“If it please, my lord Ebruis, the discussion should not be delayed, it is for the purpose of conversing with you and the council that I have arisen from my rest,” Beyn smoothly interjected.
The quivering intensity in his voice was unnerving enough that even Ebruis could not deny it.
“Oh… Oh, very well. Are you sure you would not rather rest, Father Beyn? You do not appear to have even had a chance to change your robes,” the mayor spluttered in a feeble attempt to put off his work.
“Do the robes of my faith, marked with the blood I have shed in the name of the System, offend you, Lord Mayor?”
The fat man paled in fright before raising his hands and shaking them in protest. “I dare not, Father. I intended no such thing!”
“Very well then. If I may.” At this, Beyn took a vacant chair and gestured toward Mrs Ruther. “I would be grateful to you, Mrs Ruther, if you would apprise me of what has occurred in the last two days. Have the monsters threatened us?”
Somewhat surprised at being called on, the elderly matron took a moment to gather her dignity before replying. “They haven’t, Father. We’ve not seen so much as a leg of those ants since they marched into the forest after you were… attacked.”
After saying this, she quickly met Beyn’s gaze before flicking her eyes away, as if scalded by the fire she saw there.
“More troubling than the monsters, as strange as that is to say, is the disturbance in the capital. We haven’t had a reliable message out of there all day. Fighting in the streets, the soldiers setting fire to the merchant district, blood on the steps of the castle. It sounds dreadful. The people are too scared to work, gazing at the smoke rising over the walls from dawn to dusk!”
With his good hand, Beyn gripped his chair so hard his knuckles cracked.
“This disturbance in the capital is more important, you say? More important than the agents of the Dungeon rising from beneath our very feet?” More than just passion, hatred now dripped from every word the priest spoke, causing those closest to draw away from him.
Mrs Ruther visibly worked to regain her voice. “There hasn’t been a single victim of those monsters in this town, but we hear of hundreds dead inside the city. Most of us have family in there, Father. I’m terribly sorry for your injury, we all are, but we’ve got more pressing issues than those ants!”
At this, Beyn rose and burst out loudly, “For the first time in a thousand years the Dungeon has reached up and delivered its servants to the very surface, and you are distracted by petty fighting in the city! Do you not see the grander destiny that has been laid out before us?”
A few people shifted uncomfortably in their seats.
Mayor Ebruis attempted to calm the agitated priest. “You did say something similar at the church two days ago, Father, and, well, that didn’t turn out… so well?”
Beyn turned his blazing righteous gaze on the mayor, and then at the others one by one, until all had turned from him and were silent.
“At first, I believed the great System had called on us, had blessed this town by delivering its greatest blessing, experience, to raise us up and forge us for a new purpose. I still believe that is the case. This,” he waved the bandaged stump of his arm in the faces of the council, “was my misjudgement. I foolishly believed the System had delivered its fruit to us and all we had to do was pluck it, but no, there are no gifts within the System, only rewards! Rewards that are rightly earned and so I was punished for my transgression!”
Ebruis waved his hands to try and relax the priest, but it was to no avail.
“We have to take up arms, can you not see that!” Beyn exhorted the council. “Those hideous beasts, led by that demon ant, shall return. Not only this, more will come, I assure you! Our trial is not yet complete. The people must be told. We must rise to this test!”
After these words, Beyn strode out, leaving the flabbergasted council behind. He marched to the town square where he began to preach with mesmerising power, stretching the limits of his oratory skill to bend the hearts of the people.
A crowd gathered, and that evening, when several monsters emerged from the hole in the church, he urged the people to arm themselves and led the crowd personally in a great charge up the hill and into the building wherein those creatures were defeated.
The people roared in triumph and celebrated their victory. Beyn was unmoved. He asked that a watch be put on the church and turned his gaze toward the forest.
15. Core farming
I need cores.
Like, super badly.
Cores for me, cores for Tiny, cores for experimenting. I need cores to raise my skills, to fuse into more powerful cores for myself and for Tiny, and I need cores for my other side project.
CORES!
The number of monster cores we’ve extracted so far from the farm was a grand total of one. When Tiny and I went in there to cripple the creatures this morning, we found a monstrous toad had already slaughtered most of the creatures. Tiny excitedly rushed to engage it, charging up his lightning fist and exploded the foe with one punch.
Luckily, he hadn’t destroyed the core.
Still, one core every three days is not nearly enough to meet my needs. I refuse!
I just don’t yet have a solution to this problem.
Tiny and I are currently resting in the nest. A contented bustle has come over the colony recently as the workers have been busy doing the things that workers love to do. Tending to the brood, expanding the nest, foraging for food. Our new anthill has become impressively large now, the top reaching toward the peak of the trees. I had to ask them not to make it any higher or we’ll end up too easy to spot. Our main objective still remains to hide and ride out the wave.
I want no trouble, be it human or otherwise.
To my delight, the pupae have started to hatch over the last few hours. Hundreds of new workers emerging to swell the ranks of the colony. When this generation finally emerges, we will have reached the one thousand worker mark! A milestone in the life of a young colony to be sure.
This is nothing though. If we expand the farm a little and keep the supply of Biomass coming, it won’t be long until we reach two thousand, five thousand, one hundred thousand!
That was the other exciting thing this morning, the queen finally awoke from her rest. After a massive feed provided to her by the workers, she got busy producing the next generation. Even as I rest, the workers are scurrying about madly with fresh clutches of eggs, stashing them into the egg chambers, fastidiously cleaning them and ensuring they are the right temperature.
This means it’s time to advance the schedule of my project. For that… I have to have cores!
As I clack my mandibles in irritation, I’m suddenly distracted by a noise. Turning around, it isn’t Tiny snoring for once, though he is asleep, thick meaty arms flung over his face like a hairy teenager. The noise instead came from the pupa stashed with us in our private chamber.
The cocoon has already begun to take on a distinct thin shade as the young larva inside has gone through its remarkable metamorphosis, transforming from a grub and into an ant. Still ghostly white and translucent, as its carapace has yet to harden, the almost complete worker has started to move, twitching its limbs and stretching out for the first time.
I guess I’ll help the little thing. It’s normal for other workers to assist newborns breaking free of their cocoon, cutting away at the threads with their mandibles. The very first workers in the colony will have this task performed for them by the queen herself.