Symbiotic: Chapter 15

Sara pressed deeper into the Crystal Cavern Mine, her spores drifting outward in a thirty-foot halo of awareness. The main shaft stretched on, littered with broken carts and shattered crates, but now it was alive with danger.

Ten more swarms revealed themselves as she advanced, jagged crystal formations that her spores betrayed as living ambushes. Each time she responded with focused will, unleashing Infested Cloud Strike. The spores burrowed into shard-carapaces, bypassing armor, tearing through bodies, collapsing the swarms in shrieking resonance. One by one, the tunnels fell silent again, their predators reduced to husks. With eacy victory, her microbe harvest filled back what was spent.

[Infested Cloud Strike] Cost 150 Microbes

*Ping* [150 Microbes gained. Current Network: 850 of (1000) 1500]

*Ding* [Your party has killed a Crystal Crawler Swarm (T2) x10]

3000 Experience being divided evenly among your party.

Error: Party size (1501) exceeds limit. Negligible experience gained.

Current Experience to next level: 414.93 of 500]

Between battles, her spores brushed against faintly humming nodes embedded in the walls. Neutral energy crystals, glowing softly in her mind’s sight. She harvested them carefully, the System chiming as they vanished into her storage:

[Resource Node Harvested x2]

Item Collected: Medium Neutral Crystal x2 (Added to Pocket Storage)

The deeper she went, the more the shaft narrowed. The structured mine gave way to thinner, snaking tunnels. Exploratory veins dug by miner teams searching for crystal deposits. Her spores traced the rough walls, gouged by chisels and picks, beams hammered in haste to keep the stone from collapsing.

She followed one tunnel, only to find it ended abruptly in a dead wall of stone. Another branched sharply, but her spores revealed nothing but rubble and silence. Again and again, she found dead ends, abandoned projects, and caved in passages.

Then, in one narrow passage, her spores brushed against something different. A faint subtle air pressure, as if the cloud itself was being nudged. She paused to get a sense of what she was feeling, and realized: it was wind. A current of slowly moving air, pushing against her spores from deeper within.

Sara’s nodded. “There we go. About time!” In a dungeon buried in stone, wind meant passage. Direction.

She tightened her grip on her spear, spores drifting ahead like the living mist that they were. Without hesitation, she turned into the tunnel where the wind pressed against her cloud.

<>

The main shaft of the Crystal Cavern far behind her now, littered with it’s broken carts and shattered wealth that spoke of its humanity, or at least link to the surface. Sara pressed forward, spores drifting ahead like ghostly scouting tendrils. The wide, open chamber gave way to narrower paths, tunnels carved not by nature but by desperate miner hands.

The walls closed in, jagged and uneven, the air thicker, heavier. These weren’t the structured shafts of a working mine, but were hand dug exploratory veins, snaking passages dug by teams searching for the next crystal deposit. The tunnels twisted unpredictably, branching and curling back on themselves, as if the miners had followed faint glimmers in the stone until the crystals were found or the effort was surrendered.

Her spores brushed against abandoned tools wedged into cracks, chisels left mid-strike, and beams that had been hastily hammered into place to keep the walls from collapsing. Many had splintered, sagging under the weight of stone. The deeper she went, the more the signs of human labor faded, replaced by something else.

The ground trembled faintly beneath her boots. Not constantly, but in moving pulses. Vibrations that rippled through the stone like the heartbeat of something vast. Her spores caught the resonance, echoing back to her in faint waves. It wasn’t the skittering of Crawlers. This was slower, deeper, more deliberate.

Sara paused, her breath shallow. She had crossed into another domain. The tunnels here weren’t made by miner’s hands. Where the miners had stopped, something else continued. The tunnels she passed through now, weaving from natural cavern to natural cavern, were round, almost smooth. As if a massive Icecream Scoop has been used over and over to create a tunnel.

The walls glittered faintly with crystal veins, but many were scarred, gouged as if something massive had scraped through them. Her spores traced long grooves in the stone, tunnels within tunnels, evidence of creatures burrowing with strength far beyond human tools.

The silence was deceptive. No skittering, no clacking. Just the faint tremor of stone shifting, the suggestion of something vast moving unseen.

Sara tightened her grip on her spear, spores drifting wider, every sense alert. The Crystal Crawlers had been predators of the surface shafts. Here, in the twisting veins, she had stepped into the realm of something older, stronger, and infinitely more dangerous.

The next creature on her Dungeon Shopping List. The Greatworms were near.

