

  “Why are you here, anyway? I thought only Alyn was in charge of Emily’s education?” Zac asked of the poison mistress.

  “When I heard about her talent, I wanted to check her out. I noticed she’s also a bit ruthless and crazy, so I think she would make a good disciple of mine,” she said with a slight smile.

  “Who’d be a disciple to you?” Emily shot back with a scathing glare.

  “I can’t help you train at the moment. Listen to Alyn. She is far more knowledgeable about these things than I am. And think long and hard about your future path before deciding. The choices you make for your class and attributes in the future will impact your whole life,” Zac said as he started to walk away. He didn’t want to comment about the discipleship, as that was something between the two of them, and he didn’t want to butt in.

  “Oh, and no hanging or whipping. She’s a student, not a slave,” he added as he moved away.

  All three of them looked like they weren’t finished, but Zac used [Loamwalker] to move away. The rest of the day, Zac simply relaxed and adjusted his state of mind. He watched a few movies and took a walk along the shore. Finally, when the counter reached one hour left, he walked over to the wall. Not long after, Ogras and his four generals joined him.

  As time passed, more and more of the warriors arrived, and thirty minutes before the next horde arrived, every combatant was at the ready. Adran was also there along with the humans, who nervously looked around. It was on Zac’s command they were brought here. They needed to see the reality of this new universe.

  They thought they’d escaped calamity when they fled their island, and hoped to get back to normalcy now. But that was impossible, as their experience with the frenzied rats was only a small greeting gift from the System, and it would only get worse. Unless they started to take things seriously, the world would move forward without them.

  Alyn and Emily also joined them on the wall. Emily wanted to walk over to Zac, but Alyn kept her close to the stairs leading down, together with the other noncombatants. They didn’t know what would come from the next wave, and they needed to be able to quickly get down to safety if it was needed.

  The time slowly crept forward, and everyone gazed upon the battlefield with a solemn expression. Some tried to spark a conversation to lighten the tension, but any talk quickly died out under the heavy atmosphere. The moment his counter went down to zero, a huge blinding light appeared in the distance. The next second, a large construct appeared, most closely resembling a hive or anthill.

  It looked to be almost a hundred meters tall and was somewhat shaped like a pyramid. The whole construct was a dark gray, almost turning black. There were also green lights covering the hive, almost making it seem like they were windows wrought out of emeralds. On the ground, a few large entrances were visible.

  The structure gave an oppressive feeling, like the whole thing was a large lumbering beast.

  “What do you think?” Zac asked Ogras, who was standing next to him.

  “Some sort of nest. It looks like this second horde is a bit different compared to the first. There are no pillars unless they are inside that thing. I’m not sure where we go from here. I get nothing when trying to use my identification skill on it,” Ogras answered with slightly furrowed brows before he increased his volume. “Anyone recognize it?”

  Only frowns and shakes of heads and a few short answers followed. None of the demons knew what they were facing. The minutes passed, and the unsettling feeling only grew larger as nothing happened.

  “Should we go in? It doesn’t feel like a good idea to just leave that thing alone. Who knows what’s going on inside there,” Zac asked with a frown.

  “I sense something!” a voice suddenly shouted. It was one of the earth mages among the demons. He jumped down from the wall and placed his hands on the ground. “There are subtle vibrations in the ground. I think the things inside the nest are digging downward,” he said with a serious expression.

  A few more demons jumped down, and they confirmed the suspicion. Something was going on inside that hive, but it was happening beneath the ground.

  “We can’t let this go on. We need to head in,” Zac said as he jumped down from the wall as well. “First group, follow me!”

  Twenty-five demons quickly jumped down behind Zac. They were a mixed group of both ranged, support, and melee classes. They’d shared the same shift as Zac during the fights with the wolf horde and were the demons Zac was most acquainted with apart from Ogras and Alea. They also had two earth mages in the mix, who would be able to help with the scouting.

  They carefully approached the huge hive. It was quite far from the wall, and Zac noticed with a frown that it was outside the range of all his offensive arrays or fortifications. If they wanted to destroy this thing, they would have to do it by hand. Perhaps they could construct siege engines that were more designed for structures compared to hordes of enemies.

