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((Triple Saturday -- Page 1 of 3))
His plan worked, though maybe a little too well. Lightning leapt from rod to rod, destroying each one as it went and sending so many iron chunks flying at once they created a kind of electrical storm all around him.

‘Okay,’ came Emiliana’s voice again. ‘Are you still there?’

Hector was busy annihilating all of his shredded iron so as to rob the electricity in the air of its prime conductor, but he still managed to say, ‘Yeah.’ It calmed the crackling storm almost instantly, but now his armor was the prime conductor, and a bolt from the thin air struck him, though it was weak enough that it only knocked him back a couple steps instead of sending him flying.

He launched himself away just as the worm’s gaping jaw crashed down.

That was much closer than he wanted it to be. He could sense sludge all over his armor and started trying to remove it with more acrobatic movements, as he did earlier.

‘You okay in there?’ he asked, consciously directing the thought at Garovel alone.

‘Yeah, I’m good.’

Emiliana was saying something again. ‘--was hoping to corroborate more of this so that I did not tell you something that was false. The list is quite long, so--’

‘Just give me whatever you’ve got,’ he told her.

‘Um--very well. Their slimy bodies have strange electromagnetic properties, which allows many of the larger ones to accumulate a very strong charge and expel it from--’

‘Yep. Know that. What else?’

‘Um. Ah--do you know that their sludge can be a powerful acid?’

‘Yeah.’ He neglected mentioning that it was one of the things about worms that he was LEAST afraid of, having already seen much more powerful acid elsewhere. No sense in derailing the conversation.

‘Okay. Did you know that they can increase their mass by breaking down rock and absorbing it into their bodies?’

Oh.

Oh shit.

‘No, I didn’t,’ said Hector. But that did explain why the worm seemed to be a little larger, all of a sudden. And a lot of those rocks that the worm’s lightning had torn out of the floor and walls were missing now, according to the Scarf.

‘They can also divide themselves and reassemble as they please.’

‘Yeah. Seen that firsthand.’ Granted, this particular worm hadn’t done so yet, but he didn’t doubt that it could. Though, given the circumstances, he might’ve preferred a bunch of little worms to the one big one. They might be more difficult to keep away from, sure, but at least he wouldn’t have to worry about getting pancaked into the wall or swallowed whole.

‘I have also read that worms can absorb the abilities of servants that they have eaten. I have seen conflicting information with regard to this one, however. Do you know if it is true?’

‘No, sorry. Haven’t seen that one yet, thankfully.’