“Shit! What are those things?!”

  “I don’t know, sir. They sort of look like those weird Earth creatures that the genemother made… Wait, one of them’s flying towards us!”

  The pilot of the military aircraft squinted as the animal flapped its skeletal wings as it flew towards them in a jittering motion. But as it came towards them, it soon became clear just how large it was compared to normal. It fluttered over towards them.

  But it was far more massive than any Earth bat that the pilot had ever seen before. It was nearly four feet long with an even larger wingspan with its strange wings and hair over its body.

  The pilot looked down at his console as several warning lights started flashing.

  “Sir, that things sending high pitched sounds at us. Beyond human hearing. Ship thinks that it’s a hostile scan us…”

  The bat lost interest in them and faced its head another direction and paused for another moment.

  It quickly turned and tucked its wings and dived downwards at an angle towards the ground.

  The pilot shifted the shift to see what it was diving for only to see a figure in black fleeing from the Immortal history building. With a burst of gunfire they fired at something in the building behind them.

  Before the pilot could react the large bat completely ambushed the man from behind and plowed into his back from above. The small claws at the end of its wings grabbed the black clothed man by the shoulders as it opened its mouth and sank the sudden large fangs in its mouth into the figure’s neck.

  A second later dozens of small lizards came pouring out of the building and started piling onto the black clothed man and consuming him even as he thrashed to dislodge the large bat that was convulsing like a vampire sucking the blood our of its victim.

  “S-Sir?” the gunner with the mounted machine gun stammered, “W-What should we do?”

  “That guy’s screwed,” the pilot said after a moment, “Calling for permission to fire. Command? You seeing this?”

  There was a pause on the radio for a moment before there was a reply, “Permission granted Delta zero. Clear the musuem of any hostiles… Human or otherwise.”

  “Confirmed.”

  The pilot glanced at the gunner who nodded back. The man below had gone still as the animals kept tearing the body.

  The aircraft opened fire and the three others hovering around the edge of the property did the same a few seconds later. The powerful bullets tore up the ground and killed the animals latched onto the man.

  The three aircraft circled the property and systematically fired on any strange looking creature that seemed to systematically hunting down and mutilating the men wearing black that were holed up in the various buildings.

  “Command, how long do we have left before we get ground support?” the pilot asked the radio after there weren’t any more sightings of beast or living human for over a minute, “We still have motion and a lot of movement in the buildings. Especially the living exhibit building. That thing is completely lit up with all sorts of activity. I can’t get a good visual of what’s happening in there.”

  “We’ve been informed by witnesses that there are at least four Immortals among the humans who invaded the museum,” Command replied, “These creatures seemed solely focused on eliminating them and their allies by their accounts. Change in orders. Retreat to the borders of the property and patrol. Eliminate anything that attempts to leave. We’ll be forming a perimeter and focused on containment for now.”

  “Uh, sir? Some of these things are small,” the pilot replied, “Swarms of lizards of some kind smaller than my hand at best. Do we have containment of something like that?”

  There was some swearing over the radio for a moment before it cut off.

  A few seconds later it clicked on with the tail end of someone yelling.

  “Blast anything that moves at the perimeter for the next five minutes. The containment shield should be up after that. Prepare to fall back to the exterior in t-minus five. Confirm?”

  “Confirm,” the pilot said before drawing back his aircraft to circle the edge of the museum’s large estate. He waited for movement as he circled, but everything was contained to the buildings for now.

  Three minutes left until the shield activated. The pilot could see the uniformed soldiers setting up generators and clearing a perimeter to install the containment shield in a hurry.

  The pilot’s head snapped to the display as there was a sudden lurch of movement inside the living exhibit building. There was a large shift as what had been one seething mass of creatures split into smaller groups and charged at what the pilot could clearly see was a fleeing naked male human.

  Behind him was a horror show of enraged and mutated animals charging after him and only a few seconds behind.

