The Other Ant

__________ POV Machi__________

What was that? Were we really all overpowered by the En of a single person?

It felt dreadful, almost as if he was crushing my mind with his presence. I don't know how far his En reached. But I could hear the car alarms ringing in the distance.

It clearly affected the city a bit. I turned on the radio we had on one of the crates and tuned into a local broadcast. The others were laying the knocked out members on mats.

"It seems our city has been hit by a powerful earthquake. A lot of the city infrastructure has been damaged. No deaths have been reported as of now. But there are quite a few injuries."

I could hear an audible gulp from Nobunaga... And the sweat on Feitan's brow was more evident now.

Kalluto also seemed shocked by this turn of events. But he didn't react much outwardly.

How exactly does one reach that level? He looked young too. But it seems that he's actually our leader's teacher...

I remember when Chrollo went missing for a few weeks or, was it around two months? I can't remember correctly. We were all still children, all we had was each other at the time.

All of us panicked at the time. We didn't know where he was or what was happening to him.

We were extremely relieved when he reappeared. Although he had changed a bit. Gained a few more scars and became a lot stronger. Thanks to him, we were able to protect ourselves better.

He also thought the rest of us how to use Nen. It was a strange experience, it left all of us with questions.

But he always avoided a straight answer, the most we ever got out of him was that he got lucky and found a book on Nen.

Now, to find out he had a teacher isn't really surprising in any way. But the fact that his teacher is basically a monster in human skin explains quite a few things.

The unusual agitation in our leader's voice when realizing who he was speaking to was not a pleasant thing to hear.

But, at least he will be able to escape his curse. And we will be able to hunt down that chain user eventually. Things are looking well...

__________ POV Ashton__________

Getting back to my apartment was quite uneventful. I completely ignored the collapsed buildings on the way home.

I made a call to good old Netero and told him to spare me an exorcist and send him on a mission for me.

The old man agreed although a bit annoyed that I interrupted his meditation time. I have quite a few things to do now.

For example, I need to look at the Queen's body more properly. I didn't have the chance to examine it while I was dismembering it.

I didn't really have a place to put it on. But covering my bed with Nylon will have to do for now. I always carry some around for practical reasons...

Anyway, ripping space open and dragging out the queen's torso wasn't a difficult affair. A bit draining Nen-wise maybe.

Usually, corpses don't require this much Nen to store and take out... Living things always take a lot of Nen. Did I fail to notice something inside the queen's torso?

I doubt it's a maggot. Worms and smaller life forms don't take as much Nen to store. This feels a lot like storing a living child.

Something I experimented with before. Chrollo survived of course. But he said he didn't remember anything while in my storage.

I already knew that time didn't affect living beings in that place. I was curious as to how they felt whilst inside.

From that experiment, I learned that they don't even realize that they entered the space in the first place.

Even if they walked in it willingly and have the memory of doing so. Their brain simply can't register the fact that they entered the strange space.

This means that the queen might've given birth to another ant beside the King. I wonder if it's as talented as the king...

I looked closely at the queens ripped out belly. And I could see a sleeping figure. It looked exactly like a small child. It was underneath one of the queen's organs, hidden. But I could see it with Gyo.

It had quite a bit of aura. I carefully removed it from the queen's torso. I didn't want it to further damage the queen. It's already difficult enough to study.

It had red hair and large purple eyes. Its skin and features were weirdly human. Well, there was also the rat tail, but it wasn't all that major a mutation.

If I didn't know any better. I'd say the queen ate a baby at the end of her life and didn't get to digest it properly.

The small Ant seemed to wake up after I removed it from the queen. It started crying, it was extremely human-like. Like a newborn child. It had its eyes open, looking around the room. Despite it's wailing.

But its eyes were weird. They looked at me with a strange calmness. I could feel my smile stretch on my face. Something interesting to study comes to me by itself, how quaint.

I wonder... How will this little ant develop? Will it be as strong as the King? Better? Or maybe it will be just like any regular ant?

The latter is the most likely answer. The king took a lot out of the queen to nurture. I think her other spawns were disregarded whilst she was doing that.

Although, this one might've developed a bit unnaturally. Its eyes were filled with intelligence. Something only the Royal Guards had at birth.

Well, all ants were intelligent to some extent. But this seems very unique. It already looks smarter than Youpi...

Maybe my senses are failing me, but I can also feel a bit of aggression coming from it. It's probably just confused... I'm sure that's it.

I threw the queens body back into the ripped open space. I didn't have any interest in it now, I will study it more later.

I already have something else to play with.

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