Chapter 32: Chapter 32

Belissar awoke the next day and went to check on the hives. He found the queen of the closest hive waiting for him at the entrance to her beehouse, flanked by two workers.

“Hi there, want to show me something again?”

The queen danced a salute and then brushed antenna with the two bees, who flew up towards Belissar. His eyes widened as he looked more closely at them...and found they were the wrong colors. One had bluish-green and black stripes, while the other alternated purple and black. He took a closer look...

Medicinal Monster Bee Worker

Belissar didn’t know, but figured the bees would know what they were doing. In any case, extra medicine was always a good thing. He especially liked the part of their description about improving the health of the hive as a whole. Healthy hives and stronger broods always made him happy.

But the most important part of this development was not either of the two bees themselves. It was the knowledge that monster bees could change and grow into new forms...without a reward from the Tower or the gods. Belissar’s mind raced as to what might be possible. If a couple of healing herbs and poisonous flowers had led to this...what might his bees be able to do? How far could they take this? ᚱ₳NȪ฿ЕŚ

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He smiled and nodded his head towards the queen.

“Well done, this is amazing.”

The queen in question froze solid. Belissar chuckled as he went about to check on the other hives. And as he did so, he began to dream of all sorts of fantastical and impossible bees. Fantastical and impossible bees that might be very real one day, between the power of the Tower and the magic of the monster bees.

“I’ll have to get some more plants next time...”

The Firstborn froze completely as her mind processed the report. The First of the Fifth had sent her new workers across the King’s lands, declaring her achievement with the approval of the Conduit. And this news...changed everything.

The Firstborn admitted she had underestimated the First of the Fifth. She was the eldest of the Apiary queens, and yet she did not seem to understand their purpose as the Firstborn did. They were defenders first, and all else second. Should the invaders break past the gate to the Beyond, all that they had built would be torn down and destroyed. So, there were no tasks more important than preparing for the fight to come.

And yet, the First of the Fifth spent her days and her efforts on the production of honey. The Firstborn could understand the need to maximize production, but the First of the Fifth took it further. From what the Firstborn had heard, she obsessed over quality, and split her honey based on her assessment of each batch.

The Firstborn understood, to some extent. She, too, had the desire to offer her tribute to the King, and she agreed that he deserved nothing but the very best. Yet, she could not help but be a bit disappointed. The First of the Fifth was her counterpart in the Apiary, the eldest of the queens that the others looked to and followed. She did not wish for the First of the Fifth to change her focus, or anything of that nature. The Apiary hives’ honey production had proved to be a critical asset in the Third Invasion. Moreover, the Firstborn was glad that the armies of the Flower Meadow were powerful enough that the Apiary hives could devote themselves to such efforts. Yet...she did wish that the First of the Fifth remembered the broader picture. She worried that her counterpart was neglecting their primary duty with her obsession and causing the younger queens to follow suit. It did not befit her role as a fellow firstborn.

But that assessment had proven largely wrong.

The First of the Fifth’s efforts had paid off in completely unanticipated ways. Her honey from the new plants had transformed into a weapon that had great effect upon the enemy of the Fourth Invasion. And now, her offspring had taken on the qualities of the honeys she curated so obsessively. Her workers could now deploy a venom unlike anything the Firstborn’s army possessed and had dedicated tenders to ensure every larva of her brood grew healthy and strong.

And she had done all of this with the plants that the Firstborn had neglected.

The Firstborn was ashamed to admit she had ignored the wisdom of the King. After he had gifted them with new patches of flowers, she had focused her workers’ efforts entirely on the mana flowers. The flowers that would provide the most nutrition for their efforts, to allow her army to grow as large and powerful as possible with as little work as possible. So, when the other new plants had proven to have no more mana than the normal flowers, she had not paid attention to them. Their nectar and their honey had been mixed in with the rest of the normal fare, treated no different than any other.

So, she had not noticed the potential lurking inside that humble nectar. She imagined what might have been if she had done as the First of the Fifth. She imagined a soldier bee with a debilitating sting, causing the enemy to stumble and fall after but a few attacks. She imagined what her soldiers might look like had they been tended by dedicated healers.

She had been truly foolish.

The Firstborn set out to rectify this. She wished to separate out and organize her honey based on its source. She would not go to the extent the First of the Fifth did, but at least she would separate the nectar from the new patches so that they could feed some of the new brood upon it. She quickly realized, though, that this was not possible in the short term. Her hive was still operating on a smaller workforce, one that could not sustain her current army if they shifted focus away from the mana flowers. They did not have the time to spend on organization, nor on gathering sufficient nectar from the other, low mana patches. As they were, they would struggle to gather enough honey from the other plants to produce even a single worker of the types the First of the Fifth had displayed, much less a honey-guzzling soldier.

The Firstborn stood still again as she realized the truth. It had not been that she had not noticed the potential of the plants...it was that she couldn’t have. Her focus on the soldiers prevented her from taking the steps necessary to ever discover such a thing.

It was only the First of the Fifth, and her obsession with honey quality, that could have produced this outcome. It was only her who could have revealed this new path for the army’s growth.