The Bee Dungeon
Author: Icalos
POBee 300.2 - The Everyday Bee-roes
The First of the Fifth’s First Daughter cut the link before the Firstborn could reply, so she gave orders to her communers to past on congratulations the slow way. The Firstborn wholeheartedly approved of the First Daughter attempting to evolve, she had stepped up to turn the hive of hives into material reality with her joint dances. There was no queen more deserving of an evolution than her.
The Firstborn also didn’t mind the temporary loss of joint dances. After all, she would not require those dances for her present project. She watched as a squad of lancers danced a salute before her. She replied with a dance of her own.
“Lancers ready, pixie soldiers ready?”
A group of the small King-things, pixies as the King called them, saluted in their own fashion.
“Ready! Let’s go, go!”
The Firstborn danced the attack signal and the lancers started their dive. The pixie soldiers laughed and shouted from the backs of the lancers. Two of them failed to get their weapons, long stinger-like sticks, pointed in the right direction. The wind caught the weapons on the side and pulled the pixies right off of the lancers’ backs. A third leaned the wrong way when his lancer banked to the right and fell off to the side. Only two of the pixies managed to hang on for the duration of the dance and only one managed to get her weapon pointed in the right direction to sting with the lancer.
The bees were happy to fight alongside their new allies. A lancer squad carrying pixies with stinger-like weapons allowed them to double the number of stings in a single dive without risking any addition bees or requiring more space to maneuver. An idea perfectly in tune with the hive of hives, one amazing enough that the battle meadow queens were going to try having bigger bees carry smaller ones. There were, however, issues in actually pulling it off. A pixie soldier standing by the Firstborn shook her head in the pixie dance for a negative response.
“We’re playing more than training. At this rate, the captain’s going to yell at us again if she can escape Her Majesty’s advisor…”
“Hard when bees and pixies can’t talk during dive.”
The pixies, fortunately, had magic to interpret bee dances and turn their own language into dances. However, not every pixie was as skilled with the magic as the others. The average pixie soldier, for instance, had to be watching a bee dance directly for the magic to work, which was difficult if the pixie was riding the dancing bee. Besides, even if the pixie soldiers could understand a dance from a bee they were riding, the lancers couldn’t dance during a dive. A lancer thus couldn’t communicate her movements to her pixie rider, making it hard for the pixie to adjust correctly.
“Pixies sure can’t connect to communers, hive of hives?”
The pixie soldier exhaled her breath.
“I mean, it’s possible…but to be honest it’s scary to connect to a mana hive mind like that. We might absorb too much mana or get swept away if the hive is too big.”
The Firstborn again could not refute the pixie’s concerns. The hive of hives shared similar concerns about connecting with the pixies who, while allies, were ultimately not part of the King’s hive. But the Firstborn refused to give up. Time and time again, the hive of hives had overcome challenges impossible for any normal monster bee. The Firstborn believed they would do it again.
So, she went to the closest of the First Daughter's communers and started asking about the hive of hives, looking for ideas her sisters and children thought of that she had not considered. She watched the communer report about the trapper squad watching one of the spiderkin weave a web, learning what their enemies had taught the new members of the hive of hives. About the Third of the Sixth discussing the nature of fire with the karnuq queen. About the karnuq hive-builder trying to link her mana to the First of the Ninth’s hive like the hive of hives would.
But, ultimately, it was not any of these interactions that gave her an answer. No, it was something closer to home, an interaction not between bee and King-thing but between two bees…
This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.
“Ok, think that right. Beero try again?”
Beero danced a confirmation to the First Dronecaster as he completed digging a pattern in the dirt. She then stirred up her mana and directed it into the pattern. Both battlecaster and dronecaster then stood still as they watched the mana fill the grooves in the ground…
The mana finished filling the grooves…and continued flowing, looping around for a second before dissipating. Beero immediately began dancing.
“First Dronecaster did it! Amazing, incredible!”
