The Earth After Rebirth

Chapter 474: The General

"Egg? Something swallowed and gave birth to her in an egg?" Hiro tilted his head and asked.

Kiro laughed. "I don’t think so, maybe it’s a monster similar to a spider. You know how they put up webs and come back later for whatever stumbled on it, I think it’s something similar."

"Then we should stay alert, lest the monster comes back for its prey." Hubris said his head darting in every direction.

Kiro dropped to the ground in a meditative stance in front of the egg. Trusting his companions to be better lookouts while he gathered his strength.

He may have threatened Hubris back there but he knew by how much his strength was returning to him that he owed his mount more than he could give.

The entire world felt like it was made from Kaos, thick and easy to access, Kiro took the advantage of absorbing as much as his reserves allowed, it didn’t look like he would be done any time soon. His body was in a state of starvation, the hunger now seemed insatiable.

There was no peep from him, he wasn’t complaining. The last time he had this much at his disposal was when him and Hubris had found a portal that lost them in a foreign land that turned out to be Hubris’ home land.

Of course he knew that greed would be his undoing, he took only what his body could handle, only what his mental fortitude could digest. He had always been able to avoid going insane from the energy, he knew its dangers, he didn’t want to test it beyond unimaginable limits, not now when they were in a different space than Asgard.

He was still very much convinced that dying here would mean serious consequences or even death to their real bodies, he wanted to avoid any unnecessary dangers.

Kiro had siphoned almost half when he felt a disturbance. Just at a distance, the wind shifted and his head turned on its own as if his naked eye would be able to pierce through the fog of darkness.

"Something is coming." He said barely a whisper.

Hubris had sensed the trouble coming, he was already on his legs intently looking at the direction he felt the danger coming from, he did something Kiro had never seen before, the hairs on his back stood, making him larger than he already was.

Spindly legs that made the beast tower even over Hubris appeared at a distance, it made the large hellhound look like a house dog. And in no time at all, the harbinger was in front of them.

Hairy and thin, it had eight of them. Kiro could’ve sworn it was a spider but it had a human torso. Chiseled muscles, hard as rock, so they seemed. An orange beard covered most of the face but not the expression it wore, it was not anger just annoyance. As if they were bugs bothering it.

"Who dares interrupt my Queen’s slumber." A thunderous voice sounded, causing the two to pluck their ears with their fingers.

Kiro couldn’t exactly hide his confusion, before answering to the seemingly reasonable Harbinger, whom preferred talking before throwing fists, he looked around for any slumbering queen.

"I uh, apologies? We will ask to bother you further as we are waiting for our friend to...hatch." He answered hesitantly.

"Take her? You can’t take her, she’s mine now, my queen."

Kiro slowly turned his head to Hiro who was now blue in the face from holding in laughter. The statement took him a little time to process so that he understood what the harbinger meant.

"I have competition with a bug man?" He said a vein popping on his temple.

The harbinger looked thoroughly offended that this puny human was claiming his queen as his. His pincers flared, the relaxed expression it had before was gone, replaced by one a war general would have worn.

"You dare?" The thundering voice had returned.

"Why not wait for her to hatch, so she can pick who she wants then?" Kiro offered, he wanted to get out of there without fighting this thing, his vibration skill was going haywire telling him to run.

The harbinger growled, it was a while before they realised that it was its way of laughing. It was apparent that what Kiro told it, it found amusing.

"Choose? puny human that is my queen now."

"At least he doesn’t see her as prey." Hiro said laughing a little, he could see his friend didn’t see this the least bit amusing and so he tried to diffuse the situation.

"Ryu!" Kiro replied with his hand held out.

Within seconds the staff was in his grasp. The time for games was over, they were here to get Isla home safe. He had no idea how they would survive this harbinger that seemed to be stronger than a general in their ranks.

"Get in formation."

Neither of the two questioned, they stood in front of the egg, backs against each other, so that whichever angle it chose to attack someone had it covered.

Despite the harbinger claiming Isla as its queen, none of them trusted the words of a monster. Besides that, it was clear that its attacks would be far more dangerous, affecting not just them but their surroundings as well.

"Hiro, can I leave protecting her to you?" none of them were mages that could cast such spells, Kiro’s class was very attacking, only Hiro with his shield was capable of deflecting strong attacks.

Kiro sensed his scepticism by his inability to answer right away in such an emergency situation.

"Hiro!"

"But—"

"Hubris and I will hold it off, just protect her."

"Okay!"

Hubris wore an expression he had never witnessed before against enemies that weren’t him, it was pure terror aand concern. The last time was when his mount was a pup.

"Don’t get too close to it. I’m sure you know we stand no chance, I know we are both close quarter combatants but lets always leave distance, always."