Re:Ant Lord-Chapter 164: Storm-Line

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Wind howled through the broken riftscape, carrying the metallic tang of ozone and the far off stench of scorched beast hide. Kai’s silhouette moved in long, silent strides across tilted rock plates, each footstep scattering silver dust left behind by the departed beast over time. Above him, black and blue clouds spun in a violent gyre, spearing white spears of lightning into the fractured ground. Every strike shook the air with a sound like mountains colliding.

Follow the thunder; where the storms converge, iron sleeps. That was the System’s directive message to him. It was crisp, impersonal, undeniable.

Kai used predator instinct and let a small pulse of Monarch aura sweep outward in a 30-pace radius. The world returned as a shifting relief map of vibrations and aura echo: fissured basalt, buried pools of essence, broken ore veins releasing slow, glowing drips. No moving foes. No new guardians.

Still he felt eyes.

A hunter’s instinct was never wrong. There was a tiny prick of awareness at the nape of his neck—told him he wasn’t alone. He hadn’t been since leaving the basin.

Far back among the tumbled columns of obsidian, a lone figure crouched. Tall for a rabbit-kin. It was nearly Kai’s height in hybrid form. She wore scavenged bone armor over her silver black fur. One ear was torn(from the last battle) at the tip; the other twitched restlessly.

Her name, whispered among savage rabbit clans, was Azhara the Fangsister—the sole five star rank leader who’d fled the massacre when Kai’s second Ruler’s Roar erased her entire team.

She dug a narrow tunnel into the loamy earth with her claws, heart thundering in her chest, until the muffled screams above faded into silence. Buried beneath the soil, her body trembled, not from exhaustion, but from something far deeper. Fear.

A fear that pierced through her bones and rattled her predator instincts. The blood of a predator ran through the veins of the savage rabbit clan, a violent mutation inherited from their earliest ancestors—predator blood fused with prey form. Most rabbits in the clan were far from timid, especially those who had awakened the dormant genes of their ancient predator kin.

When Kai unleashed his Ruler’s Roar, it wasn’t just sound, it was sovereignty made manifest. A primal edict from one who ruled not with words but with sheer will. The sound struck like a lance through the minds of all beasts nearby, but for the savage rabbits who bore predator instincts, it was an alarm bell in the deepest part of their souls. Her knees buckled instantly. Her fur stood on end. Every nerve screamed danger. She didn’t think much. She just dug.

Others tried. Four star rank warriors of her clan. The hulking, scarred veterans who had torn apart wyverns and serpents—hesitated for a moment too long. That moment cost them their lives. The sheer pressure of Kai’s Monarch aura and Ruler’s Roar oar crushed their confidence and split their spines. Only she, nimble and instinctive, had survived by doing the one thing those warriors could not... admitting her fear.

A question might arise: why didn’t the six star rank predator guardian react the same way?

The answer was chilling in its simplicity.

First, arrogance. The guardian had seen Kai as a mere three star rank insect, unworthy of true attention.

Second, and more critically, madness. The creature’s body was a prison of hundreds of absorbed souls—screaming, seething, battling within. It had long since lost any rational mind. What remained was a beast driven by fractured rage, guided not by instinct but by raw, directionless fury. Its predator’s intuition was dulled beneath the constant howling storm inside its chest.

But she had no such handicap.

From her place underground, she watched in silence. Watched as Kai the Ant Lord Monarch tore through the guardian’s body and devoured its very essence like a tyrant god.

A tremor ran through her again. Not of dread. No. Something else stirred in her veins now.

Revenge.

Hunger.

Obsession.

She had tasted the cold, metallic fear that came from facing a true apex predator and something primal inside her had liked it.

When she finally clawed her way free from the earth, her claws caked in soil and her lungs gulping air like a drowning beast, she spotted Kai’s silhouette disappearing into the horizon. He ran, fast and sure, chasing the rumbling echoes of distant thunder.

So she followed him. Not because she wanted to fight. Not even because she hoped to escape. But because something had awakened inside her.

A dark truth.

The fear she had felt didn’t just horrify her. It thrilled her. Twisted her thoughts. Her heartbeat fluttered at the memory of being dominated by that overwhelming aura. She had discovered a dark, shameful craving buried deep in her nature.

She was a masochist. A dark fetishist of fear and power. Deep inside, she didn’t want to destroy Kai. She wanted to feel that terror again.

To tremble under his presence, to feel her instincts scream against her will, to lose control and submit to something far, far stronger.

And someday... perhaps, if he spared her, she could offer him more than fear. She could offer loyalty. Even submission. But first, she would follow. And watch. She would learn just how far his dominance could reach. Despite everything, she also wanted to take revenge if she found Kai’s weakness. She is basically a mad and wild woman, who is unpredictable.

Azhara shadowed Kai now, silent as drifting cinder, waiting for weakness.

Kai, though, did not yet know her name but his Predator’s Instinct kept flashing faint red in the corners of his vision, as if the rift wind itself carried warnings.

He clenched his fist and pressed on. The landscape changed first in color, then in sound.

What had once been dust choked wasteland now gleamed beneath his feet like a shattered god’s mirror. The dull, ashen rock gave way to strange blue tones. It was glass like in texture and unsettling in reflection.