They had done it! They had completed the first step towards learning wards like the ward one! Figuring out a dance for storing mana had been a challenge, but the First Dronecaster’s innate instincts for passing and storing mana with a queen proved to be the key. They then had to convert that dance into a pattern…but now they had succeeded. The mana Beero passed into the pattern had not immediately dissipated but had stayed in the pattern, if but for a moment.
The First Dronecaster, however, did not start celebrating.
“Works…but not long enough. Need to improve pattern and mana…doesn’t like dirt. Dirt pulled on and broke.”
Beero stopped her celebration dance. It was true that a storing mana for a single second was woefully inadequate. They’d need to store it for much longer if they wanted to make wards like the ward one’s. The pattern itself was the First Dronecaster’s work, so Beero got started thinking about the second problem.
If she recalled, the warding one taught them about this. The wards had to be created out of a material suited to the mana. Beero and the First Dronecaster were digging patterns in the dirt for convenience, but now that they had a working pattern it was time to consider what material they should use. The ward one used mushrooms and plants…but that would require the assistance of the gardeners, all of whom were currently busy spreading new flowers and foraging from the flower one’s realm. Beero couldn’t justify distracting them from those crucial, King-given tasks for a mere experiment.
Besides, there was an obvious answer for a bee-made ward.
“Will ask workers if can make out of wax!”
Beero was about to dance to the nearest communer when she noticed the First Dronecaster hadn’t responding, instead standing completely still.
“First Dronecaster? What wrong?”
He suddenly shook himself.
“Nothing wrong! Beero’s idea good. Just thought…Beero taught soldiers and drone magic dance, but never taught workers?”
Now it was Beero’s turn to freeze. That…was true, wasn’t it? She had never attempted to teach the workers supporting the hive of the fallen the magic spells. After all, no workers had been among the fallen ever since the King granted the soldier bees to the hive of hives. But…First Dronecaster hadn’t fallen either before Beero taught him. And these workers all had left the hives and queens of their birth to come and join the hive of the fallen, hadn’t they? Their sacrifice was no less than any other member of her hive.
“That’s…good idea. Should try teach. If workers can learn, then workers can make wax and make ward at same time! Amazing, incredible! Is great idea!”
Once again, the First Dronecaster had helped Beero fulfill her duties as queen, making her aware of this great oversight. Beero wasted no time getting started. She requested two groups of workers, one to start making wax wards with the First Dronecaster to test the material…while Beero started teaching the others the ways of the fallen.
If this work…the hive of the fallen would become even more of a true hive than ever before, every bee within it working together on their duty to the hive of hives. And Beero would spare no effort in seeing it done.
The workers! The Firstborn buzzed her wings as the First Daughter's communer reported Beero's latest deeds. She thus turned her thoughts to the most fundamental type of bee to the hive of all, the workers who were so ubiquitous and necessary she often overlooked their presence altogether. It was an oversight she would have to stay aware of going forward.
As for workers in the context of the challenges the pixies and lancers had cooperating…the hive of hives had actually considered that solution. After all, chromatic workers already helped the bee army navigate through the Fairy Groves, so why not have one on a lancer’s back to communicate with the pixie? Unfortunately, that method hadn’t worked out during a lancer’s dive, the worker had to hold on and couldn’t dance freely once the lancer got up to speed. They also considered using a communer who could dance with mana…but that wouldn’t work unless the pixies could connect to the hive of hives.
But what if a worker could learn magic of some sort? Maybe a worker could make a lightning dance that a pixie could see while the worker clung to the lancer’s back? Or maybe one of the King’s spell-bees, if Beero’s hive could learn to make them, would be able to dance on a lancer’s back without being blown away? The bumble helper had said something about gravity sticking things together, could one of the First of the Fifth’s Sixth Daughter’s workers stick herself to the back of a lancer tightly enough to dance? Or maybe one of the Fourth of the Seventh’s workers would be able to fly fast enough to keep up while dancing?
If any of those worked out, then the lancer could use her hive’s mana connection to let a worker know how she was about to move and the worker could then dance to warn the pixie rider.
