Luke slowly took backward steps, his feet vibrating in fear as he did, his thoughts were in a frenzy, what could he possibly do to escape the iron ape? Amidst the chaotic thoughts, an idea formed in his mind.
"Codex."
Luke muttered, his lips slightly shook as he spoke, he then focused on the set of words, he went to the shape shifter section and then concentrated on the [stone beetle.]
Another group of words appeared..
[Would you like to shape shift into the stone beetle?]
[Yes] or [No]
’Wouldn’t mind of I do.’
Luke chose the option yes and then stilled himself, gritting his teeth, immediately pain enveloped his entire being, he fell on the ground weakly.
Starting from his legs, each of his bones began breaking, it felt as though something was grinding him to dust from within, each crack was silenced by the noise the herding colony made, from the bones in his legs and upwards, the pain writhed continuously.
What occurred in seconds, felt like hours too luke, soon enough, he could no longer grit his teeth, he wallowed in pain.
Tears formed on his eyes as the broken bones began taking shape, his body shook, the pale skin of Chris began turning dark and hard, Luke groaned louder, his hair vanished, his blood boiled, muscles twitched violently under the pressure the pain from transformation caused.
His body’s length began reducing, his bones that had been ground to complete dust once, realigned, the hardened skin developed into layers, coming together as a hunch back, Luke’s iris that was black, began assuming a red glinting form, it’s size also reducing.
A few seconds after, the bones that had been breaking stopped, his blood no longer felt warm, his legs were absent and something heavy was on his back.
Luke’s regained his composure..
’What the fuckk?’
***
The iron ape, a massive, muscular grotesque void creature, eight feet tall, tore through the mushrooms like they were made of paper, barraging through the midst of stone beetles without pause and crushing some in the process, It had two sets of extremely powerful arms. The top set, was attached at a massive, slouched shoulder girdle, and possessed long muscular bicep structures, but ended in overly elongated, gnarled hands with six fingers in each, tipping with obsidian claws. The second, slightly smaller but still formidable pair of arms emerged from on the other side of its body, directly beneath the first pair.
It’s face was sunken, it’s eyes were hollow, pure, soulless black. It’s jaw was massive and powerful, filled with multiple rows of jagged, mismatched teeth that shifted and re-aligned as it gnashed it together. And it’s skin was covered together by a dark metal.
The iron ape roared and took hold of the next large mushroom, it propelled itself forward, it’s vicious form glinting under the moon light. A cave appeared before it, smoke from a recently put out fire oozing out of the cave.
The iron ape roared, and the whole dungeon shook, echoing the primal sound.
And just as the roar paused, running out from the cave was a Stone Beetle with red glowing eyes. It’s rushed in a different direction as if terrified by the sudden roar.
The iron ape, barely taking notice of the stone beetle, lunged towards the cave.
***
Luke scurried between mushrooms heading towards the colony of beetles that were just ahead of him, tripping over his legs or were they his hands?
He maneuvered through the ore stones that glinted faintly in the dark, lighting up the dungeon.
’That went quite well..’ Luke snickered within himself as he wasn’t quite certain yet, but what he knew was that he had not completely escaped the iron ape just yet as the stone beetles hadn’t stopped moving. Luke also noticed that his sight wasn’t as clear as it had been before, the imagery his eyes presented felt red and blurry and apart from that, he was significantly faster than he had been earlier and also felt a powerful urge to kill humans.
Ahead he could see the numbers of the Stone beetles were lessening. The primal roar echoed once more, Luke didn’t need to look behind, he actually couldn’t, but he was quite certain that the iron ape had left the cave and was most likely after the Stone Beetle colony.
Luke moved past the first Stone beetle, then the next, as he used natural manuevring instincts to out run them. The type of instincts one possessed having walked through crowdy areas too many times. Ahead was a large hole, large enough to fit at least one stone beetle.
Behind him, Luke could already hear the sound of cracking stones as the iron ape smashed through the Stone beetles without pause.
’Does it know I escaped with them?’
The iron ape edged closer, destroying the Stone beetles in it path.
The thought crossed through Luke’s mind subtly, he couldn’t shrug it off, his Stone Beetle heart thumped loudly as he closed in on the hole.
*Smash!*
The ground behind Luke opened and three stone beetles aimed for the hole, the rest of the stone beetles, were pushed to the sides along with rock splinters...
**
The moon shone through a hole into a cave that stood at almost three hundred feet upwards, The walls of the cave were made of moss stones and jagged basalt, glowing faintly with bioluminescent fungi and ore that traced patterns like constellations on the rock. Massive, gnarled stalactites hang like gothic chandeliers, and towering stalagmites rose like spires from the cave floor.
The air was cool and mist heavy, high on one of the sheer rock walls, about hundred feet above the floor, was a perfectly round, dark tunnel, and a blowhole poured forth a torrent of clear, cold water. This water crashed down, a sculpted, multi-tiered waterfall into the pool below. The roar of the water echoed through the entire chamber, mixing with the gentle drip of condensation.
Inside the water, were hundreds of unmoving Stone beetles, in their midst one of the Stone beetle’s red glinting eyes fluttered open.