I Became an Ant Lord, So I Built a Hive Full of Beauties-Chapter 384: Cutting & Leash

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Rauk tried to push himself up. His right arm did not answer. His left arm shook and slipped in the blood under him. He blinked once and his eyes focused on Kai’s boots.

"Stay down," Kai said.

Rauk spat red and pulled air through his teeth. "Finish it. Kill me."

"No," Kai said. "Not yet." He knelt, took hold of the five-star’s wrist, and set the spear point where plate met flesh. "You put your hands toward my child. I will show you what that costs."

He cut clean. One stroke. Then the other.

Rauk screamed once. It was deep and raw. Then he bit the sound off and stared at the sky, face white. His arms lay in the sand like heavy sticks. Blood pumped and then slowed.

Kai wiped the spear on Rauk’s chest plate. "You live because I want you to see the result of angering me."

He turned. "Azhara. Give me your Bow."

Azhara stepped in and handed him her short bow without a word. He unhooked the string and ran it through his hands to feel the stretch. He looped one end, leaned over Rauk, and slipped the loop around the man’s neck low and tight. He tied a hard knot on the other end and made a dog leash.

Rauk breathed fast. He swallowed. He did not beg.

"Stand," Kai said.

Rauk tried. He did not have arms now. His legs pushed. He swayed. He did not get up.

"Then crawl," Kai said. "Your feet work. Your mouth works. Use them."

He tossed the free end to Azhara. "Hold him. If he tries anything, take his legs."

Azhara caught the line and tugged once to test it. "Heel," she told the captain like he was a bad dog. Rauk glared up at her. Azhara smiled without humor and set her boot on his shoulder to keep him still while she looked at Kai. "Bodies?"

"Gather them," Kai said.

She moved. She did not waste steps. She worked in circles, quick and neat, dragging the forty-eight dead four-stars into two rows with the same simple care she would use to stack firewood. She checked pockets and belts as she worked, stripped loose pouches, and kicked weapons into a pile out of the way. The captain watched her, jaw clenched, blood still wet around his shoulders.

Kai stood over the first corpse. He drew a breath. The taste of core heat still sat on his tongue.

He crouched and set his palm over the chest. "Essence Eater," he said inside himself, and let the skill open.

The heat moved. The heart’s last drop pulled toward him. The corpse sagged as if the last string had been cut. A faint light flowed into his palm and ran up his arm like a warm drink on a cold day. It settled low and deep.

[Ding! Essence Eater: successful extraction. Unallocated stat points +4.]

He moved to the next body. He did not speak. He bit through at the scar of the heart and drank the last of the life that could be taken without wasting it. The warmth came again.

[Ding! Essence Eater: successful extraction. Unallocated stat points +4.]

He kept going. Third, Fourth. Fifth.

[Ding! Essence Eater: successful extraction. Unallocated stat points +4.]

[Ding! Essence Eater: successful extraction. Unallocated stat points +4.]

[Ding! Essence Eater: successful extraction. Unallocated stat points +4.]

He paused. The bells in his head were not loud, but they were steady. He did not want them.

"System," he said in his mind. "Do not give me each small note. It is a fight night. It is noise. Give me the tally at the end. Also, stop giving me an experience message for each kill. Tell me only when I level up."

[Ding! System Acknowledged. Per-kill and per-extraction notifications suppressed. End-of-sequence summary will be provided. Level-up alerts will continue.]

"Good," he said inside, and kept working.

Azhara set her heel on Rauk’s leash and watched. Her eyes shone. She did not turn away when Kai bit into the chest and pulled out the last strength from a heart that had stopped twenty breaths ago. She watched like people watched a storm on the sea. It scared her a little. It made heat move under her skin. She shifted her weight and rolled her shoulders like she had to shake off the feeling. She did not shake it off.

Rauk watched too. Awe sat under the pain. He had seen men drink blood for brave acts and old rites. He had never seen a man draw strength from the last light in a body and grow steadier with each draw. He tried to understand it. Pain blurred his edges. He still tried.

Kai moved down the line. He did not hurry. He did not slow down. He took what he wanted from each chest and left nothing behind but meat and plate and dust. The sand gathered what he did not need, the blood. The moon watched. The wind pulled at loose hair and cloth.

Azhara spoke once, voice low. "You are very bright tonight."

Kai did not answer. He kept his mouth to his work.

Rauk spoke once, a torn whisper. "What... what are you?"

Kai did not answer him either.

When Azhara finished stacking and stripping, she leaned her weight against the leash and went still. Her lips parted, breath slipping out in a different rhythm. She didn’t touch herself, but she didn’t have to — the heat was written plain on her face, in the way her eyes unfocused, in the way her mouth softened. The captain noticed, jaw tightening, and turned his head away. It wasn’t modesty. It was the shame of watching someone else’s hunger laid bare and knowing it had nothing to do with him.

Kai finished the first row. He moved to the second. His hands were steady. His eyes were hard. His jaw flexed now and then. He had a picture in his head of a small face behind bars. He fed the picture with this work. He fed himself. He fed the promise he had made.