Building a Safe Zone with My Harem In The Post-Apocalyptic World

Chapter 201: Versus The Ants

The three of them immediately ran through the hallway, but every turn was already filled with worker ants and another batch of majors.

Through the green tint of the night vision goggles, countless bodies climbed over the walls and ceiling while others rushed straight toward them, their antennae moving wildly as they let out continuous hisses.

Jace was the first to move, deliberately dodging all the majors while killing the worker ants to clear the way for them to move.

His knife swung straight at the softer joint between the head and thorax before he kicked the body aside.

While Otis made sure they weren’t being attacked from behind, shooting the fat’s stomach, making the floors wet and their movement slowed because some of the worker ants slipped.

The worker ant rolled across the floor, making the ones behind climb over it, but there were simply too many.

"Forward! Don’t stop! Workers ants are easier to take care of!" Arthur shouted, "Otis, throw one grenade to the left corridor!"

Otis immediately pulled the pin and threw it without questioning. The explosion buried dozens of worker ants under concrete and broken walls, opening a path just wide enough for the three of them to squeeze through.

"Right side!" Arthur pointed again.

Jace switched to his rifle and fired several controlled shots. The bullets shattered the front legs of the ants blocking the hallway, making them collapse one after another while Otis finished the ones still crawling with his combat knife.

The deeper they ran, the more workers gathered. It was as if the entire headquarters had become one giant nest.

Arthur suddenly grabbed Jace’s arm. "Stop shooting!"

Jace frowned but lowered his rifle. A strange buzzing sound echoed from somewhere above them, becoming louder every second.

"Major," Arthur whispered. "Shoot the wings first. The shell is too thick."

The moment he finished speaking, three Majors flew down from the ceiling. Their bodies were almost twice the size of the workers, and transparent saliva continuously dripped from their mandibles before being launched toward them.

"Down!"

The three of them rolled across the floor.

The saliva struck the wall behind them as it instantly hardened into dozens of long crystal spikes that pierced through concrete and steel alike.

"Fuck..." Otis immediately aimed at one of the wings and pulled the trigger.

The bullet tore through the thin membrane, making the Major lose balance and crash against the wall.

The other two didn’t stop. One rushed toward Arthur while opening its giant mandibles.

Jace stepped forward without hesitation and blocked the bite with his combat knife. The impact almost knocked the weapon from his hand.

"Move!"

Otis stabbed the damaged wing while Arthur threw another grenade toward the corridor behind them. The explosion immediately buried another wave of worker ants trying to surround them.

"We don’t have time!" Arthur shouted.

Jace pushed the Major away and raised his rifle again. This time he waited for a perfect moment as the major hissed, behind that giant mandibles was a small mouth as he shot it over and over and it fell to the ground almost immediately after that.

Unfortunately, the last Major had already circled behind them.

Arthur noticed it first. "Left!"

Jace turned immediately, but he was still too slow.

Another stream of saliva shot toward him. He avoided the center of it, yet several hardened spikes still grazed past his shoulder before one completely pierced through the muscle and stuck out from the back.

Blood immediately soaked his sleeve. Otis moves forward and shoots the major using Jace trick which makes it die right after. He then grabbed him before he lost balance.

"Can you still move?"

Jace pulled the crystal spike out with a groan and threw it to the floor. "I’ll die if I stop."

Arthur looked ahead and saw another corridor packed with worker ants already rushing toward them.

He immediately took out a grenade in his pocket. "Straight ahead. Blow up the workers and keep running. If we stay here for another minute, every ant in this headquarters will gather in one place."

Arthur threw the grenade into the middle of the swarm while Jace ignored the blood dripping from his arm and charged forward, cutting down the surviving worker ants one by one to force a path through the endless colony.

They kept running while killing every worker ants blocking their way. However, Arthur could feel something weird in the hallway.

"The headquarters structure changed." Arthur suddenly said.

Neither Jace nor Otis answered as another worker ant jumped toward them. Jace grabbed its mandibles, twisted its head to expose the softer connection between the thorax and neck before driving his knife through it and kicking the body aside as it was the last in front of them.

They then move further choosing the hallway without ants on it and when they find a door, they finally open it and hide inside the room. Trying not to make too much sound.

"About your words earlier, what do you mean?" Jace whispered.

"The map."

Arthur pointed at the wall. "The hallway should be straight, but it curves downward. Something is pushing the whole structure from below."

Only then did they realize the walls inside this room no longer looked like concrete. White membranes covered almost every surface, connecting one wall to another with countless strings that looked similar to spider silk but much thicker.

They stretched across the ceiling and floor while transparent liquid slowly flowed through them like veins.

Otis accidentally stepped on one. It bounced. His face immediately turned ugly.

"Don’t tell me this thing is alive."

"Maybe?"

The three of them looked at each other in confusion because they didn’t have a choice but to move forward as the ants kept decreasing in number in this part of the building.

"Since you remember the map, where exactly are we now?" Jace asked.

"I think we are close to the back door. But the problem is we keep moving down, we are basically on the ground now. So... in front of us is probably the Queen’s chamber."

Otis groaned and leaned on the wall while Jace closed his eyes and decided to bandage his wound with the cloth he got by ripping his clothes. After a while, he finally decided what to do.