  Even as the pilot watched an animal that he vaguely recognized as an Earth deer lowered its antlers and charged forward with its massive pointed antlers sitting above its head. Somehow the creature bounded forward far in front of the rest in a blur of motion so fast that it almost left an afterimage of a streak of motion from behind it.

  As the naked man fled the deer lowered its head and tossed it upward right as it reached the man, goring him and piercing through his back with the sharp antlers.

  The man squirmed and screamed as the Earth deer lifted him into the air and then shook its head to the side to send the man falling to the side. The rest of the animals caught up as the man lay on the ground, his momentum stopped from the attack from behind.

  There were so many that the pilot had trouble picking individual ones out of the crowd well. The deer nimbly jumped in the air and twisted to face the man again and charged with its head lowered again. The apparently uninjured man who must be an Immortal tried to roll away, but the deer lifted him up again and tossed him to the same side as before.

  A side that just happened to be in the middle of the rest of the charging menagerie of rampaging creatures.

  The spot in the grass where the Immortal landed immediately became a scene of chaos as the mass of varied creatures all jostled and fought to reach the Immortal in the center and continue to injure him.

  The animals weren’t exactly antagonistic with each other, but if another got in its way then they would briefly fight or push past each other in their eagerness to attack the naked Immortal man.

  “Command, you seeing this?” the pilot said a little numbly as the Immortal was torn to pieces and regenerated over and over again. But the man’s flailing occasionally injured one of his attackers or crushed one of the smaller attackers. So somehow inevitably the swarm around him was diminishing even with all the seemingly miraculous assorted abilities and power that all the Earth animals seemed to possess in their efforts to attack him.

  “We see it Delta zero,” the radio answered, “Shield up in one minute. Begin to fall back. We’ll deal with whatever… that is later. Hopefully the Immortal Enforcers will get off their asses for once and help deal with this…”

  “Confirmed, command,” the pilot said as he and the rest of the vehicles fell back out of the range of the shield. Thirty seconds later the shield activated, its shimmering surface arcing over the whole area as the shield generators and their power sources activated.

  With such a large area the shield would be weak, but hopefully it would be enough to deal with some mindless animals…

  Although the pilot felt himself doubt himself as he kept circling the perimeter with his vehicle. With what he’d already seen what those creatures be capable of already, who knew if they’d be able to break the shield or not when they put their mind to it…

  — — —

  “Captain, there’s been an update for the attack on the Museum of Renewal. It seems… The reports are rather fantastical, sir. I’m not sure if I we should take them at face value. They are rather… crazed.”

  Entiru turned to the man standing next to him on the heavy military transport and frowned.

  “Now? Right after Malketh ran off? Could they be connected? What do you mean, crazed?”

  “Unsure, sir. We’re still ten minutes from arrival. We have reports of mutated Earth creatures with strange forms and size emerging from the living exhibit building and hunting down and killing the human attackers while avoiding the museum staff. They have video. An unknown Immortal helped extract the genemother and save the staff that he could. Description matches Malketh, but no confirmation yet that it was actually him.”

  “And the attackers?” Entiru said, ignoring the reports of the strange animals. He would deal with whatever that was when he could confirm things with his own eyes. Video was always so fickle, so easy to create fabrications that needed an expert to verify if they were real or not. No use in seeing the video until he had a possibility in believing whatever it would show him.

  “Still unknown. They were… ruthless Captain. Main goal seems to be the Genemother and the museum’s accumulated funds. Executed and killed many of the staff both to motivate the genemother in giving them the passwords to the accounts, as well as seemingly randomly in the other buildings. There’s some confusion on the accounts. Some survivors report being huddled together into groups, while other reports the attackers opening fire on the civilians as soon as they saw them with their heavy weapons. And one last thing… There are reports of Immortals among their number. At least six, but there could be more scattered across the building. Four were with the genemother among the first appearance of the strange animals. Even now the animals are… causing all six of the Immortals to regenerate over and over from their combined assaults.”

