Good things always come to an end. When we approached the final room of the second floor it looked entirely different than the rooms before it. The room had a total of 15 of the flying variety of the ants. The flew around in the air, observing an army beneath them. There was at least 80 of the ground type ants on the floor.

No matter how you sliced it this was going to be a difficult fight. I quickly retreated and relayed the information to Hylia. We discussed briefly and decided the previous strategy would be the most effective. I was to take out the Flyers before we engaged the ground troops. Hylia would be unable to handle the large group by herself, and would need my a.s.sistance.

With a plan in place I quickly headed back into the room. Before attacking I did a survey around the room, and noticed that the ants would occasionally approach a large underground pond for a drink.

Before commencing my attack I made a quick trip to the pond. I slipped into it quietly, casting several [sleeping poison] spells before reactivating stealth and leaving the pond.

The timer still had over two hours on it, so I returned to Hylia, telling her of the change in plans. She nodded, agreeing to wait for a total of 20 minutes to allow for my poison to effect as many of the ants as possible.

The rest was very welcome after constantly fighting and moving for the last hour and a half. When I pulled a jug of water from my inventory Hylia's eyes widened in surprise, but gratefully took the offered drink. The 20 minutes pa.s.sed quickly, and I soon returned to the room containing the ant army. To my surprise over half of the ants had already been poisoned, including 5 of the Flyers.

The flyer had noticed something was wrong, and were flying even more vigilantly through the cave. I carefully maintained my stealth as I prepared to strike.

I did not have to wait long before an opportunity presented itself. A single flyer drew close as it was inspecting the army. I quickly fired off a total of 5 shots. 4 from my my hand and one from my off hand. The bullets struck true, leaving small gaping holes of the flying beast.

My body appeared briefly after the attack, but I had taken refuge behind the body of a sleeping ant. I entered stealth right after my stealth had been broken. That brief moment of my appearance had been sensed by the ants that remained awake, and they looked around for the presence they felt. Several other flying ants had flown over, forming a protective circle around their wounded comrade.

This did not matter to me, as the poison from my bullets was already eating away at the ant. I quietly moved to another area before repeating the process, choosing and ant that was slightly further away from the rest.

The process took almost 15 minutes to complete. But finally The last of the awake flying ants were dead. Before I went to get Hylia I decided to take care of the remaining flyer that were asleep. After all any surprises could make this experience fatal.

With my task complete, I retrieved Hylia. We focused first on those ants who were still awake. Do to my recent activities they noticed Hylia right away, and several globs of acidic poison were shot towards her. She did an amazing job at dodging, but with almost 40 globs spat towards her it was impossible to dodge them all.

Her skin began to sizzle as two globs directly hit her. She screamed, but the pain seemed to motivate her as she shot forward like a rocket. Her maul was a blur as she rapidly attacked the ants. Those that were not fell in a single attack were met by a rain of bullets.

The numbers of ants began to dwindle until not a single awake ant was left. Wounds had acc.u.mulated on Hylia's body, and her movements were much slower than they had been. Regardless our next prey were the sleeping ants who were even easier as we picked them off one by one. They would wake as soon as they were attacked, but died to the repeated blows by a hammer or a few bullets before they could even react.

With sweat dripping down our brows we looked at the graveyard of the once might ant army. b.l.o.o.d.y remains and broken carapaces filled the room. Not a single trace of life could be seen.

u003cYou have completed the quest [Clear the ant nest] with an hour remaining. Would you like to start the optional quest [Slay the ant queen]? Y/Nu003e

I looked at Hylia, her wounds looked painful and would be slow to heal, but with a determined look on her face she nodded.

I was to caught up in my own Bloodl.u.s.t to notice that her body was trembling, or how pale her face looked.

When I selected yes the world around me began to swirl. It did not go the usual black. instead all of the colors around me appeared as a whirlpool, until eventually we found ourselves in a completely different room.