Chapter 495: Chapter 495

The bees had done a small+ purification in the morning, so the Tower moved straight to the celebration banquet when the time came. Belissar checked in quickly with his council, but the reward from the God of Mischief’s quest was a random one so there was no choice to be made. They would just have to see what they received.

Belissar opened up the reward, grinning in anticipation.

Treasure Chest Full of Bees now available!

Belissar blinked. A treasure chest…full of bees?

Treasure Chest Full of Bees

- Type: Bee, Trap, Resource

- Mana Upkeep: Variable based on contents, 10 minimum (Overall cost halved by Blessing of Bees, 5 minimum)

- Description: Treasure! Loot! Shiny things! Definitely not bees! That’s what the challengers think when they see this treasure chest and then BUZZ! It’s full of bees! Magically formed bees unless real bees decide to hide amongst them as well, just in case you were worried!

Uses monster bee workers by default but can be adjusted to use any Bee type monster available to the dungeon, for a price. It works as a regular treasure chest feature as well should a challenger brave the bees. Stocking the chest with honey or honeycomb will reduce its mana upkeep and the bees generated may change based on any special characteristics of the honey used.

Belissar blinked again a few times. Eventually, though, he began to smile.

“So…I guess it’s a trap that makes spell-bees to attack whoever opens it? That seems useful.”

Chief Rohsuak seemed…less pleased.

“Ah, one of those. Trap chests like these are a bane upon challengers who get…overeager.”

“Are they bad, then?”

Chief Rohsuak took a moment and then shook her head with a chuckle.

“I suppose not from this side of things. I general, I believe trap chests exist to ensure that challengers stay alert and do not allow their greed to get the best of them. It…would be somewhat devious to place trap chests when you do not use regular chests, however, at least from the perspective of the challengers.”

Belissar furrowed his brow and then glanced over at the bumblebees.

“So…it’s a thing mostly for challengers?”

He directed the question towards one of the bumblebee soldiers and Finnakynne popped out of the fuzz. She crossed her arms with a complicated expression on her face.

“Well…yes. Daddy loves pranks like that. But…hmm…”

“Ok, I’m trying not to trick people, but I’ll answer your question, ok Beely? So…Daddy loves creativity and he clearly had a hand in this one, so there’s probably a lot of leeway in how you set up the trap and what you want it to do. Maybe you can tell the spell-bees to do different things besides just immediately stinging whoever opens the chest? There’s probably more options than the straightforward one…so that you can trick people in different ways and then trick them again once they figured out the original trick and so on and so forth. That’s…well, that’s pretty much most of my dungeon…”

Finnakynne’s eyes widened and then she shook her head.

“Ah! You probably want to know if it does anything to shades, right? Sorry, sorry, the answer to that is yes. Traps and treasure chests and mischief-making features also become big mana beacons during purifications, so they can distract shades even if the Hunger doesn’t care about the loot.”

Belissar’s eyes widened…and then he sighed.

“That’s…good to know. Would have been good to know.”

Finnakynne frowned and shrank on herself.

“Ah, sorry. I didn’t know that you didn’t know that, Beely. From what I’ve seen and what Daddy’s implied…most of the dungeon stuff that you might not think works on a shade has some adjustment to help during a purification. Um, in case you didn’t know this either, rest zones and safe rooms discourage shades from entering as long as they aren’t the only way forward to your core, and slow down shades that do enter them. Or…oh! You have bloodsucking bees, right? They probably suck out and purify Hunger if they try that on a shade. Stuff like that.”

Bellisar’s eyes widened further.

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“Ah…I also didn’t know that. Thanks Finnakynne, that’s really helpful to know.”

Finnakynne nodded sheepishly before dipping back down into the fuzz.

“Yeah, sorry we didn’t think of it before. You’re good enough at this we forget you don’t know what we know at times.”

Belissar couldn’t help but smile at that. Well, now he knew. He’d have to see what he could do with these treasure chests, but if nothing else they’d be a way to throw spell-bees at the shades. In fact, now that he thought about it, maybe they could use these to figure out how shades would react to monster bees in the first place! Then the bee army could learn how to fight a new shade without having to risk bees in a scout battle! Belissar began to grin.

“You know, I think these are really going to help. What about all of you? Anyone have any ideas on what to do with these?”

Finnakynne immediately popped back out of the fuzz and waved her hands around.