  “Six?!” Entiru demanded as he slammed a fist into the metal wall of the transport angrily, “Six Immortals! Maybe more? An attack on the genemother and her family? Inconceivable! They will pay! After everything she’s done for us they spit on her face like this? Hurt her despite them supposed to know better with their long lives? Who are they? Do we have any descriptions?”

  “N-Not yet, Captain,” the Enforcer stammered, slightly intimidated as Entiru’s anger at the situation boiled over, “No matches yet.”

  Entiru calmed himself slightly and lifted his fist away from the slightly dented wall.

  “Sorry. Can’t believe Immortals would do something like this,” he apologized, “Maybe some mortals who are ignorant or stupid enough somehow to not know. But for Immortals who should know better to do something like this…”

  “We’ll get them, sir. They’ll pay for what they’ve done.”

  Entiru nodded firmly and took a deep breath before firming his resolve, “Let’s get into the exosuits. I want those traitors to Gaia in our possession as soon as possible. Strange animals or not, I won’t risk losing them.”

  “Of course. We’re almost there. But prepare yourself, Captain. These creatures will present a tough fight if they turn their attention to us.”

  Entiru nodded, “Noted. Make sure the other Enforcer teams come with the restraints. I want absolutely no mistakes on this.”

  — — —

  Entiru fired his heavy weapon at the deer currently charging at him with its head lowered. In a flash it hopped to the side out of the path of his fire and resumed its attack completely uninterrupted. Something about its movement was unnatural, yet there was nothing specifically about it that Entiru could pinpoint as the source.

  Entiru dragged his weapon to the side but the horned Earth deer crashed into him with its antlers. Even in the exosuit the hard blow caused him to take a half step back. But he turned his weapon upward and before the Earth deer could leap out of the way again he fired his weapon into it and managed several powerful shots into its torso. It fell to the ground dead, Entiru’s blast at close range finishing it off.

  He looked up from his small duel with the creature to see five other Enforcers in exosuits had pushed forward with the nimble creature distracted and reached the thrashing Immortal at the center of the mass of clawing creatures.

  One of them reached inside and pulled the naked woman out and put her over his shoulder in the exosuit.

  They immediately made a run for it as the dozens or remaining creatures charged after them and screeched in rage from having their prize stolen from them.

  After a fighting retreat to the edge of the containment field, they left and the assembled military might behind them opened a gap that shredded the creatures that had dared to chase after the group. They quickly went through and carried the last woman out of the shield and closed it behind them.

  The panting woman that they’d just extracted was roughly thrown to the ground and locked up by metal bands and cuffs meant to hold Immortals in place.

  It would be time to enter the Living Exhibit building itself soon. There should be two more Immortals in there at least. All of the mortal attackers had been killed and brutalized by the maddened creatures, leaving only the Immortals left. That woman had been the fourth Immortal that they’d captured. The others seemed to have been able to scatter somewhat even if the smaller groups of creatures followed them out of the main building to keep attacking and brutalizing them in a futile attempt to kill them.

  The whole areas where the four Immortals had been pinned down by the animals were literal bloodbaths, the Immortal bodies being torn to pieces coating the grass red alongside the dead bodies of the creatures fallen either to the Enforcers guns or the thrashing Immortal’s acidic regenerating limbs after they were injured.

  That left two more of the Immortals that had been seen that were still in the writhing mass of animals and heat signatures inside of the museum. And it was time to go out and get them back.

  A smattering of a few smaller rats scratched on the edge of the shield as a larger squad of Enforcers gathered themselves in the exosuits. In this emergency, Entiru had called on almost their entire force of over a hundred Enforcers to come assist them. They didn’t have that many exosuits available, but the local military had been kind enough to lend them the extra hardware.

  The other Immortals and the exosuits for them would be here in a half hour. Until then, all Entiru could do was wait for them to arrive. Actually, there was one more thing that he could do…

  “What’s the news on the unknown Immortal and identifying the attackers?”

