There was an old maxim that had survived for several centuries, not just because of how serious it was but because of how catchy it was as well. "tunnels snakes rule". It might have once belonged to a gang, but it was now better known as a warning to those who would be stupid enough to walk into a Tunnel Snake's territory without being extremely careful about where to put your feet. The fact of the matter was, like it or not, the tunnel snakes had been on the list of deadly animals for a long time now, because that was what they were. They were extremely dangerous, and were known to take out entire groups of travelers within five minutes and then disappear not to be seen again until it was hungry and needed it's next meal. It was this reason that the village had paid someone to take care of them the moment they found out about their infestation.

Tunnels snake, around as intelligent as dolphins, were an apex predator that was more technically classed as a parasite because of how they bred. See, the Tunnel snakes have four things that make them deadly. the first thing that they have in their factor is the fact that they are armed to the teeth, with razor sharp fangs that could pierce human flesh and bone without any real effort and giant scythes on large arm-like protrusions that jotted out of their shoulders like a fifth and sixth limb that could slice through someone like they were butter. Secondly, they were able to sense people from the vibrations they made along the ground, since as they lived under the ground they were blind as a bat, relying on vibrations to do everything. Thirdly, as previously said, they lived underground so people found it extremely hard to track them down, whether that was to kill them for being a threat or for killing them as prey.

This had allowed them to evolve beyond what any normal animal could. finally, they were extremely cunning, their predator instincts were beyond that of a normal animal, they were almost on the same level as humans, except they were capable of no higher thought. When it came to tracking, killing and eating they were brilliant, but anything else was completely foreign to them. they appeared to have no knowledge about chakra, which was one of their biggest Achilles' heels. The second thing was that they were blind, and since they only worked off of vibrations that worked brilliantly in the favor of an intelligent predator. What was even luckier was that the one that was haunting this area was not fully grown yet, and was instead a juvenile. Not that they weren't a threat even when not mature, but they were less of a threat certainly.

So, flying low over the area that they had been warned about, Horus came to a stop mid-air. His body was flying above the ground, his talon-tipped claws not even brushing the ground for fear of giving away their location. On his back, Gen wove his handsigns, summoning clones that fell onto the ground. They were close enough that they didn't end up hurt from the fall, but there was now so many of them that the tunnel snake could likely not avoid this clear chance. Moving away as rapidly as they could before swinging around and watching, Horus and Gen could see the ground shaking underneath the clones' feet.

It was, perhaps, fortunate that the clones didn't have a survival impulse like actual humans did otherwise this plan wouldn't work. See, since they weren't quite as developed as the mature tunnel snake was, the adolescent took a longer amount of time to get to the surface, and had to dig away at the ground above it. It was this that was causing the vibrations, and was allowing them to know that the plan was working. The clones stood there willingly, knowing they couldn't do anything until he was on the surface. Besides, they would be killed so quickly that they wouldn't even feel it, and it certainly wasn't as if they were actually alive, this was their purpose in life, making sure that the caster was able to keep himself safe.

When the ground had finally been cut through, Gen saw the ugly thing for the first time. He didn't know why someone had thought to name it a snake, apart from the fact that it was covered in scales. this thing looked more like a giant dinosaur than anything else. He took note of how quickly and voraciously the snake had jumped out of the ground, tearing through the clones like paper mache. He was amazed... this thing really deserved it's title as apex predator, didn't it? Before he could finish his meal, Horus' wings shot out, sending a large gust that began to rocket towards their target. Of course, unable to see the vibration as they felt through the ground, it was unable to sense it until it was too late. Though, today was even worse for the poor bastard.

Pushing his hands forward so that he didn't risk hitting Horus' neck, gen's palms lit up with a pair of strong suiton blasts, the water shooting into the miniature tornadoes and turning them into cyclones. Because of the fact that they moved as fast as one another, the effect was increased exponentially, the wind hitting the snake the same moment the wind tunnels did. Tearing through the skin and leaving major marks, he burned the entire front of the snake off. It was only a first degree burn, but it was more than enough. See, the snake moved through the ground by dragging itself through it, so now that it's hard outer layer was off, doing that would rub off the skin until there was nothing left. It would basically tear itself to pieces. It was a cruel death, but it was the one that the thing had deserved for attacking innocent people. Still... all it had wanted was a meal, and he had to respect that basically. All things wanted to survive, it was the way the world worked.

1034/1000 -Mission Completed-

It is said that a family has a bond that surpasses nature, and that when someone is feeling angry and stressed they can call upon unimaginable strengths. Whether that is true or whether it's something that people make up just to try and import the importance of family onto people who don't believe in that kind of thing is still a rather unknown thing, but the fact remained that the moment that they had scarred through the poor snake's body, leaving it a burned mess on the floor that was struggling to even move, a giant, feral and foul scream shot up through the air. Now, it was clear from the sound of it that it was definitely not a human scream, but what was more obvious was that whatever made it was... well, to put it nicely, huge. It had shot out across the area and was only now setting in on Horus and Gen a very important fact about life. See, things only exist if they're born. Now, that was an obvious fact that everyone should be able to know the moment they understand about the birds and the bees, but there was also something that made this so much worse. If this thing had been born, then it had to have a mother.... But, and this was the important thing, if this wasn't even the full sized thing then the mother had to be huge. A brood mother of things like this tended to be around one and a half times the size of an adolescent and considering that that had been slightly taller than Gen, he had to wonder, or rather worry, about exactly how tall the mother was. They didn't have to wonder long, as they quickly found out.