“Oh! Beely! Hide the mead in them! That way Karpy can’t steal any without getting chased around by a bunch of bees!”

Belissar glanced over at Captain Karpakynne, who was glaring at the other pixie.

“Princess Finnakynne! I resent these accusations! I haven’t even done anything yet! It’s not fair to lock everything up beforehand!”

For some reason, Captain Karpakynne’s defense made Belissar more inclined to take Finnakynne’s advice. Other than the pixies, the bees were interested in the spell-bees and Beero in particular looked forward to seeing them. Chief Rohsuak elaborated a bit on her own encounters with trapped chests.

All in all, Belissar and his defenders were quite pleased with the new option. Belissar placed one in the battle Dirt Tunnels right away so they could see what it might do. And with that, Belissar wrapped up the day.

But as it would turn out, Belissar would face something far more urgent when he awoke the next morning. Once Belissar opened his eyes, his eyelids shot as wide open as they would go. He just lay back into the bed, staring at the message before him as his mind tried to wake up and process what he saw.

A monster has evolved!

Monster Bee Dancer is now available!

A monster has evolved! ʀᴇᴀᴅ ʟᴀᴛᴇsᴛ ᴄʜᴀᴘᴛᴇʀs ᴀᴛ novel✦fire.net

Monster Bee Dronedancer is now available!

He broke out into a huge grin once his mind caught up.

“Niobee! New bees evolved!”

Niobee began dancing about from her place on the wall above him.

“Amazing, incredible! Drones useful now!”

Belissar turned his tower sight over to the new Beecity, where a group of former drones and communers were emerging out of their evolution cells. He focused in on each in turn, starting with the new dancers.

Notable Skills: Poison Sting, Death Blow, Brood Offspring, Hive Dance

Evolves From: Monster Bee Communer, Monster Bee Worker

Description: Monster bees, by nature of the quantity of magical creatures gathered in one area, produce an ambient mana that links them together. Communers can tap into this mana to expand this link. Monster bee dancers take this a step further, adjusting the mana itself to affect the rest of the hive in turn. Their dances resound through the hive’s mana, boosting the other bees in various ways depending on the dance. While they are not incapable of combat, they are not specialized in it and are most effective when kept from harm.

In addition to evolving from existing communers, new monster bee workers may be raised as dancers, though this requires notably more resources from the hive.

Belissar leaned back enough that he could look up at Niobee and smiled, reaching up to brush her back.

“You helped them, right, Niobee? Thank you for that. Thanks to you and the communers, we got those dancers after all. I felt a bit bad skipping them all those times before, so it really helps that you and the hive of hives managed to evolve them yourselves.”

Niobee squirmed about but didn’t start dancing since he was brushing her, instead using her mana and pheromones to convey her intent.

“King is best king! Niobee will help! Hive of hives will help!”

Belissar’s smile grew. She truly was his best friend. And now, thanks to her efforts, not only did the Tower gain dancers, it had gained a new kind of drone too.

Monster Bee Dronedancer

Notable Skills: Hive Dance, Hive Cooperation, Mana Sight, Mana Absorption, Mana Transfer, Mana Blending, Brood Offspring

Evolves From: Monster Bee Communer, Monster Bee Worker

Description: A monster bee drone that has absorbed enough mana to form his own mana core, enabling him to regenerate his own mana. This resolves the drone’s normally limited lifespan and allows him to survive mating. In addition to these benefits, he can now use his own naturally blending mana as a bridge to link different types of mana together. The drone’s previous reliance on externally granted mana also gives him an innate ability to absorb mana and adapt his own, as well as to transfer his mana to others.

This drone has learned how to blend the mana of the hive, or of different hives working together, to support the efforts of the other bees, much like the monster bee dancer. His dances are not as powerful as a dancer’s, but his ability to blend different mana sources allows him to link different bees that are working together, facilitating their cooperation. If the bees affected are of different types, evolutions, or even species, the dronedancer’s dance may grant unique boosts based on the bees in question.

These made Belissar even happier than the dancers, if he was honest. They were a dancer specialized in helping the bees work together, exactly what the hive of hives was trying to do at the moment. But, more importantly, they were a kind of drone that wouldn’t die during mating. So, from this moment onward, the hive of hives could raise new queens and new hives without sacrificing any bees at all.

Bees lives would be saved and new bees would be gained. Nothing made Belissar more happy than that.