Once again, the Firstborn realized the hive of hives had even more potential than they had realized thus far. And so, once again, the Firstborn reached out to her sisters. The hive of hives would figure this out, together.
The Firstborn also didn’t mind the temporary loss of joint dances. After all, she would not require those dances for her present project. She watched as a squad of lancers danced a salute before her. She replied with a dance of her own.
“Lancers ready, pixie soldiers ready?”
A group of the small King-things, pixies as the King called them, saluted in their own fashion.
“Ready! Let’s go, go!”
The Firstborn danced the attack signal and the lancers started their dive. The pixie soldiers laughed and shouted from the backs of the lancers. Two of them failed to get their weapons, long stinger-like sticks, pointed in the right direction. The wind caught the weapons on the side and pulled the pixies right off of the lancers’ backs. A third leaned the wrong way when his lancer banked to the right and fell off to the side. Only two of the pixies managed to hang on for the duration of the dance and only one managed to get her weapon pointed in the right direction to sting with the lancer.
The bees were happy to fight alongside their new allies. A lancer squad carrying pixies with stinger-like weapons allowed them to double the number of stings in a single dive without risking any addition bees or requiring more space to maneuver. An idea perfectly in tune with the hive of hives, one amazing enough that the battle meadow queens were going to try having bigger bees carry smaller ones. There were, however, issues in actually pulling it off. A pixie soldier standing by the Firstborn shook her head in the pixie dance for a negative response.
“We’re playing more than training. At this rate, the captain’s going to yell at us again if she can escape Her Majesty’s advisor…”
“Hard when bees and pixies can’t talk during dive.”
The pixies, fortunately, had magic to interpret bee dances and turn their own language into dances. However, not every pixie was as skilled with the magic as the others. The average pixie soldier, for instance, had to be watching a bee dance directly for the magic to work, which was difficult if the pixie was riding the dancing bee. Besides, even if the pixie soldiers could understand a dance from a bee they were riding, the lancers couldn’t dance during a dive. A lancer thus couldn’t communicate her movements to her pixie rider, making it hard for the pixie to adjust correctly.
“Pixies sure can’t connect to communers, hive of hives?”
The pixie soldier exhaled her breath.
“I mean, it’s possible…but to be honest it’s scary to connect to a mana hive mind like that. We might absorb too much mana or get swept away if the hive is too big.”
The Firstborn again could not refute the pixie’s concerns. The hive of hives shared similar concerns about connecting with the pixies who, while allies, were ultimately not part of the King’s hive. But the Firstborn refused to give up. Time and time again, the hive of hives had overcome challenges impossible for any normal monster bee. The Firstborn believed they would do it again.
So, she went to the closest of the First Daughter's communers and started asking about the hive of hives, looking for ideas her sisters and children thought of that she had not considered. She watched the communer report about the trapper squad watching one of the spiderkin weave a web, learning what their enemies had taught the new members of the hive of hives. About the Third of the Sixth discussing the nature of fire with the karnuq queen. About the karnuq hive-builder trying to link her mana to the First of the Ninth’s hive like the hive of hives would.
But, ultimately, it was not any of these interactions that gave her an answer. No, it was something closer to home, an interaction not between bee and King-thing but between two bees…
This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.
“Ok, think that right. Beero try again?”
Beero danced a confirmation to the First Dronecaster as he completed digging a pattern in the dirt. She then stirred up her mana and directed it into the pattern. Both battlecaster and dronecaster then stood still as they watched the mana fill the grooves in the ground…
The mana finished filling the grooves…and continued flowing, looping around for a second before dissipating. Beero immediately began dancing.
“First Dronecaster did it! Amazing, incredible!”
They had done it! They had completed the first step towards learning wards like the ward one! Figuring out a dance for storing mana had been a challenge, but the First Dronecaster’s innate instincts for passing and storing mana with a queen proved to be the key. They then had to convert that dance into a pattern…but now they had succeeded. The mana Beero passed into the pattern had not immediately dissipated but had stayed in the pattern, if but for a moment.
