The Bee Dungeon

The time had finally come. Belissar finished up the day’s beekeeping lesson by passing out the honey from the tray, which was greatly appreciated by his students. After that, he made his way to the battle meadow to prepare for the day’s purification, rearranging the first floor rooms. As usual for the daily purifications, the Dirt Tunnels was first, followed by the battle meadow, and then the Lava Field.

The Hunger coalesced and, this time, took the form of a small turtle shade. Belissar rubbed his chin and quickly nodded his head.

“Change of plans, everyone! I’m moving the Lava Field in front of the shade. Third of the Sixth, hang back and keep your hive out of sight, be prepared to evacuate if the shade heads your way.”

With the buzzing of countless salute dances in the background, Belissar quickly made the changes. Since the shade was already in the Dirt Tunnels, Belissar could only place the Lava Field between the tunnels and the battle meadow, but he put the entrance to the Lava Field right along the shade’s path, before even the first Pit Trap. His hope was to test the defensive features of the Lava Field against a turtle shade, both to test the room’s power against the turtle’s robust defenses, and also since the turtle was slow enough for the Third of the Sixth to evacuate her hive if worst came to worst.

Fortunately, the shade acted as he hoped. Once it found the door to the next room, it crawled inside. It slowly made its way across the volcanic rock, growling with a low rumble as the heat raised all around it, but it continued forward without any ill effect.

But then came the moment Belissar had been waiting for. The mini-volcano began to rumble, sending tremors echoing across the room. Then, with an explosion of light and ash, a flaming boulder launched from its mouth into the sky, burning across the air like a shooting star. It plunged towards the ground, flames roaring all around it as it descended down. It landed with a crash, kicking up waves of ash and smoke as flaming debris scattered across the area.

It had also landed in an entirely different section of the room from the shade, which made its way forward without any sort of response.

But Belissar held his breath as yet another boulder launched…and then sighed as it struck the entrance to the room, long after the shade had left. Then came another…and another…

It was on the fifth boulder, just before the turtle shade reached the first lava river in its path, that the boulder finally struck true. And, in Belissar’s opinion, it had been worth the wait. The shade vanished under the cloud of ash and fire, which was still rising as Belissar immediately received the message.

Belissar smiled.

“We won, everyone. The shade got crushed by a mini-volcano boulder.”

Belissar chuckled as he watched the bees start their celebration dances, then rubbed his chin. The mini-volcano proved powerful indeed, it could crush at least a smaller turtle shade in a single blow, and anything that survived would find itself on fire and choked by smoke and ash. Yet, the boulders were not at all accurate, or particularly fast. A faster shade may have crossed the room before it was struck, at least if it could get past the lava rivers. Belissar might be able to deal with that by manually activating the volcano…but what if the shades specifically dodged the attack? The boulders were not exactly hard to miss as they descended. Belissar felt it may not be wise to rely solely on the volcano.

In the end, it would still come down to his bees. The volcano might not catch a fast shade before it could cross the room…but that would change if there was an army of burning bees blocking their way.

Belissar nodded to himself. In the end, the room did as he hoped. The volcano was powerful enough to deal with a shade that might ward off his bees, and his bees could hopefully handle anything nimble enough to dodge the volcano. It would be a powerful addition to the defense once the Lava Field bees raised a soldier army of their own.

This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

And with that, it was time to decide on the rewards.

Small Purification completed! Please select a reward:

- +100 DP

- +20 Max Mana

- Shortcuts

Belissar blinked, and then focused on that last option.

Shortcut

Type: Utility

Mana Upkeep: 3

Description: A shortcut enabling quick travel between floors and rooms. Only usable by those the dungeon master permits. Corrupted entities may not use, as contact with corruption will disable shortcut until purification. ṘÁNɵβËṧ

At first, Belissar tilted his head…but his eyes slowly widened as he thought a bit further. Quick travel between floors and rooms…he was guessing that meant the shortcuts could be used to bypass rooms otherwise in the way? Would that let his bees quickly travel between the rooms as necessary? Would that allow the karnuq to bypass the first floor if they wanted to leave the Tower, so that Belissar didn’t need to move the Lava Field out of the way each time? That seemed like an amazing feature to have.

And even his worry that a shade might use it was resolved by the feature’s own description. Not only could he decide who gets to use the shortcut, the Hunger specifically would not be able to use them since they'd be disabled on contact. With that, there was no reason to hesitate.

Shortcuts are now available!

Belissar wanted to try one out right away, but instead he turned to Niobee.

“Hey Niobee, can you ask a bee to remind me about shortcuts at tonight’s meeting?”

“Ok!”

He put it aside for the time being, for now was the time to celebrate with the bees.

Belissar once again gathered with the queens and Chief Rohsuak, along with the gardeners as he had requested.

“So, we have a lot to go through tonight. First…um, sorry I made this choice without telling you all, but we have a new feature. They’re called shortcuts…”

Chief Rohsuak’s eyes began shining the moment Belissar said the name. The bees began to buzz their wings and dance about as Belissar read out the description. The Fourth of the Seventh flew right in front of him.

“Can fly right to Beyond from Orchard?!”

Belissar rubbed his chin, but slowly nodded.

“We’ll have to test it, but I think so.”

At that point, Chief Rohsuak cleared her throat.

“Actually, I can assist here, Sacred Den Master. I’ve encountered shortcuts in other Sacred Dens and they do exactly as you think. You can use them to go straight from the entrance of the Sacred Den to higher floors, or to move between otherwise disconnected rooms.”

All of the queens, lead by the Fourth of the Seventh, began dancing at that.

“Amazing, incredible!”

Belissar smiled and nodded.

“I think it will be. We’ll start setting some up tomorrow morning, so…maybe think about where you’d like to be able to go over the night?”

All the bees saluted at that, while Chief Rohsuak grinned.

“Next…we have another three thousand DP to spend. We can get another room for that last open slot, another monster type, or up to three new room features. Oh, um, we’ve never actually considered these before, but we can also buy extra room slots, more mana, or new perks. Those are more expensive, though, so we’d have to save up. Does anyone have any suggestions?”

Belissar actually had an idea of what he wanted to buy, but he was trying to get the bees to share their opinions with him, so he didn’t mention it just yet. They mainly had the usual responses of “more flowers,” “more bees,” and “whatever King chooses!” Belissar chuckled and turned to Chief Roshuak. He would certainly like to hear her thoughts, though he knew that she was holding her tongue intentionally so didn’t think she’d speak up this time.

Surprisingly, though, she did.

“One thing to consider, Sacred Den Master. Now that we are opening trade with the sigmaka, consider that the more types of goods your Sacred Den can produce, the more we will have to bargain with. They may also wish to send challengers one day, you may wish to prepare for that if it is something you want.”

Belissar nodded at that. Those were good points. He ideally wanted some of those aphids and wasn’t sure if the sigmaka would part with any, so having more to trade could be a good idea. Likewise, sigmaka challengers wasn’t something he had considered, but he guessed he could always invite them in if he wanted some? That would improve his DP income and help with that mission to help challengers receive blessings that was still ongoing.

On the other hand, he was not sure he wanted to let any sigmaka into his Tower just yet, especially armed ones. He had gotten along with King Ratuatapi well enough and the sigmaka swore not to harm his bees or the karnuq, but finding out that the sigmaka might have attacked him made him wary of inviting them back in anytime soon.

Belissar’s own preference started to solidify but he had one more question to ask before he made the final decision. He looked around towards the gardener bees, who were currently hovering a bit further away and behind their respective queens.

“I’d like to ask the gardeners something now: can we cross-pollinate some sort of monster flower?”

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