The moment they heard the scream, they had moved extremely quickly in a hope that they wouldn't end up having to deal with whatever it was that was so clearly anguished about the death of the juvenile, and it was very well that they had done that or else they would be little more than food right now. What had pierced through just where they had been flying a second ago was... well, the best way to describe it was gigantic, although that didn't quite give the thing the merit that it deserved. The thing was at least five times bigger than the juvenile, and considering that that had been taller than him, that was really saying something. It had to be, what, ten foot tall? But, what was weirder was that whereas the juvenile had been walking around on two legs like an ape, this thing actually moved like a giant worm, whilst still retaining the things that the juvenile had around his body, although now on a gigantic scale like the rest of it's hideous, distended body. This thing was the very epitome of foul, from the way that it looked, to the fact that it's jaw seemed to be made up of three flaps of skin that covered a massive mouth with more sharp teeth than even a shark with each tooth being around the size of a new born baby. It even smelled of manure and rotten meat. How he had failed to tell that it was coming before it had emerged from it's tunnel was still a mystery to him, but it looked like he wasn't going to be able to have time to deal with this. His clone technique was still overcharged, so he was instead going to have to rely on his other techniques. Unfortunately, that was when he realized that the mother wasn't alone.

He knew very well how these things bred, it was a horror story that he had read and been unable to forget. It was more terrifying than any hell that he had been taught of by his parents, although maybe this process would be in his own personal hell should he do something wrong. See, the way that it happened was that the mother swallowed a still living creature, and took it inside it's body. Rather than swallowing it, it was put aside into a strange little sac inside the giant body where spore-like eggs were impaled into the poor bastard's body, kept alive but slowly starving to death. They would eventually die and begin to rot inside the sac, and after a gestation period of around a year and a half, the eggs opened up to reveal up to four of the little buggers, which would then fly out of the mother's gullet. How it was able to survive something like that, he wasn't sure, but he knew that the eggs ate their way out just like wasps', which was the main reason that they swallowed someone that they weren't intending on eating. It allowed their "babies" fresh sustenance the moment that they emerged. Thankfully, these things were only fit for breeding once every five years, which was why there was still a relatively tiny population of them still around the planet, but it was also why they struck such fear into the hearts of those who knew about them.

This mother had four larvae like things, clearly having recently come out of mother because of how small they were. Unless, of course, they had aged very slowly, he was not sure about how quickly they grew up. Either way, they were around a fifth of the size of a normal person, but they still had the sharp protrusions on their body, the things that would eventually grow up to be their fifth and sixth limbs. Now, he knew what he was going to have to do. despite the fact that this thing was blind, it still had eyeballs, something that had apparently not been removed via evolution yet. Considering the tough hide that these things had and that the eyeballs were around the size of a human or, in this case, a giant hawk this was going to be the easiest way to kill it. It was going to be disgusting and dangerous, but he was going to have to let Horus deal with the mother whilst he personally dealt with the children. Jumping off of Horus back, he turned his back on his partner and moved towards his new prey.

They were able to see where he moved from his vibrations in the ground, but that didn't matter. Moving his hands forwards with his much higher speed than theirs, he slammed them both together, squishing the first of the children like they were little more than a bug. He managed to get the second with the same method before he was wounded for the first time. Not managing to see them all at once, he felt a blade like instrument slice through his coat, his shirt and grazing the flesh of his arm, springing a small spurt of blood to the surface, spraying the warm contents out like a fountain, landing on the larvae, which licked it up voraciously. Fucking disgusting things... His disgust and anger had become more than enough, and within a few seconds rather than Gen, Set was standing there, moving his hands through the handsigns. He was forging the basics that would go towards him taking care of the other two, as a gigantic orb of wind shot out around him. Due to their small size and the strength of the air currents, they were pulled inside the rotating walls, unable to find their way out as he began to move towards the mother, the orb following him as he went. Finally, came the sound of sickening thuds as the bodies were moved onto the lowest row, before being slammed into a rock, crushing their bodies into fine paste. They were dealt with, and so that now only left their mother, something that would have been a lot more comforting if the mother had not been around 10 feet tall and hungry.

Following their plan perfectly, Horus began his final descent, his body rotating in barrel roll after barrel roll as he moved until he finally moved so fast he actually worked like a drill. Considering that a few days ago he had cut through solid rock to cause a minor cave-in , the soft squishy parts of this thing's giant eye was no match for his movement. Making impact, the thing screamed with an unearthly, bloodcurdling howl that seemed to echo out of the very caves of the badlands themselves, before there was only silence. He had pierced through the thing's head and into the brain, cutting through a part of it. He was not sure about how much brain damage they had done, but they had done enough to be able to send it falling on it's ass, slowly bleeding to death. Picking up as large a rock as he could carry, Set moved over to the eye and set about cutting his friend free, loosening more and more of the thing with each slice of the rock, until there was finally enough room for Horus to move and get himself out of the eye, still covered in blood and brain juice. That... was pretty disgusting. If horus' mouth was not underneath a beak, Set would have guessed that he was frowning.
"Well, look on the bright side... Nobody's dead"

1534/1500