Re:Ant Lord-Chapter 173: Serpent of Lightning

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But Kai hadn’t arrived at the carpenter ant colony’s tunnels as a planned hero or some gallant prince from the skies. He literally crash landed into a random corner of the southern forest. Pure chaos. And yet, fate had its own design... leading him straight to Akayoroi.

A few hours ago...

Inside the Rift Gate

Beneath a thunder-glass sky and above a lake that hummed like a live wire, the system whispered its final warning:

[Alert: Hostile Entity Detected

Classification: Storm Myriad Beast – "Tesseral Seraphim" (Rank 5★, Aberrant)

Location: Underwater cave mouth at 2 o’clock.]

The mirrored lake bulged outward like a membrane stretched from below. A serpentine skeletal head surfaced. It has teeth of raw ore, and twin globes of swirling plasma eyes. Lightning flickered inside its translucent neck, illuminating a segmented body that shifted between solid metal and liquid quicksilver.

The creature hissed with a sound like solid hitting water. Kai’s spear slid to his hand.

Predator’s Instinct mapped weak points: joint seams where metal plates overlapped; a pulsing core of molten ore behind the skull.

The Tesseral Seraphim lunged at him. The mercury lake did not ripple. It exploded.

Pillars of silver shot upward like inverted lightning, each spout arcing into the glassy air with concussive force. The blast sent razor droplets in all directions—each glob of quicksilver glowing with internal charge. Kai twisted sideways, Antenna Sensory Boost flaring at maximum. His body tracked every vibration in the molten lake and picked up the coiling hunger before it broke the surface again.

Something massive moved beneath. Then it emerged.

A serpent, thirty meters long, wrapped in glasslike scales with raw lightning running between its segments. The beast’s body was segmented and unnatural, as though star metal and thunder had been welded into one. Its mouth opened into a hexagonal split, each tooth a mirrored star-iron blade. Its roar was not sound—it was a pulse, a magnetic scream that numbed the teeth and made the meteor crater hum like a tuning fork.

[Tesseral Seraphim – Aberrant 5★ Proto-Elemental Beast Guardian.

Essence Saturation: 218% Instability Rating: 90% Danger Class: Critical Passive Effect: Aura Disruption Field

Special Ability: Electrostatic Domain – Lightning Loop Trap

Reward on Kill: +500 EXP | Rare Lightning Heart | Infused Ore Scales ×12]

Kai’s jaw tightened. This was no elemental whelp. It was a storm-forged weapon. One born in the chaos of proto-elemental lightning and meteoric iron, grown fat on aura, and bloated with static fury.

It struck.

The first whip-like pass scythed through a ledge of fused glass behind Kai, reducing it to vapor. He activated Reflex Mode just in time, sliding between a snap of its jaws. The world slowed to a breathless crawl. Droplets hung in the air like frozen stars, and the serpent’s fangs loomed above him in slow motion.

Each tooth shimmered with molten runes script formed through nature’s fury, not man’s design.

He pivoted, digging his foot into a divot of glass and drove his spear upward with surgical precision.

The blade punched through the soft joint beneath the serpent’s lower jaw, right where the ore hadn’t fully crystallized.

ScreeEEEee!

The beast shrieked, thunder vibrating through its coils. It thrashed, tail swinging like a war scythe, obliterating an entire ridge. Kai used Reflex Mode and rolled back, the speed of real time slamming into his senses.

A thunderclap detonated behind him.

Adaptive Armor shifted instantly, hardening along his shoulders and forearms to resist slashing arcs. Lightning kissed the plates but dispersed, licking along his frame like angry snakes.

From the cliff above, Azhara watched.

She had followed Kai against all instinct. Her breath caught the moment the serpent emerged, eyes wide, pupils trembling. Her entire predator-born body screamed to flee. Her knees buckled. Her claws gripped the stone. But then she saw something that froze her more than fear.

Kai didn’t retreat. He stepped toward the lightning. fɾeeweɓnѳveɭ.com

Her body shivered.

Pain, sharp and cold, crawled down her spine. Not because of the serpent—but because of him. This was the second time.

The second time that thing inside her stirred. That strange shameful joy curled under her belly like heat. Fear turned into craving. Terror twisted into admiration.

Her voice caught in her throat as she whispered with a lustful face, "Hurt me again..."

Below, Kai didn’t hear. He was already moving.

The serpent coiled midair, its body shimmering with lightning veils that lashed the atmosphere like godfire. Then it spun—its scales crackled, and arcs of electricity formed a cage around the entire crater.

[System Warning! Environmental Shift: Electrostatic Dome Activated

Risk: Aura Burn – All entities exposed to passive lightning loops.

Countermeasure: Grounding via meteor fragments detected.]

Kai’s eyes narrowed. He spotted the two exposed shards of meteoroid star iron near the lake’s edge. His breath hissed between his teeth.

The serpent dove.

He sprinted.

One bolt clipped his shoulder, it seared but didn’t penetrate. Tiny Tank flared on contact, hardening every plate. His boots dug into cracked cobalt as he slammed his hand onto the first meteor shard.

BOOM! 💥

Lightning hit and forks arcing from the sky into his back, but instead of melting him, the energy redirected. It bled down his arm and into the meteor.

His teeth still rattled. His eyes burned. But he lived. The serpent shrieked in confusion, its trap had failed.

Kai moved before it could adapt.

He lunged, shoulder-first, into the serpent’s flank, letting Tiny Tank absorb the recoil. The impact staggered the beast. His spear danced in his hands. Within seconds three jabs, rapid and precise, into the shimmering connective tissue beneath its right side. Molten iron burst from each strike, hissing and steaming across the crater floor.

Then came the tail.

Whip.

Kai ducked. The blow shattered a wall of fused storm glass behind him.

He came up under the creature’s belly. It’s the softest point. He dropped the spear, letting it clatter to the side. With a grunt, he opened his mandibles—those monarch-forged fangs that can shatter iron and sank them into the ore heart pulsing behind its jawline.