  “Nothing on the attackers,” Entiru’s second command said from next to him as he watched his squad drag the confused captured Immortal over to the others that had been brought out in preparation for transport to the Immortal prison, “Nothing on our database at least. The mortal governments are still discussing and running their own searches. They might catch something that we missed if these Immortals have been pretending to be mortals to fly under our radar. Malketh lasted a long time without being caught when he did it, I’m sure that there’s more like him out there…”

  “And what of Malketh? Is he the mysterious Immortal that worked to save the civilians?” Entiru asked.

  “It’s confirmed to be him. We have footage and eyewitness accounts. Although he’s missing. Left as soon as he confirmed that everyone was being treated properly at the hospital. Somehow he’s disappeared from all surveillance systems. The mortal governments are running a manhunt for him right now.”

  Entiru grunted, “He has a lot explaining to do. However he’s involved he better come back soon before I start thinking he was working with these attackers somehow.”

  “You think it could be him?”

  “It could. But he seems decent enough. You never know though. So we’ll see what he has to say when they find him.”

  “Do you think that…”

  Suddenly all the creatures scratching at the containment shield changed all at once. Their bodies rippled like the surface of a placid lake that had a thrown into it. Entiru’s second in command cut himself off as they both stared at the strange phenomenon with wide eyes at the clearly supernatural event.

  The rippling settled down and all the creatures had changed. Altered. They were bigger, sharper claws. The rodents' claws were now dripping a clear liquid from their tips as they continued in their attacks.

  “C-Captain? Did they just get stronger?”

  Reading on this site? This novel is published elsewhere. Support the author by seeking out the original.

  The shield started flickering as a large Earth bird’s beak pierced through the shield slightly as it pecked forward.

  “The shield should hold,” Entiru said even as he eyed the smattering of animals attacking the shield in unison. It started flickering and fuzzing in certain sections even if the damage healed over again after a few moments.

  “Until reinforcements arrive at least,” he added, “And maybe we should get the mortals to add a few more generators to reinforce it…”

  — — —

  It was time. All of the Enforcers except for the still missing Malketh were here and wearing the loaned and armed exosuits for the assault.

  The shields had been reinforced three times now and the animals forms had rippled unnaturally twice, increasing their strength.

  The mortals were in a bit of a panic as they saw the creature’s strength increasing in such little time, worried about what would happen when they broke out.

  The captured Immortals had been taken away to the Immortal prison for the moment until this situation was under control and each of them could face judgement by the whole Immortal Council.

  The hundred exosuits lined up in front of the shield with their weapons at the ready. With so many of them this assault should be easy, Entiru thought as he saw the couple dozen animals of various sizes scratching at the shield even with their power.

  The shield fell and the mortal military behind them unleashed their full might into the gap. And unlike last time… some of the creatures survived. One of the rats slipped right past the gap of the open shield and darted to the side. Before anyone could stop it, it leapt towards one of the men with the guns and slashed out with its claws dripping with clear liquid.

  The man hit with the swipe stiffened and fell to the ground foaming at the mouth, and the animal managed to attack three more soldiers before a lucky bullet managed to hit it mid leap and kill it with a single hit.

  The birds were hit with precision lasers that had been brought out and mounted on the ground in big boxes with humming generators behind them. The birds fell out of the air roasted after a few seconds of the high powered lasers frying them before they could escape.

  A few more of the smaller lizards or mice caused havoc among the mortals behind them as the soldiers struggled to shoot them with their weapons once they reached their formerly organized lines.

  Although the men who had been paralyzed by the rats’ poison weren’t dead yet, so if all went well they shouldn’t die just yet.

  But Entiru and the other Enforcers ignored the chaos behind them and charged forward through the gap. The mortals could deal with it by themselves, they had a mission to accomplish.

  The pounding of their feet shook the ground as all a hundred of them ran forward in their exosuits and carrying their weapons.

  Eyes of animals looked out through the windows at the noise as creatures with blood stained maws inspected them curiously, not aggressive at all as they watched them go by.

  They reached the Living exhibit building quickly and saw a high concentration of creatures inside. They could hear the screeches and growls inside like that of a massive brawl inside.

