Bill walked out to see what was the condition of the cave walls and whether it would be better to just cut their losses with the cave now or if it was secure enough to spend the night, but he became absolutely petrified after he saw a giant hole made in the cave's dead end with several glowing yellow eyes staring right at him.
He was frozen with shock as the last thing he expected to see after coming out of the barrier was an opening made in the previously secure cave and an unknown number of beasts that were making their way inside.
The shaking of the cave had made the two torches that Mako had made the day before fall down and burn out. It was pitch black inside the cave right now with the only sources of light being the fire from the campfire that Bill had protected while forming the barrier and the glowing pair of yellow eyes that kept growing in size as the beasts were about to enter through the hole.
With no other source of light, Bill knew that he would be at an even bigger disadvantage than he already was and he quickly used the few moments he had before the beasts entered their cave to think of a possible plan to get out of there.
Bill acted quickly as he used his Wind ability to make a giant gust of wind to blow back all the beasts that were about to enter the cave and then used his Earth ability to plug up the hole which bought him some time. It was by no means effective as the beasts could easily blow a hole through it as well but it gave Bill a couple more moments to think.
If he was alone by himself, he could easily just dig himself into the earth and tunnel away but this wasn't a viable option considering that he had two other people to take care of and all of their items as well and his earth ability wasn't accurate enough to manage to tunnel and carry Mako and Leon at the same time.
Another reason Bill disagreed with just escaping by using the Earth ability is that the beasts approaching the cave were most likely Earth ability users as well, which is why they could make the entire cave shake in preparation for their entry.
Bill frantically racked his brain, trying to think of another way out but nothing came to his mind at the moment. His heartbeat became louder, but his brain was still drawing a blank.
"Ahhh! Forget it! I am not the thinking type anyways!" Bill said to himself as he gave up trying to make a solid plan and just resorted to doing what he did best; facing the problem head-on!
Bill quickly grabbed all the extra logs that he had gathered during the day and threw them all randomly over the cave floor. He didn't have the fire ability but he did have the Wind ability. Wind was an ability that enhanced fire. Bill learned this after he and Mako accidentally created a joint attack during their fight against Rhino.
He carefully grabbed one of the logs that were on fire from the campfire and using his wind ability he increased the intensity of the flames and directed those flames toward all the other unlit logs so that at least he could have some visibility during his upcoming fight.
The cave began to shake once again as the beasts tried to punch the same hole through the earth wall that Bill had created. However, this time the intensity was a lot less as the beasts had already found the weak point of the cave and were now only targeting that area as compared to before when they were trying out a random area to see if it lead to anywhere.
The time was up! Bill had his breastplate armor under his military uniform and he also grabbed Mako's arm guards and combat knife. He could hear the beasts entering the cave and he quickly came out of the barrier ready to face the beasts head-on.
The burning logs released enough light that it made the cave surroundings semi-visible. The beasts turned out to be gigantic beetles. Bill closed the barrier behind him to make sure that Mako and Leon would remain safe; however, he did leave a small two-inch gap in the wall to make sure fresh air could still circulate inside the barrier.
The beetles started pouring out of the hole one by one. They were pitch black in color and had translucent yellow muscles that resembled the texture of plastic. Bill had no idea what type of beast they were, what were their abilities, strengths, or weaknesses, or why they weren't attacking him from the start.
The beetles continued to grow in number and Bill could only watch in horror as their numbers grew. Bill might not know much about beasts but he did realize that the battle will initiate as soon as he moved a muscle.
The dead end of the cave was now filled with rows and rows of gigantic beetles who were waving their antennas in the air trying to sense something. Minutes passed by and the beetles finally stopped coming out of the hole. Bill was keeping track of all of them as they poured in and all in all, Bill had to deal with 46 beasts on his own.
This was a crazy number and Bill didn't even know what level these beasts were. If they were all low tiers, then the following fight was going to be easy but if they were medium or high tier then things were about to get wild. Judging by the general aura and feel that was coming from the beetles, it was clear to Bill that these weren't low tiers beasts.
Beasts also emit auras the same as people but theirs is harder to detect as they have a natural filter that allows them to mask their aura so that they could approach their prey without alerting them.
It was really hard for Bill to stay in the exact same position for several minutes while staring at the thousands of sharp tiny razor-sharp teeth poking out from all the beetles' mouths. Soon enough sweat started to build up on his forehead. The water droplets continued to combine on his skin until finally, one became big enough to fall down from his face.
As the water droplet ascended downward, Bill knew that even this would be enough for the beetles to finally make their move. At this critical point, when Bill was about to fight his most dangerous and difficult battle yet, he had only one thought racing through his mind.
'I wish I was a water ability user!' Bill screamed in his head.
*PLOP!*
The singular drop of sweat had collided with the ground, sending signals to all the beetles' antennas and they immediately started rushing forward with their weird plastic muscles lighting with yellow color.
Bill didn't even move from his place as the beetles rushed toward him. He stood there in place as hundred of small spikes started to erupt from the ground. These were sand spikes and Bill used them to target all the first three rows of beetles that rushed toward him.
Bill wasn't just stupidly standing still and wasting time as he was in the standoff against the beetles. He was secretly using his Earth ability to grind the earth underneath the ground into smaller and smaller particles until they resembled sand. He had hoped to continue making enough sand to target all the beetles at once but his sweat gave him in.
Using the sand he had available he launched an attack on the beetles; however, the beetles were resilient as not even a single one was taken down from the sand spikes as they just weren't sharp enough to penetrate through their tough bodies.
The sand spikes only caused the beetles to be stopped temporarily and they soon got back on their feet and continued their assault. Their muscles began to glow brighter and brighter as they rushed toward him. Bill formed small ninja stars in his hands using both Earth and Sand abilities to create a durable and sharp accessory that he could freely spin and throw at fast speeds.
Bill continued to launch ninja stars at the beetles and they worked better than the initial sand spikes; however, they still weren't enough to deal serious damage as they were only causing minor bleeds and cuts on their bodies.
The muscles of the beetles had reached their maximum amount of glow and they soon opened their mouths to reveal electric arcs forming inside. Within seconds, balls of lightning, the size of a football were being formed in their mouths and aimed at Bill.
*ZING!* *ZING!* *ZING!*
The beetles from the previous rows didn't hesitate to launch their attacks on Bill while the ones on the front lunged forward to attack him physically. Bill couldn't protect himself from both attacks at once so he had only one option left.
The lightning balls collided, making small explosions upon impact and kicking up a lot of dust and smoke into the air. The beetles themselves were confused as all the dust was messing with their antennas and they temporarily lost track of Bill.
Bill had used his earth ability at the last second to create a stone spike under his feet in order to launch him into the air and using the Wind ability he was able to glide away from the beetles and the small barrier he had made for Mako and Leon.
'Fighting head-on isn't working! I need to come up with a strategy and find their weakness or else I'll become their dinner!' Bill said to himself as he devised a new plan.
