The One Made of Many.
The giant Insect attacked the trio without giving them a single moment to take in what had just happened. Using its giant antenna, it hit both Ritsuka and Castoria, sending the first against the wall while the second blocked it with her magic.
Mash jumped and hit their enemy in the head, stunning it for a while before it turned its eyes against the Shielder, spitting acid against her before trying to stab her with its giant fangs, yet she managed to dodge it.
While Mash kept their enemy busy, Castoria went to check on Ritsuka, helping him get rid of the bugs that were trying to swarm him.
"Are you alright Master?" -
"Don't worry, I'll live. Go help Mash, I'll try something on my own" -
The Caster launched several of her magical projectiles against the giant insect, burning parts of it as Mash sliced one of its legs using her shield. She thought that she managed to hurt it in any meaningful way, but she soon realized she was wrong when its legs reformed almost immediately.
"It isn't just a single being, it's formed from several smaller insects!" - Ritsuka yelled as he looked more deeply into their enemy, seeing how its skin continuously moved.
"Is it just many bugs… I'll burn them right here!" - using several small objects she brought with her and overcharging them with magic, Castoria threw them against the giant bug and made them explode, lightning the place on blue flames and causing the giant creature to shriek in pain as the million insects and arachnids tried to escape the fire to no avail. Instead… They ate it.
"What the hell is that!?" - Castoria yelled as the fire was slowly put out, and the huge bug reformed with little to no damage made to it before launching a powerful acid spit onto the 3. While they dodged it, it slowly started to crack the ground that they were on, and there was no telling where they would end up if they fell.
"Senpai, I think it's best if we get out of here!" - Mash yelled - "We're not going to beat this before it cracks the floor!" -
"If you want to run them, I think I can have something that can help!" - Ritsuka said as his Command Seals started to shine. He attempted to summon Ishtar's Shadow Servant as a way to make a quick escape, but the end result was… Strange, to say the least.
Instead of summoning a Shadow Servant, his clothes instead changed to Ishtar's ones, or her clothes adapted to his body.
"WHAT!?" - he yelled out loud as soon as he saw himself. He had a lot of questions, but there wasn't time to answer any of them - "Mash, Castoria, hold onto me!" -
Both girls did as Ritsuka told and held him, with him floating out of the location as the giant insect started shooting acid at them, which was blocked by magic projectiles used by Castoria.
They got out of the pit that they were trapped in and made a run towards the exit of the cape and then directly towards their improvised home in the cave by the beach.
Once there, they had a moment to catch their breath and think clearly over what happened, although they had to attend something first.
"Senpai… Your outfit…" - Mash said as she looked at what Ritsuka was wearing.
Just like Ishtar's outfit, it left very little to the imagination, only covering his crotch and chest, leaving everything else uncovered.
"How did this…?" - before he could finish his phrase, he started to shine and fell to the ground. As the shine faded away, he returned to his regular clothes and felt incredibly tired - "Agh… Why…?" -
"Instead of summoning a Shadow Servant, he took the powers of one of them for a brief period of time…" - Castoria explained while helping Ritsuka up - "It seems that doing so left you in a weakened state" -
"Yeah… I think that one's obvious" - Ritsuka said weakly as he slowly sat down on the floor of the cave - "Well, at least we got out without much issue…" -
"Speaking of, we need to talk about that think we fought in there" - Mash said as she sat down in the floor as well - "I think we all saw that it wasn't just a single entity" -
"Yes, it was a fusion of the insects that lived down there, and it was terrifying" - Castoria said while trembling a bit after remembering what that creature looked like.
"Most importantly, nothing we did hurt him, even Castoria's bombs only did a bit of damage, and that only served to keep him distracted for a bit" -
"Plus, the floor was slowly crumbling due to that thing's attacks. If we stayed there for longer, who knows where we would've fallen to" -
"Well, at least for the moment we know to avoid that cave, at least until we have a sure way of dealing with that thing" - both girls agreed with Ritsuka's comment.
"In that case, we should start exploring other parts of the island. I suggest going to the large mountain in the center. There might be something in there" - Castoria said.
"Seems like as good of a place to start as any. Plus we could use the extra height to see more of the island than we could before" - Mash continued with a smile.
"It's settled then, tomorrow we'll go to the mountain" - Ritsuka finished, and both girls agreed - "Alright, I'm just going to lay down for a while since I'm tired from… Whatever the hell I did with that Ishtar outfit…" -
As Ritsuka laid down, Castoria left the cave and went to the beach to try and catch some fish while Mash stayed behind to care for Ritsuka. Alone with her thoughts, the Caster did her best to get some food for tonight, yet despite the number of fishes, catching them proved to be a challenge for her.
"Here, let me help" -
"Mash? Weren't you with Ritsuka?" -
"I saw you were having some problems, and I came to help. You can go take care of him, I'll deal with this" - the Shielder said with a smile as she used a wooden spear to catch the fish.
"Thanks Mash… We'll see you back there" - Castoria said as she made her way towards the cave where Ritsuka was resting. She sat down at his side and started to caress his hair.
"You look cute while sleeping…" - she whispered to herself - "I wanted to just be the two of us on this trip, but having Mash here… Might not be a bad idea" -
She laid down next to Fujimaru and closed her eyes, feeling a strange warmth by being next to him. She felt like she could go to sleep, but just as she was about to go to sleep, Mash arrived with fish for them to eat for dinner.
The 3 of them ate before sleeping for the day, they needed to be well rested since the trip towards the mountain would be rather… Large.