  They spread out in a circle around the building, squads of twenty preparing to enter a different door as discussed before.

  Entiru and the most dedicated of the Knights were in Entiru’s squad as they waited a full minute to get into position before breaching.

  Just as Entiru burst through the front door his heart dropped as he saw the forms of all the animals in the area rippling and morphing as their power somehow upgraded again.

  All eyes in the room turned to Entiru and his squad as they opened fire with their weapons. The whole horde of creatures instantly grew hostile and charged towards them. Their barrage of bullets did surprisingly little to the animals whose skin was either scaled or extremely thick to resist the impact from the bullets.

  Entiru stumbled as a swarm of over forty small lizards near the floor bulged their throats outward and then spat a greenish liquid towards his squad.

  Entiru raised his left arm as the wave of greenish liquid washed over him and started sizzling through the metal. Entiru eyed the acid eating through his military grade armor like it was burning paper.

  Then the other four squads entered the room and fired their own weapons as well from all sides. The creatures split, their concentrated charge at Entiru and his squad broken by confusion as they all split off to attack the different squads.

  Entiru tossed his dissolving machine gun to the side as it started melting from the little lizards’ acid. He reached to his belt and took out the single canister sitting there.

  “Grenades! Now while they’re distracted!” Entiru shouted before arming his grenade and throwing it into the center mass of the horde of altered Earth creatures. A moment later his own squad followed suit and let loose with their own grenades. Entiru’s left arm started freezing up and he hissed in pain as the acid started dripping through his armor and directly onto his regenerating skin.

  The grenades went off all at once at the center of the horde and killed the vast majority of them with the combined blast. The other squads were holding their own, although some individuals were panicking and firing their weapons wildly the creatures got into melee range and started removing large chunks of their armor with only a few angry swipes of their claws.

  With no weapons and a disabled exosuit arm, Entiru rotated to the back of his squad and observed the battle clinically and began issuing orders over the suit radios to the squads to help them work together more efficiently. They’d never expected to encounter military style combat like this, so most of the Enforcers were inexperienced with how to work together.

  But after nearly four minutes of constant combat and stress later, the last of the horde had finally been defeated, down to the smallest lizards. Although out of all of them those had been the most dangerous as they skittered into corners and under debris before ambushing them from unexpected angles.

  If the creatures had been working together… then they might have not won, Entiru suddenly realized somberly. Even now more than half of the exosuits were partially or fully disabled, their Immortals forced to eject from the armor or not be of much use in combat anymore.

  But the creatures were defeated and after waiting for another minute with their guns pointed outward, no more approached to attack them.

  Entiru quickly moved towards the center of the chaos towards the pile of unrecognizable animal bodies lying there and saw that his second command had pulled another naked woman Immortal from the goop. She was thrashing and shouting with panic in her eyes as she looked around to the group of Enforcers in and out of exosuits glowering at her in disgust.

  “Where’s the second one?” Entiru asked quickly as he glanced around to look for any more movement in the piles of gore.

  “No sign of them, Captain. She’s the only one we can find.”

  Entiru grunted in frustration before shaking his head in the exosuit.

  “Off we go then. Let’s get out of here. Enforcers! Make sure to carry your unsuited comrades with you. Leave any gear here. Alright, moving out in ten seconds. Go go go!”

  The Enforcers out of their exosuits quickly scrambled to find partners in their squad to carry them on the journey back outside. The terrorist was handed over to one of the Enforcers with an exosuit that still seemed to be relatively undamaged.

  The ten were seconds were up and they started jogging forward.

  “Captain!” Entiru put his hand to his ear as he got a transmission from the military outside.

  “Yes?”

  “Watch out! There’s a massive creature coming your way! Drawn by the explosions we think!”

  “How big?” Entiru asked as he glanced around warily.

  “It’s…”

  Before the man finished talking, the question was answered by the beast itself rounding the corner of the building in front of him.

  “Holy Gaia!” Entiru cursed as the whole group came to a stop as they saw the massive beast expose its full form, “Is that a dragon?”