<>

Sara stepped out of the narrow, miner-dug tunnel and into another natural cavern that felt vast compared to the cramped veins she had just traversed. Her Sporesight drifted outward, painting the chamber in ghostly outlines. The walls glittered faintly with crystal veins, but one section drew her attention immediately. A collapsed heap of stone and crystal, piled high against the cavern wall. Hopefully her way through wasn’t buried underneath all that rock.

At first, it looked like rubble. A cave-in, perhaps, where braces had failed and the miners had abandoned their work. But as she advanced closer, her spores brushed against it.

Her breath caught. Within thirty feet, her Sporesight revealed the truth: the “pile” was no accident. It was alive. Fifty feet of segmented body, ten feet wide, plated in crystalline armor that shimmered faintly in her spore-sense. The Greatworm lay coiled, its bulk disguised as debris, its presence masked until she was far too close for comfort.

The cavern trembled faintly, a pulse rippling through the stone as the creature shifted. Segments scraped against crystal, sending sharp vibrations through the floor. Her spores recoiled as if pressed back by the sheer vitality of the beast.

Then the System chimed, cold and precise:

[Identify Activated]

[Creature Identified: Greatworm] Tier: 2

Body: Force 38 | Speed 34

Mind: Thought 32 | Knowledge 30

Soul: Self 28 | Sum 26

Disposition: Mindless Hostility

Threat Level: High (Apex Burrowing Predator.)

Abilities

• Burrow Tremor (Active): Greatworm vibrates the stone around it, causing localized cave-ins or destabilizing footing. Targets within range suffer reduced mobility and risk tunnel collapse damage.

• Crystal Armor (Passive): Segmented plates of crystal reduce incoming physical damage by 25%. Energy-based attacks are partially refracted, lowering effectiveness 50% unless precisely focused.

• Resonant Roar (Active): Emits a deep sonic bellow that targets Mental Defense, ignoring Physical Defenses. Can disorient, stun, or cause temporary sensory disruption.

• Tunnel Sense (Passive): Greatworms perceive vibrations through stone, making stealth nearly impossible in their domain. Any movement within 100 feet is detected.

• Devour and Infuse (Passive): Consumes crystal deposits to temporarily increase Force and Soul stats, making prolonged fights increasingly dangerous.

• Segmented Strike (Active): Uses its massive body to whip or slam segments against foes, dealing area damage and knocking targets prone.

- Greatworms are massive, crystal-armored burrowers that dominate the deeper tunnels of the Crystal Caverns. Their bodies are segmented and plated with crystalline growths, making them both resilient and deadly. Unlike the swarming Crystal Crawlers, Greatworms are solitary apex predators, claiming entire tunnel networks as their lairs. They are violently aggressive against anything they perceive as a threat. And they perceive Everything that moves in their territory as a threat.

- They move with deceptive speed through stone, their burrowing vibrations shaking the tunnels and destabilizing supports. Often Greatworms will try to collapse entire tunnels to crush their prey and then consume their corpses right along with the stone that crushed them.

<>

Sara froze in place, she was definitely thankful for the extra information Identify was providing as her abilities grew, but a small part of her wondering if Not Knowing the flavor text might make her feel better. “Come on… No Cave In’s. No Cave In’s!”, she thought to herself as she tried not to move, breathe, or even let her heart beat.

The Greatworm’s head lifted slowly, crystalline plates grinding against one another. Its maw opened, jagged shards lining the interior like rotating teeth, and a low resonant earblasting hum filled the cavern. The sound wasn’t just noise, it was an assault. It vibrated in her chest, in her skull, threatening to shake her focus apart, completely ignoring her wonderful armor and slamming straight into her mind.

Sara tightened her grip on her spear, spores swirling defensively around her as she tried to hold her thoughts together to come up with a battleplan. She had fought swarms, harvested crystals, and carved her way through the mine. But this was a threat on a whole different level. This was no nuisance, no scattered enemy. This was the lord of the tunnels, the reason the miners had fled, the apex predator of the Crystal Caverns.

And, as Sara felt blood pour from her nose at the mental assault, the Greatworm charged towards her like an avalanche of hate.

<>

The cavern shook as the Greatworm uncoiled, fifty feet of crystal-plated body grinding against stone. Its maw opened, jagged shards lining its throat, and a resonant hum filled the chamber. The sound pressed into Sara’s skull, threatening to shatter her focus.

Her spear felt useless in her hands. She knew it even before she dived under it’s charge and her stab slid off stone with barely a mark. The weapon couldn’t pierce the stone & crystal armor, even as strong as her Body Force had grown. Even her Infested Cloud Strike, so effective against living swarms, would find little purchase here. The Greatworm was more mineral than creature, its biology buried beneath layers of stone and out of reach.