  When they were a few hundred meters away from the black nest, one of the earth mages shuddered and put his hands on th
e ground. Zac immediately stopped and glanced around carefully.

  “They’ve stopped whatever they were doing underground,” the mage said.

  In response, the group immediately took out their weapons, unsure what would happen. Zac’s eyebrows suddenly rose in alarm as he stared at the large holes on the ground floor of the nest.

  “Get ready!” he shouted as he took out a large rock from his pouch.

  A huge stream of insectoid monsters was pouring out of the nest, heedlessly charging toward the group. Their colors matched the hive, a mix of black and green. They had large chitinous shells that covered their bodies; both their appendages and mandibles looked like sinister weapons.

  There seemed to be three types of insects in the army. The most populous looked like a mix between an ant and a mantis. They had three pairs of legs with three joints much like normal ants, but they were as large as a pony. The front set of legs were sharp hooks, and it looked like they were made for digging or fighting rather than running. They could be regarded as the normal soldiers of the insect army.

  If the first group could be considered 80% ant with some mantis peppered in, then the second group could be seen as mostly mantis. They were at least 50% larger compared to the normal insects, reaching over two meters in height with their bodies, with their torso stretching upward. Their two front legs were huge sinister blades, looking extremely dangerous.

  The last group of insects was very different compared to the rest. Their legs were shorter and their bodies were fat, almost bulbous. The other creepy crawlies were mostly black with some green details, but these ones were mostly green. They also had huge heads with oversized circular maws.

  Zac immediately threw out three rocks, each targeting a different type of insect. He still preferred this type of test on new enemies.

  The first rock slammed into the foot soldier, crushing its head and instantly killing it. The larger mantis-like being actually managed to react and tried cutting the incoming rock. However, the force in the throw was too strong, and the insect missed as the stone slammed into its chest. The shell of the insect actually didn’t break as the stone cracked from the impact. The insect was thrown away and fell down twitching on the ground. If it wasn’t dead, it at least was dying from the impact.

  The last insect exploded into a large pool of green goop that instantly started scorching the ground. Zac realized, with some shock, the last things actually were large walking vats of acid or poison. He didn’t even have time to digest the information before the green acid monsters spit out large balls of the green liquid at the demons.

  “ACID! Target the green ones!” Zac shouted and moved out of the way from the incoming projectiles. A few defensive spells were erected as well to protect the group.

  Feeling he had a good enough grasp of the beasts, Zac charged up his skill and set out to decapitate some enemies.

  104

  The War Council

  “It looks like they are expanding their nest underground, moving downward. We believe they are digging toward the Nexus Vein,” one of the earth mages reported to the group who was sitting around a table.

  Twelve hours had passed since the hive appeared, and they had made some discoveries. The ants were called [Ayn Hivebeasts] and the three types they encountered so far were called Ayn worker, Ayn guard, and the green acid shooters were actually called Ayn vomiters.

  After the initial clash, they quickly learned that there was an enormous number of beasts inside the large structure, as they kept pouring out as they fought. But the moment they retreated, so did the ants. But just a few minutes after Zac and the demons stopped their assault, the digging was resumed, according to the earth mages.

  They were currently holding a war council while two regiments led by Ogras’ four generals were keeping the ants busy. They needed to figure out a strategy for this new horde, as their old one wouldn’t work. Most of their preparations were in vain, as the new monsters didn’t seem interested in attacking the town. The wall stood unassaulted, and the arrays couldn’t reach the hive due to the distance.

  Zac almost felt that the System specifically chose this type of challenge since the last wave almost felt like a gift of experience and money rather than a challenge. Certainly, the last waves were tough, but never to the point of true desperation.

  “That’s it, then? We’ll head in and destroy it today,” Zac said with a frown.

  The Nexus Vein was the lifeblood of his island. It created the crystals in the mine and the high concentration of Cosmic Energy in the atmosphere. Anything from cultivation to crafting to even farming would be far more efficient in this area. If he bought an island-wide gathering array in the future, it would truly become a paradise. He couldn’t risk his city’s foundations just for the opportunity to farm some insects.