  The Earth lizard was massive at over forty feet long and covered in thick greenish scales that were whitish on its underbelly and dark on its top side.

  It opened its massive jaw filled with jagged sharp teeth and hissed so loudly that the whole group was forced to take a step back from the force of the sound.

  The Earth creature connected in Entiru’s mind a moment before the creature charged at them with its massive bulk. It was a crocodile. A massive crocodile.

  “Dodge! To the sides! Open fire on it!” Entiru called as he followed his own advice and ran perpendicular to the path the crocodile was charging.

  The crocodile opened its jaws wide and leaped forward and closed them around the naked woman and the Enforcer in the exosuit carrying her. The Enforcer in the exosuit had frozen in place in fear as the giant beast of legend descended upon her.

  The crocodile swallowed the two of them with a single gulp metal and all, its heavy scales barely even being scratched by the gunfire of the exosuits that were still functional. Several of the Enforcers threw their grenades at the crocodile’s feet and they exploded. The explosions caused the reptile’s feet and lower legs to be singed slightly, but nothing more than superficial damage. And despite its bulk the creature was pressed so low to the ground that it barely even stumbled even when its legs were slightly injured by the grenades.

  The crocodile hissed angrily and swung around suddenly and slapped three exosuits with its large thick tail as it slapped them full force even as it struck with its jaws to bite two more exosuits directly in front of it in half, leaving only their lower torsos and legs behind.

  The three exosuits went flying into the air with a crunch of crumpling metal and shouts of surprise.

  The crocodile hissed angrily and opened its jaws slightly before swiveling its head again and attempting to bite another Enforcer in an exosuit nearby and tail whipping two more exosuits behind it in the process.

  Entiru put his hand up to his ear and hesitated. What could they do? This thing seemed practically invincible and their group was already heavily damaged from their last fight.

  Then the alligator’s form began to ripple like it was within water and Entiru’s eyes widened.

  “Air support!” he cried over the radio, “Air support now! Drop the shields, kill it before it gets stronger!”

  There was shouting on the other line leading to the outside, but as the crocodile’s form grew from forty feet to over fifty feet, a strong voice cut through the noise on the other side and started taking command.

  The shield above them shut off and there was a distinctive roar of an engine above them before a barrage of explosives sprayed across the back of the crocodile.

  The explosions bit deep into the animal’s back even as its surface kept rippling furiously as it grew in size.

  The ripples stopped and revealed a much larger animal with a few dislodged scales and a few others scorched black around where there had been a direct hit. But even then the actual wounds into the creature’s skin were shallow and only lightly bleeding.

  More missiles came roaring down from the sky to hit the massive crocodile and it loudly hissed again before turning and started running away.

  Everyone paused for a moment as they watched the fleeing creature in shock for a moment.

  Entiru thought back to the layout of the property to try to imagine where the creature could be going. It clicked after a long moment. The lake! It was going to hide in the lake under the water.

  It was a bit big to stay in there, but the water might soothe its burns and blunt some of the impacts from the missiles above if it pressed itself right to the bottom…

  “Let’s go,” Entiru called out loudly as he glanced around the battered group of Immortals loosely scattered around from when they had dodged the crocodile’s charge.

  “Retreat before that thing comes back.”

  The Enforcers paused but after a few more moments of watching over the fleeing crocodile being bombarded from the skies, they all started running again to the edge of the containment shield.

  They managed to reach it and a few seconds later the section of the shield opened and let them through. Entiru looked behind him as he heard more explosions and saw that the mortals had managed to open a large hole in the top of the shield while keeping the portions at the ground somewhat activated still.

  They had all made it back, except for their actual target and the Enforcer that had been swallowed along with her.

  But they needed a break to regroup and let the mortals find them some new gear. It would take some serious firepower to defeat that massive creature.

  — — —

  “It’s been four hours. The creatures’ mutated over six times since its first appearance. I still think we should just drop an antimatter bomb on the place, kill it for good before it gets any more dangerous.”