But Sara wasn’t alone. She had her network.

Her spores swirled outward, thirty feet of Sporesight painting every segment of the beast. She saw the armor, the crystalline plates, the sheer bulk. But she also saw the seams where crystal met flesh, the faint vibrations of life beneath the mineral shell.

The Greatworm lunged forward, its massive body slamming into the cavern floor. Its massive segmented tail whipped outward, sending shards of stone flying. Sara rolled aside, tucking as she landed to come to her feet as quickly as possible and continue moving. She raced along its length, spores clinging to the beast’s plates and seeking purchase. She pressed her will into them, Sara needed more than just sight.

[Ability Activated: Infested Cloud Strike]

Cost: 150 Microbes. Current Network: 700 (850) of 1500]

Her spores burrowed, not into the armor, but into the seams between rock plates. They dug into the faint threads of biology beneath, tearing at muscle and sinew where the crystal shell could not protect. The Greatworm shrieked, its resonant roar breaking into a discordant scream.

The Greatworm’s roar shook the cavern, crystal plates grinding as it uncoiled. Sara’s spear hung useless at her side, she already knew it couldn’t pierce the mineral armor. Even her Infested Cloud Strike had failed, spores struggling to do more than minimal damage to a creature that was more stone than flesh.

But she had managed something. A few spores had burrowed into the seams where crystal met sinew, clinging stubbornly to the faint threads of biology beneath. It wasn’t much, but it was enough for a foothold.

Sara closed her eyes, pressing her will into the network. Pulling on a Skill she had not yet tested the boundaries of.

[Skill Activated: Novice Energy Manipulation Mastery]

[New Energy Alteration Discovered → Acidic Conversion -1 Temporary Mind: Thought for 5 Minutes.]

Her spores shifted, their resonance changing. Instead of tearing blindly in their search for biology to infect, they began to secrete corrosive energy, reshaping themselves into acid. The seams hissed, stone sizzling as the spores ate away at the crystalline joints. Cracks spiderwebbed outward, widening with each pulse of acid.

The Greatworm convulsed, thrashing against the cavern wall. Segments slammed into stone, sending tremors through the floor. Its roar faltered, breaking into a discordant shriek as its armor began to fail.

The pained roars of the Greatworm tore at Sara’s very mind, staggering her and knocking her to her knees. Dropping her spear and shield, she grasped at her head, attempting to stave off the damage. She couldn’t stop now. This was her chance.

With a though, Sara stumbled to her feet, her two-handed bat, fungal threads woven into its surface, appearing in her hands. With a shout, she swung, the weapon crashing into the weakened seam. The crack widened, shards flying as the acid-softened plates shattered under the impact.

[Power Swing] -1 Temporary Body: Force for 5 Minutes]

Again she swung, blood dripping from her eyes and ears as the Greatworm’s Resonant Roar continued its unending mental assault. But she didn’t need her eyes and ears in this moment, her spores guiding her to the weakest points as she stumbled along the flailing, screaming, Greatworm.

She just needed to…

[Power Swing] -1 Temporary Body: Force for 5 Minutes]

Each strike broke more of the armor, exposing raw flesh beneath. The Greatworm writhed, its massive body collapsing against the cavern wall, segments shuddering as its protection failed.

Last long enough to…

[Power Swing] -1 Temporary Body: Force for 5 Minutes]

Kill it before it killed her!

One final swing split the seam wide open. Acid hissed, spores burrowed deeper, and the Greatworm convulsed violently before falling still. Its crystalline plates cracked and broken, its body slumped in ruin.

The cavern trembled, dust raining from above. Greatworm and Mycorrhizal Host were both battered and broken. But Sara stood, or at least slumped, triumphant, and the Greatworm was dead.

Sara stood over the fallen apex predator, chest heaving, spores drifting faintly around her. Confident that nothing else would be anywhere near the lair of a Greatworm, Sara let herself drop to her knees as she summoned aid from her network.

[Ability Activated: Repair Self]

[Cost: 50 Microbes. Current Network: 650 (800) of 1500]

Wounds Restored. Mental Defense Restored

*Ding* [Your party has killed an Apex Greatworm (T2)]

500 Experience being divided evenly among your party.

Error: Party size (1501) exceeds limit. Negligible experience gained.

Current Experience to next level: 414.26 of 500]

Mind numbed from the mental assault, body battered and drained from skill overuse, Sara knew her options were to rest, or to… Well.. no… Her only option was to rest and heal before she tried anything that dumb again.

“Just five more minutes, mom!”, she muttered into the cavern as she slumped to her side in exhaustion and ignored the rest of the System notifications.

<>