The Bee Dungeon

The First of the Fifth was ecstatic. So ecstatic, in fact, that she spent the rest of the morning zipping about in a celebratory dance. How could she not be? She had helped other queens find their specialties and fulfilled the will of the King, who praised them all for the effort.

All good things must come to an end, however, and the work must continue, so eventually she came to a stop. She had to take a moment to recover before proceeding on her next task, but proceed she must. She sent word through two of her communers to inform two of her fellow queens that the time had come.

She made her way over to large, open-air cavern where the Dirt Tunnels connected to the Apiary, where the Apiary Bees could gain access to Ground mana flowers along with subterranean plants and mushrooms. The first digging queen, the Fourth of the Fifth, was already waiting alongside a much smaller digging queen and a digging drone. The other queen she awaited came flying in through the shortcut to the Dirt Tunnels on the wall of the cavern, instantly raising the temperature of the cavern.

The Third of the Sixth had arrived, with a small burning queen and burning drone of her own.

The First of the Fifth needed not give any commands for the two queens to get to work, exchanging their drones and queens. The King had granted them his power at the same time he offered them the powerful honeypots. His power assisted in the evolution of bees, helping the latest generation of evolved queens take on the aspects of special honeys, as well as speeding up the evolution of workers and soldiers into their various advanced forms. But the First of the Fifth knew that the King’s latest boon was not limited to those applications. Indeed, they had not yet attempted the application the boon was focused on most.

That changed today as the new princess bees and drones embarked on their mating flight. The King’s boon promised new bees should different types of bees mate. The queens had spoken and the First of the Fifth had proposed a test with the Fourth of the Fifth and the Third of the Sixth. These two queens, evolved from the Fire mana flower and the Ground mana flower, had the most distinct differences and most distinct mana of all the queens with established hives, so she felt that this pairing, if any, would show them what the latest boon could achieve.

The Fourth of the Fifth’s and Third of the Sixth’s daughters returned, now full queens. The First of the Fifth examined them closely. Their mana had shifted, twisted together with the drones’ to become something different. It condensed in their torsos, forming a mass that seemed ready to explode.

In fact, the two young queens began dancing frantically to their queens. The mothers responded and the two daughters zipped off back to their respective mothers’ hives. The Third of the Sixth then began a report dance to her.

“Daughter said need to evolve again, letting her evolve in hive.”

“Ok. Let know when hatches. And let Conduit know more drones sacrificed so King can honor.”

The Third of the Sixth and Fourth of the Fifth both saluted and then all three queens returned to their hives. The First of the Fifth swayed in a happy dance as she flew.

She’d have to wait for the two new queens to finish evolving to know the full results…but that in itself spoke of grand success. Soon, she’d have two new queen types to introduce to the King.

And the possibility of many, many more to come.

The Third Queen of the First Dynasty of the Third Spawner, the first of her line, arrived at her destination. She greeted the First of the Fifth’s First Daughter’s worker as she exited the shortcut before making her way into the Orchard. She headed not for the grove where the hives of the Orchard watched over the room, nor to the mystical Fairy Grove where the children of the Fourth of the Seventh and First of the Fifth’s First Daughter honed their pathfinding. No, she headed through the trees of the Orchard, where a modest but still numerous nest of bees waited.

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The Third of the Third had deviated from many of her fellow Flower Meadow queens in the latest round of evolutions. Most of the other Flower Meadow queens, led by the Firstborn herself, had rushed to evolve the newest archers, or more of the previous lancers. The Third of the Third, on the other hand, felt uncomfortable doing so. The Firstborn and the others had long pushed their hives past the point of sustainability to build their mighty army, relying entirely on the donations from the Apiary to keep themselves going. The Third of the Third’s hive wasn’t even as prosperous as theirs, and she simply could not overcome her instincts blaring at her to expand her honey production before she even thought about raising a larger soldier type. So, rather than evolving her soldiers, she evolved her workers and raised a handful of honeypots. Their improved ability to process and imbue honey with mana allowed her workers to diversify their foraging away from the overworked mana flowers while still producing as much if not more honey per nectar gathered as before.

Well, it was nowhere near what the Apiary queens could do, but nonetheless she had managed to produce a respectable honey surplus, enough at least to maintain her current soldier numbers. She could even start raising a lancer or archer with only minimal assistance from the Apiary bees if she desired, though her contributions to the army would still be far less than her fellow queens unless she put herself into a serious honey debt. She had thus been at a loss at how she could contribute significantly to the bee army while still maintaining a sustainable honey production. It had seemed like, in the end, she could only choose one or the other.

It was then, however, that she came up with a different idea. Something else she could do with her honey surplus. Something that, out of all the Flower Meadow queens, only she could do because of that surplus.

And that had led her here, to the carpenter bee nest.

She and her escort of workers and soldiers hovered over the magical palace the King had built for the new bees. There, she waited patiently until the new bees noticed her. The largest of their number headed her way, with several of the others noticing her and then following suit. The large carpenter bee didn’t dance, though she did bob up and down slightly once before staring at the Third of the Third.

The Third of the Third gave her own greeting dance and launched into her business.

“Have proposal. Need wood cut. Can give honey in exchange.”

The carpenter bee continued to stare at her. The Third of the Third was just wondering if the other bee had understood her when the carpenter bobbed a few times and then zipped about. She then danced to her workers who began flying to the nearby carpenter bees, passing along the honey they had stored in their crops. Each carpenter bee they fed then began to follow them along.

Soon, the Third of the Third had a small swarm of carpenter bees following her workers. She, in turn, led them back to her home in the Flower Meadow. She led them to a large stack of wood, tribute from the karnuq left here by the king.

Her workers landed on various points of one piece of wood. She wasn’t sure if the carpenters would fully understand their dances, so the workers guided the carpenters one by one. The carpenters seemed to understand well enough, placed their mandibles on the surface, and began to vibrate and sheer off the wood.

Meanwhile, a few squads of soldiers stood nearby, mostly her own. The soldiers who had been assisting the karnuq build their hives.

This was the idea she had come up with. The construction squad had been taught how to lift wood and assemble structures, but had no way of processing the wood without the karnuq or the King. The karnuq were the King’s to command, and the Third of the Third would never ask the King for help with a job of her own. But the carpenter bees? The First of the Fifth’s First Daughter’s communer network reported on the newest bees, noting their ability to bore straight through solid wood.

With their help, the construction squad could begin assembling wooden structures all on their own, without the assistance or the direction of either the King or the karnuq. They could assemble more of those platforms for the hive of the fallen to cast their magic stingers from, or expand the line of sharp stakes the King had placed in front of the Bee Barracks. They could begin preparing for a battle before it happened.

And in exchange, they could provide their mana rich honey to the carpenter bees. The carpenter bees, strangely, did not seem to store or produce honey, each one spending most of their day drinking from flowers as individuals. The Third of the Third could eliminate their need to do so, allowing them to work for the hive of hives in the way that only they could.

And so, cooperation began between the Bee Barracks and the carpenter bees.

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