Olivia’s clan had known about the hellwasps. They had built their village far from the forest where the vile insects made their nests, perched upon the edge of a sea-facing cliff. So it was only occasionally that one of the demons made the strange journey across the open fields between the treeline and the clifftop town: something that was easily handled by a squad of their capable warriors. Olivia wondered if their complacency in that fact had been their downfall.
She was just such a warrior that would be sent out to deal with the stray insects; monstrosities that grew nearly to the size of the hunting dogs that were locked inside when the telltale buzzing filled the air. That’s why she had jumped out of her bed that morning, grabbed her sword and rushed from her home. Her neighbours had looked to her for guidance, each one having felt the same deep trembling in the ground. Then, not long after, the humming began. It was quiet at first, just a nagging tug at the back of her ear, but it grew louder as the day went on, until it nearly drowned out all other noise. A dark cloud formed on the horizon, and she remembered the fear that had bubbled up in her throat when she saw it. She knew now what had happened: a landslide had torn through the paper-like hives of a hellwasp colony, displacing them and sending them into a rage, fuelled by the search for a new nest. Back then, she hadn’t pieced it together fully, but she knew they needed to leave.