Even so, they arranged to be delivered a number of cores each day that they could manage, along with their four assistants. With these cores, they strained their minds as hard as possible to push their Core Shaping Skills to the limit. Pushing until their heads were near exploding and they collapsed in a heap. At which point, the core would be put in a corner with the others which had been manipulated and collected at the end of the day for delivery.
It all came down to cores! There just weren’t enough of them.
Since the eldest insisted on fuelling the evolution of as many hatchlings as possible, the colony consumed a ferocious number of cores, and farming efforts had expanded to try and meet the ravenous demand. Other than providing water to the farm chambers in order to give the monsters a source of Mana infused water, there was yet to be a development in the methods used to increase the speed and likelihood for a monster to develop a core. This was shaping up as a key challenge facing the expansion of the colony.
It was just one of the projects the Core Shapers had bent their minds to, fuelled by their potent Will.
“Big news, Ellie! The queen is getting ready to evolve!” Bella told her partner.
Elligant wiggled her antennae in excitement, her mind instantly buzzing with the possible outcomes.
“We’ll need to make sure we’re there when she emerges from her evolution sleep,” Ellie gushed. “When she tells us her species, we’ll be able to add it to the logs!”
Bella nodded enthusiastically, taking in the logs which were carved into another wall in the chamber. This was the collective knowledge that the colony had so far amassed about monster types and evolution. Key information was obviously that which referred to their own species. The queen’s evolution should be a rare and unique one, which would give them the opportunity to record an evolution pathway that wouldn’t often be seen. The only evolution that would be more tantalising would be the eldest’s. Since that particular member of the colony walked down a path of evolution that no other ant had, and in all likelihood, no other ant ever would.
Whilst the two members of the council nattered at each other about the possible paths the queen’s evolution might take, their four assistants continued their diligent work in drawing from the collection of cores to be manipulated, carrying them back to their own individual workstations in their mandibles and then touching them with antennae and forcing changes to the information inside in order to train their Skills.
One by one, the poor ants slumped into the dirt as their minds hit their limits and they rested to try and gather strength for another attempt. This was their day, each and every day, and they loved it. To the Core Shapers, this was heaven. Grinding Skills and forging a path into the future as the experts of evolution, all things core and crafters of pets for the colony.
“How’s our main project going?” Bella enquired of Ellie, getting back onto their actual tasks.
Ellie shook her head.
“Still inconclusive. The main drawback is our lack of Skill ranks and support Skills.”
The two ants moved toward their joint work area beyond the four assistants who remained crumbled in the dirt. In their station, a single core sat on a raised mound of earth, and the two Shapers crowded around it.
The Core Shapers had been designed by the eldest in order to fulfil one primary function: to design and shape cores that could be reconstituted by members of the colony to assist in work. Much of their theory crafting and brainstorming had been toward working out exactly what sort of pets the colony needed.
The eldest had certainly proven they could be powerful when raised properly. But the Shapers very quickly abandoned that avenue of thought. They would never have the kind of resources to spare that the eldest lavished on those pets. They didn’t have enough for the ants, let alone any pets they might create!
No, that path of inquiry was pointless. Instead, they focused on pets that would be immediately useful, able to fulfil some sort of need without having to be strengthened and reinforced. They should be useful after they were fully grown and should only expect to evolve once, perhaps twice over the course of their lives.
Bella drew her antennae forward and placed them on the core, their first effort at designing a creature to serve the colony in the capacity of a pet. Activating the Core Shaping Skill, she took in the rush of information contained within and sorted it into a readable status.
After contemplating the results, she drew back to consult with her fellow Shaper.
“I’m just not sure if it serves the purpose well enough for us to go with it,” she sighed.
Ellie nodded. They’d attempted to design a pack animal to act as a logistics support, using the evolved Wolf Dragon Hound as the base. The idea behind the concept being that if a soldier or worker had this pet, they’d be able to move heavy loads far more quickly with fewer ants, speeding up the transport of Biomass, dirt, stone, logs and anything else they needed to shift.
The problem was that it was extremely difficult to find something that would be better than just throwing more ants at the problem. Need to fight stuff? More ants. Need to move stuff? Send more ants. Need to solve a difficult problem? Get some extra ants in there.
The two Shapers had been both chagrined, and extremely pleased to be confronted with the superiority of the design of their own species.
“Let’s turn to our other concept then,” Ellie suggested. Bella readily agreed.
Logistics was a bust for now. Time to go back to combat-oriented pets.
88. The Third Ambush, Part 1
We lay in wait, ready to spring the third ambush. It’s been six hours since the second battle, which had been another success. Something that made Victor very irritated. A feeling I was also beginning to share.
The horde is massive. Tens of thousands of monsters make up the rolling carpet that trundles its way toward my home. Even after two successful fights, we are only making a dent. The possibility exists that Garralosh and the Wizard Lizard just don’t care that we’re killing their zombie monsters. At this pace, more than half of them will still make it to the colony. More than enough to seriously endanger our existence.
I just can’t shake the feeling that it wasn’t going to go down that way. Why would they let us attack them, make ourselves stronger and them weaker, without any sort of retaliation? It doesn’t make sense for them to do that. Especially when they could most likely reach out and easily damage us.
With no concept of exactly what the Ka’armodo can do, we’re left fumbling in the dark as to what its intentions might be. All in all, I’m starting to sympathise with Victor; having an enemy you have no information on refuse to do anything, thus denying you information, is so frustrating.
The second ambush went smoothly. That’s a win, focus on that. We launched another Gravity Bomb, followed by an acid attack before retreating into the tunnels. So far, so groovy. This time, we’ve prepared larger underground spaces in which to do battle.
I personally had been a little shocked that the monsters weren’t restrained from following us into the tunnels. It was the collapsing tunnels that did half of the damage in the first ambush, but nope. When the enemy charged down after me, I’d been so shocked, a Wolf Dragon Cub had run up and bit me on the nose before I even realised it!