  “That place represents our history, over a thousand years. We can’t just destroy it!” Entiru insisted, “The bombardments are doing its work. It’s floundering and its outgrown the lake by now. A few more hours and we’ll take it out.”

  “Yes, we thought the same right before it started regenerating its hard outer scales after it was damaged. We can’t take any risks anymore. We have to kill it now before it gets stronger.”

  “Just a few hours then we can discuss more lethal options, I can feel that we’re clo…”

  “General, there’s been a change,” one of the analysts to the side called, “The creature’s rolling around as if in pain. It doesn’t appear to be from the bombardment. Something else…”

  The two of them went over and watched the live feed and watched the crocodile thrashing and rolling through the singed and torn up dirt beneath it as it moved.

  The missile barrage lightened so they could gain a better view of whatever was happening in more detail. After a few minutes a human form suddenly slid out of a hole right in the crocodile’s belly like a worm emerging from a rotten fruit. Right behind the woman a few seconds later a second female Immortal also emerged from a different point as they wriggled for a moment before falling to the ground while completely covered in thick mats of reddish gore and what looked like sizzling stomach acid.

  The crocodile roared in pain and flipped over again as it flailed and pressed the two women into the dirt beneath it from the motion even as its two large wounds in its underside started bleeding heavily and leak strong stomach acid onto the ground and burned its flesh around the large wounds.

  The two women recovered themselves and started making a run for it away from the crocodile and out from beneath its legs. They managed to make it out and started sprinting towards the edge of the containment field towards the assorted soldiers and Enforcers guarding the perimeter.

  The crocodile noticed them and despite its wounds immediately stopped its thrashing and flipped itself over onto its feet. It twisted to face the two fleeing women covered in gore, its back scorched black and severely burned from the hours-long assault from the skies.

  It opened its mouth and charged towards them at massive speeds, its footsteps shaking the ground as it charged. Entiru heard panicked shouting over the radio from the perimeter as the containment shields that had been continually reinforced for this whole time flared brightly in preparation for impact.

  One of the Immortals dodged out of the way as the crocodile’s jaws snapped closed and swallowed one of the fleeing women in a single bite. The creature thrashed its head around for a bit before swallowing. At the same time the woman who had dodged stood to her bare feet and fled towards the containment shield again.

  The crocodile focused on her after swallowing its first victim and charged again. The Immortal women were nearly at the edge of the containment shield and waving at the people on the other side desperately for them to let them through.

  They did not lower the shields and in fact strengthened them as the crocodile charged again as the woman turned around and observed the charging lizard in horror. Entiru couldn’t tell through the gore and chaos if it was Kasumi, his Enforcer, yet or one of the attackers of the museum.

  The crocodile snapped its jaws around the woman that Entiru could now see had firmed her stance and seemed to be shouting something defiantly at the massive creature poised to swallow her whole.

  The creature’s jaws closed with a snap and it continued its charge for a moment. It hit the shield with a heavy impact and after a moment of a high pitched whine, the shield failed and the crocodile kept moving through.

  All the mortals and Enforcers shouted in alarm and started firing their weapons indiscriminately at the beast even as everyone beat a hasty retreat as the giant beast stood only a short distance away.

  The crocodile flinched even as the gunfire barely damaged its gleaming green scales and thick leathery skin. It shut its eyes from the barrage of gunfire but mostly ignored the people around it as its throat swallowed heavily as if choking on its meal. Something was happening in there.

  — — —

  Kasumi clawed at the sides of the giant crocodiles massive throat for dear life as the fleshy walls compressed around her and tried to force her into its stomach again. She was utterly panicked as all her struggles and flailing only slowed her descent rather than helping her climb back out to freedom.

  Then right as her panic reached a peak and she was almost mindlessly flailing around a strange coolness washed over her. And suddenly she wasn’t panicked anymore and all her emotions seemed dull and far away.

  Just like before when she’d been panicking in the creature’s stomach and seen the other woman using her dissolving hands to press into the flesh around them and start carving a hole down through the animal around them.

