Anya, Jim, High Ruler Enor, and the six High Grades, at long last, were vomited from the hot, moist, unbearably rancid chambers of the beasts’ mouths.
Thick coatings of saliva dripped all over their bodies, and it took everything in them not to throw up the contents in their stomachs.
’Oh my god,’ Anya complained inwardly while the few Ethisians, who were lucky enough to only be restrained by tendrils, were released gently, ’why couldn’t they carry all of us with tendrils instead of their mouths?’
While Anya complained with drool all over her body, the rest of the Ethisians immediately got on their knees, dropped their weapons, and raised their hands. The first to do so was Enor, who motioned for the others to follow his lead.
The only ones who didn’t were Anya and Jim, the two most clueless individuals in the group.
What’s happening?’ Neither of the humans understood what was going on. That was, until they lifted their drool-covered eyes and noticed the new, strange, and eerily familiar setting they were in.
All around them was nothing but human architecture. From the beautiful treehouse set on a strong, firm tree, to the white picket fences which were only mounted for aesthetic sake and not protection.
The glowing lights coming from the house, the wild flower garden designed to mimic the ones found back on Earth, and the designs and decorations made the two Blood Acolytes feel like they were back on Earth.
But how was that possible? Unless...
’Oh!’ the realization of where they were set in for both humans. Now it made sense why the Ethisians knelt and surrendered immediately.
They weren’t taken to just some random, desolate place in the middle of the wilderness. They were brought to the Ethisians’ very own Blood Mutants.
Without hesitation, Jim and Anya fell to their knees, not out of respect or anything like that but out of fear. If even Enor himself knelt and surrendered, then it meant that these Blood Mutants were more terrifying and dangerous than Jim and Anya thought. Updates are released by 𝙣𝙤𝙫𝙚𝙡•𝙛𝙞𝙧𝙚•𝙣𝙚𝙩
"Humans," Enor began to speak while his entourage, excluding their humans, nervously battled within themselves not to show any signs of fear, "I ask for a bit of your time. See, I’ve..."
At that moment, a blood spik—thick, rugged, and emerald green in color—was hurled a few inches next to Enor, barely missing the right side of his body.
"Remember what I told you would happen last time, Ethisian?" A voice resounded from a distance, one that made Jim and Anya nearly gasp. This one, even though it spoke the Ethisian tongue, was soft, not too hoarse, and not alien at all. It was...human.
"...I know," Enor answered, trying his level best to stay calm and not panic, "and in the next few minutes, you can kill us since I broke our agreement..."
The other Ethisians looked at each other, neither expecting their ruler to willingly give himself, or them, up to death.
"...but before you do, I want to show you something. Something you haven’t seen in years."
"For your sake, Enor," another voice sounded, but this one, unlike the first, was softer and lighter; leaning more in the feminine side, "it better be worth it. Well, even if it isn’t, it has been a while since I had Ethisian blood...especially High Grade blood."
It was official. Enor brought Jim and Anya to the Ethisian Blood Mutants, the very beings who were among the most feared in Akrina.
If they thought being under Ace’s shadow was bad enough, they couldn’t begin to imagine how much worse it was going to be for them, the weakest of the Granian Blood Mutants, to be constantly compared to these two whose strength was leagues above Ace and Cherry...according to what they heard, of course.
’Great. We’re moving to the big leagues now,’ Jim grumbled, ’it was already bad enough that the Granians looked down on us. These two might be worse.’
Two sets of footprints were heard approaching Enor and his entourage. The Ethisians dared not move or look at the humans in fear that it could potentially be the last thing they ever did.
The two humans, on the other hand, lifted their heads and immediately locked eyes with the man and woman approaching them.
"What the..." Anya’s jaw dropped, and then she turned to face Jim. He was just as marveled, marveled at the sight of other humans who weren’t Ace, Cherry, or Skyler.
The man walking towards them was tall, possessed a large and wide frame with a chiseled physique. Age-wise, he seemed to be in his mid-forties, judging by the white hairs on the sides of his head.
He had short, dull orange hair, a scruffy beard that looked like it itched, and sharp orange eyes that were glowing, drawing attention to the scowl on his face.
The uncovered parts of his body were covered in battle scars, scars that were as wide as they were long and plenty, a testament to the many battles he fought. The most interesting one was the one that ran along his chest, starting from the top-right side of his upper chest to the bottom-left side of his hip.
As for the woman, she was slightly shorter and smaller than the man, but much bigger than Anya and Cherry...combined. She had long, orange-red hair that grew past her hips, glowing orange eyes like the man’s, and a ragged but soft, gentle face with a few scars next to her eyes and mouth.
The woman was strong, possessing a bulky, feminine physique. In size comparison, she had way more muscle mass than the average human, and slightly more than the average Granian soldier. She was almost on par with an Ethisian soldier in terms of size, weight, height, and muscle mass. The man, on the other hand, was on a league of his own.
"My god." Jim stared at the man, and Anya stared at the woman. They had never seen humans who were the walking, living personifications of the word battle-hardened.
"Well, I’ll be damned," the woman was the first to speak to the humans, her eyes wide open while they stared at her, "they really did. Those damned Granians defied Intergalactic Council Law and abducted more humans."