  “Wait a bit,” Ogras hastily interjected. “We also have concluded that during our attacks, they are stopping their excavation work to meet our attacks. We can simply farm them without risking the vein as long as we keep the attacks going, letting you keep your lead against the other humans,” he added.

  It was a fair point, but Zac had a feeling that it was more about the contribution points for the Fruit of Ascension than letting him gain levels. Besides, he held a commanding lead over the others as it was, and didn’t really need to gain levels at the moment. He was fast approaching the first bottleneck at level 75.

  Zac mainly needed to improve his Dao insights at the moment. He already possessed a Rare class, and his goal was to upgrade it into an E-rank Epic class. His only options at the moment were Rare or Epic, as the rarity couldn’t downgrade when reaching the next tiers. He already knew that his situation was pretty bad since the Multiverse was full of examples of geniuses whose cultivation journey got cut short since they couldn’t upgrade their special classes.

  Still, he didn’t want to give up his advantages. Upgrading to a Rare class wasn’t the best option. He treaded the path of the elite, spearheading the powerhouses of Earth. Since he was already locked into this path, he would go all the way and keep upgrading the rarity of the class. He knew that Early stage seeds were not enough for an Epic class, so it was time to upgrade his Daos. If that was at the expense of his lead in levels, so be it. He wouldn’t limit his future achievements just to become the first person to reach E-rank Class.

  “Constantly attacking out in the open is different from defending on top of a wall. We will not be able to last as we did during the wolf hordes. Besides, we do not know whether the insects will grow stronger over time like the wolves did, and it is safe to nip the problem in the bud,” Zac said.

  To be honest, safety concerns weren’t the only reason he wanted to end this horde quickly. He’d just had a taste of freedom and adventure as he’d explored in search of his hometown. He was loath to spend the next four weeks slaughtering insects. He knew that the gain of Nexus Coins would be huge, but he would still net good income if he sent people down into the mines instead.

  He was also even more anxious to get home after seeing the life of civilians in Fort Roger. Emily would have met a miserable fate unless he had been there, and worry over his friends and family was starting to keep him up at night. He even had trouble focusing during meditation, as the intrusive “what-ifs” kept popping up in his head.

  “Three weeks. Let us fight and farm for three weeks, and after that, we will invade the hive,” Ogras entreated.

  “It’s too long. You can have ten days. After that, I’m heading in,” Zac flatly refused. That would leave him three weeks to travel the world before the final wave, twice what he had last time.

  “Bah, you’re throwing away a great opportunity,” Ogras muttered in discontent.

  Zac only rolled his eyes at the demon. What they gained from the quest was already great, and they shouldn’t get greedy. The longer they waited, the more weird things could crop up.

  “Did Calrin find any information about the beasts?” Zac asked as he changed the subject.


  “He did manage to buy a short missive about the [Ayn Hivebeasts]. They are an extremely prolific species led by hive queens. As long as they have enough Cosmic Energy, the queens can almost indefinitely spawn soldiers. The stronger the queen, the mightier warriors it can birth, and more types as well,” Adran answered. Since he wasn’t part of the fighting force, he tried to help the war efforts by gathering information.

  “There are examples of the beasts’ insatiable expansion, completely infesting a planet if left alone. We believe that the threat will be over when we manage to kill the queen. After that no more beasts will spawn, and we can simply slowly exterminate the survivors. Killing the queen will likely mark this horde as completed as well,” he continued.

  “How strong is the queen?” Zac asked.

  “It should be E-grade Class equivalent. It might also have a few bodyguards close to that in power for protection,” Adran answered.

  “Okay, what does it look like? What are its powers?” Zac probed further.

  “Actually, the large construct we see is not a structure, but the queen herself. The Ayr Hivebeasts live inside their queen’s body for the most part, and the queen slowly grows to accommodate a larger population. The digging we hear is the insects making room for her body expanding down into the ground,” Adran answered with a grimace.

  Everyone’s eyebrows rose in surprise at this.

  “How the hell do we kill something that large?” Ogras asked with a frown.

  “Apparently, it has a core somewhere inside. You need to get inside to its core room and destroy it, and it will die. The exact details were unclear in the missive we obtained, though,” Adran said with a sigh.

  “Good job. See if you can find out anything else, as long as the information doesn’t become too expensive,” Zac said.