  Kasumi had to do something similar to escape here. Without knowing what else she could do, Kasume opened her mouth and bit hard on the fleshy walls above her even as she spread eagled to wedge her arms and legs against the fleshy walls as best as she could. She let out a muffled scream of pain as her teeth broke and ripped out of her skull as the fleshy walls of the crocodile’s throat undulated around her again.

  But it had worked, and when her ruined face regenerated it was half buried in the flesh. The crocodile hissed in pain and Kasumi opened her mouth slightly and bit down again. The walls pressed inwards and only her dull emotionless state let her continue as the pain grew overwhelming as her face was brutalized once again.

  But she had sunk even deeper this time. Bite by bite, she carved deeper into the base of the beast’s throat, its own attempts to swallow her injuring her and wedging her even more firmly into place.

  The flesh didn’t dissolve inside her mouth so her jaw was forced half open as it filled with gore until she half closed it again to help herself worm deeper into the creature.

  Everything was so dark, and her eyes were closed as they were coated in blood again.

  The crocodile let out another pained hiss and Kasumi could feel it flailing and rolling around again even as it seemed to try to dislodge her. Eventually Kasumi reached something hard and white that cracked her teeth when she bit down on it with full force.

  Yet just like the rest of the flesh, the bone dissolved away like it wasn’t even there as the thrashing of the beast threw her body around and forced her head to wedge into the gap.

  The thrashing started to subside as she kept moving and dissolving more flesh that was goopier and softer. The brain. Her mind dimly noted that she was digging through the creature’s brain right now. She hit bone again and dissolved through it. She was going slower now that the crocodile’s violent thrashing had settled down to the occasional violent twitch.

  Kasumi kept going, in her emotionless and focused state only her goal of escaping the creature mattered. She could feel a faint sense of her panic and claustrophobia coming back in a rising tide even now. She had to get out before it overwhelmed her again.

  The crocodile had gone still, but Kasumi’s bites and thrashing still managed to let her move upwards through the loose flesh until she reached the final barrier of the scales.

  Her panic and claustrophobia was becoming more and more intense as her strange state from before quickly began to fade. She knew that just through these scales was freedom and sunlight from this fleshy prison, but she wasn’t being injured anymore. The crocodile had stopped moving and no matter how her fingers scrabbled against the underside of the hard scales she couldn’t get through.

  Her panic and desperation kept rising as she began furiously punching and scraping at the scale above her in a frenzy fruitlessly until there was a sharp pain in her hands and she started making some progress as a small divot formed in the bloody scale trapping her in this place.

  She punched and scratched harder and faster as her heart beat in her throat and her breath came in short rapid bursts. She couldn’t even breathe properly through the flesh choking her throat and even now forcing her jaw to remain open at its maximum extension just before the point where it would turn from profoundly uncomfortable to painful.

  Finally her injured fist dissolved through the last section of scale and punched through into open air.

  She immediately stuck her hands in and worked to open the gap and crawl out at maximum desperate speed.

  She crawled out and collapsed outside into open air and quickly spat out the glob of flesh crammed tightly into her throat to the side.

  She heaved shuddering breaths and hugged the cold scales beneath her in relief as she felt the open air around her. Her breathing slowed as she slowly calmed down and her brain finally began allowing other thoughts besides relief of finally getting out.

  Kasumi sat up and blinked as she saw that she was sitting on top of the massive lizard’s head and there were hundreds of people in a circle around staring at her. She turned around and saw the massive hold that her body had drilled mostly upwards from the beast’s throat through its brain and out of the top. She looked back forward and realized that the beast’s body was completely still.

  Oh.

  She had killed it.

  “Kasumi Nagato. Dragonslayer,” she whispered to herself. Then she started giggling madly and ignored all the people watching her.

  Her laughter soon turned to crying as the trauma from what had just happened to her washed over her.

  But she had done it. Kasumi Nagato, only real dragonslayer in history. If this lizard didn’t deserve the title, then she wasn’t sure what would…