The First Dronecaster, however, did not start celebrating.
“Works…but not long enough. Need to improve pattern and mana…doesn’t like dirt. Dirt pulled on and broke.”
Beero stopped her celebration dance. It was true that a storing mana for a single second was woefully inadequate. They’d need to store it for much longer if they wanted to make wards like the ward one’s. The pattern itself was the First Dronecaster’s work, so Beero got started thinking about the second problem.
If she recalled, the warding one taught them about this. The wards had to be created out of a material suited to the mana. Beero and the First Dronecaster were digging patterns in the dirt for convenience, but now that they had a working pattern it was time to consider what material they should use. The ward one used mushrooms and plants…but that would require the assistance of the gardeners, all of whom were currently busy spreading new flowers and foraging from the flower one’s realm. Beero couldn’t justify distracting them from those crucial, King-given tasks for a mere experiment.
Besides, there was an obvious answer for a bee-made ward.
“Will ask workers if can make out of wax!”
Beero was about to dance to the nearest communer when she noticed the First Dronecaster hadn’t responding, instead standing completely still.
“First Dronecaster? What wrong?”
He suddenly shook himself.
“Nothing wrong! Beero’s idea good. Just thought…Beero taught soldiers and drone magic dance, but never taught workers?”
Now it was Beero’s turn to freeze. That…was true, wasn’t it? She had never attempted to teach the workers supporting the hive of the fallen the magic spells. After all, no workers had been among the fallen ever since the King granted the soldier bees to the hive of hives. But…First Dronecaster hadn’t fallen either before Beero taught him. And these workers all had left the hives and queens of their birth to come and join the hive of the fallen, hadn’t they? Their sacrifice was no less than any other member of her hive.
“That’s…good idea. Should try teach. If workers can learn, then workers can make wax and make ward at same time! Amazing, incredible! Is great idea!”
Once again, the First Dronecaster had helped Beero fulfill her duties as queen, making her aware of this great oversight. Beero wasted no time getting started. She requested two groups of workers, one to start making wax wards with the First Dronecaster to test the material…while Beero started teaching the others the ways of the fallen.
If this work…the hive of the fallen would become even more of a true hive than ever before, every bee within it working together on their duty to the hive of hives. And Beero would spare no effort in seeing it done.
The workers! The Firstborn buzzed her wings as the First Daughter's communer reported Beero's latest deeds. She thus turned her thoughts to the most fundamental type of bee to the hive of all, the workers who were so ubiquitous and necessary she often overlooked their presence altogether. It was an oversight she would have to stay aware of going forward.
As for workers in the context of the challenges the pixies and lancers had cooperating…the hive of hives had actually considered that solution. After all, chromatic workers already helped the bee army navigate through the Fairy Groves, so why not have one on a lancer’s back to communicate with the pixie? Unfortunately, that method hadn’t worked out during a lancer’s dive, the worker had to hold on and couldn’t dance freely once the lancer got up to speed. They also considered using a communer who could dance with mana…but that wouldn’t work unless the pixies could connect to the hive of hives.
But what if a worker could learn magic of some sort? Maybe a worker could make a lightning dance that a pixie could see while the worker clung to the lancer’s back? Or maybe one of the King’s spell-bees, if Beero’s hive could learn to make them, would be able to dance on a lancer’s back without being blown away? The bumble helper had said something about gravity sticking things together, could one of the First of the Fifth’s Sixth Daughter’s workers stick herself to the back of a lancer tightly enough to dance? Or maybe one of the Fourth of the Seventh’s workers would be able to fly fast enough to keep up while dancing?
If any of those worked out, then the lancer could use her hive’s mana connection to let a worker know how she was about to move and the worker could then dance to warn the pixie rider.
Once again, the Firstborn realized the hive of hives had even more potential than they had realized thus far. And so, once again, the Firstborn reached out to her sisters. The hive of hives would figure this out, together.