Chapter 42: The Red Harvest
Frank crouched low, his cloak fluttering softly in the quiet breeze, still damp from sweat and blood. The battle with the vines had left his ribs aching, but he wasn't done here. Not yet.
On the ground, where his sword had met flesh—or whatever it was the vines were made of—several severed tendrils lay twitching. They no longer moved violently, but they still pulsed faintly with residual energy. He picked one up, feeling a tingle of vitality crawl up his fingers. Not mana, not life-force exactly, but something primal.
Carefully, he packed the red vines into his spatial ring, sealing their presence in an isolated spatial pocket. Then he turned his eyes upward.
The fruit still hung from the blood-vine's swollen knots, glowing like crimson lanterns with purple edges forming like bruises. Each one pulsed faintly, like a heartbeat. They're ready.
Frank waited, hidden behind a collapsed stone archway, masked his presence with the same care he used when stalking predators.
Minutes passed. Then came movement.
A rustle. A giggle. Then… a monkey.
Frank blinked.
It wasn't like any monkey he'd seen before. Its fur shimmered between grey and violet under the garden's twin suns. Intelligent eyes scanned the vines. Its grin split wide—almost too wide.
Frank watched, motionless, as the monkey dashed up the vine like a ghost. The blood-vines whipped and lashed violently, sensing a threat—but the monkey danced around them. With deft fingers and unmatched speed, it plucked the fruits, one by one, storing them in the small woven satchel strapped to its back.
The vines hissed and slashed harder, but the monkey only grinned wider.
It turned, mid-air, and for the briefest moment, locked eyes with Frank.
Frank's breath caught.
He had erased his aura. He was silent. Invisible. Hidden behind seven layers of a fold . But the monkey saw him.
And worse—it smiled at him knowingly. Mockingly.
Then, it rode a branch like a wave, vaulted onto a nearby boulder, and vanished into the deeper jungle.
Frank remained frozen.
"So… it harvests them regularly," he whispered, frowning. "And it's done this before. Many times."
Now it made sense. When he'd first found the vines, they were bare. Someone—or something—had gotten there before him.
But not this time.
He had a plan.
He would feed the vine. Trick it into producing more fruit.
And then… he would take what he needed.
No more hesitation.
He remembered a colony of Rank 3 crimson ants he had passed earlier—hostile, territorial, and vindictive. Killing one would bring a swarm, but it was a price worth paying.
Frank tracked a hunting party from the colony, waited until the smallest patrol diverged near a spring, and struck with precision. He moved like a blade of thought—silent, lethal.
The largest ant—nearly the size of a boar—shrieked as his blade pierced its core. Blood steamed from its wound. Its psychic death cry rolled through the earth.
He didn't waste a moment.
Frank dragged the still-warm body to the blood-vines and threw it at their base.
The vines reacted instantly. With eerie grace, they surged forward, wrapping around the ant's corpse and dragging it inward. Tendrils punctured carapace and eyes, draining it. The corpse shriveled and cracked like burnt bark.
The first fruit budded within minutes.
Then came the real test.
The crimson ant colony responded. Dozens, then hundreds, of smaller ants swarmed into the clearing, their screeches echoing like grinding glass. They saw the corpse. They saw the vines.
And they attacked.
Frank watched from his perch.
The vines writhed like demons unleashed. The clearing became a battlefield of blood, chitin, and root. Ants poured in from underground, some bursting from the soil, some climbing trees and leaping down like suicidal commandos.
But the vines were faster now. Stronger. Every death fed it more. The fruits bloomed larger, darker. That purple tinge deepened—rich, royal, intoxicating.
Then came the Rank 3 workers—larger, armored, coordinated.
The vines met them with new techniques: spiked barbs, piercing darts, acid-laced whips. The battlefield became a massacre.
Frank narrowed his eyes. "Too much power," he whispered. "If it absorbs all of them…"
He felt it happening.
The vines' aura was swelling—compressing under its own weight. Mana was folding inward. The rank-up was close.
He couldn't let it reach Rank 4. If it did, he'd never get near it again.
But the ants were unrelenting.
Then everything stopped.
The jungle fell silent.
Every beast that had been watching from the trees, the shadows, the cliffs—went still.
Frank turned sharply.
Rank 4 soldiers had arrived and their fury shone like the name crimson ant they gave off heat as moved and looked like blood flowing rapidly they attacked with fury. The vine desperate absorbed the fruits it had produced and that al it needed to be rank four. But that was just a trickle for the ant attacked with more vigor for ,The Ant Queen had arrived.
She didn't walk. She glided, carried on a throne of living workers. Her body was twice the size of a warhorse, her mandibles etched with runes. Rank 5.
She came with her Elite Guard—four armored titans glowing with pale red fury.
Frank's heart dropped. Even the beasts that had been spectating began to back away. The monkey reappeared, perched on a tree, watching the new development.
It shook its head slowly.
Even it—mischievous, powerful, fearless—knew better than to get involved now.