The Bee Dungeon

Belissar stepped through a shortcut and into a world of color. A bright pillar of white light rose between the trees at the center of the forest, illuminating up the trunks of the trees as brightly as their canopies. Bushes and grass and small flowering plants covered the ground, while vine wrapped around the trunks of the trees, filling Belissar’s view with green. The trees were mostly varieties of pine, allowing Belissar to see between them with ease. Up above, rainbow curtains danced across the sky, creating even brighter bursts of light and color when they collided. The plants below seemed to glow as the colors washed over them in waves.
Belissar stared in wonder for a moment before switching to his mana sight out of curiosity. He winced and shielded his eyes, the entire sky was as bright as the sun with the sheer density of Light mana up above. Even the ground itself was almost completely obscured by the mana flooding through it, mana that dwarfed even that of the Fairy Grove.
Behind him, Tarwantrad and Tamosmed gasped. Belissar turned to find Tarwantrad taking deep breaths.
“Whew, that is a rush! There’s so much mana I can barely breathe in here!”
Tamosmed scowled and shielded his eyes.
“And you’re lucky you’re a Nature-type dungeon master. At least you can absorb some of this light. Some of us aren’t so lucky.”
Belissar frowned.
“Are you two ok?”
Tarwantrad flared her mana and flowers spontaneously bloomed all across her hair and clothes. She let out a relieved sigh and then smiled at him.
“We’re fine…maybe too fine! You know all of us fair folk can absorb mana, right, Belissar? Well, there’s so much mana here, it’s like having a gourmet banquet shoved down our throats all at once!”
Tamosmed’s scowl deepened.
“And that’s for Tarwantrad, who is highly compatible with Light. For those of us who aren’t, it’s more like drowning in a flood. Sorry, I’ll need to take some measures before I spend any time in this place.”
Tamosmed retreated from the room. Belissar glanced up at Niobee on his head.
“How about you, Niobee? Are you ok?”
Niobee happily danced around.
“Ok!”
Belissar then glanced around at the soldier bees following him around.
“What about the rest of the bees?”
The soldier bees themselves danced a salute.
“Ok! Lots of mana, but is fine!”
Belissar smiled at them and then, after confirming that Tarwantrad was ok, pressed on to his destination.
He found a clearing within the forest where a large, circular nest was formed. It was like a bird’s nest…but scaled up to massive degree, using entire tree trunks instead of twigs. Belissar couldn’t even see over the edges with his own eyes…and just as well. When he viewed it from above with his Tower sight, he shielded his eyes out of reflex. The interior of the nest was decorated with all manner of polished metals, gems, and pieces of glass, anything that might reflect light. In the light of the aurora above, the entire nest became yet another sun shining on the ground.
With his Tower sight, he managed to see through the blinding light to the center of the nest. There, he found a single egg, larger than he was, larger even than a horse! He though it might be bright yellow in color, but it was hard to see any detail because the egg was also reflecting the light from both the sky above and from all the reflective surfaces surrounding it below.
That egg now cracked. A claw broke through and began to reflect the light as brightly as the egg. A sharp cry pierced Belissar’s ears as the hatching broke out of the shell. It scrambled to its feet, spread its wings, and cried yet again.
Belissar then felt a new source of mana collide with his own. The hatchling twitched, then tried beating its wings. Nothing happened at first, so the hatchling cried and beat its wings faster. It crawled over to the edge of the nest and began to claw at it, while the beating of its wings grew frantic.
Eventually, it tried to jump while beating its wings. It managed to land on the top of the nest, scrambling over as it tried to get a grip. Its wings pushed it too far, though, so it tumbled over the other side of the nest and crashed into the ground in front of Belissar.
The author's tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.
The hatchling landed on its back and flailed around until one of its wings managed to push it off the ground. It flipped over and scrambled to its feet, finally giving Belissar a good look at it…or rather, him.
The dragon hatchling was about the length of a horse, though lower to the ground. He had four legs tipped with sharp claws and a pair of wings just above and behind his front legs. His scales were white in the center and yellow along the edges and so polished they reflected the light above, creating a wave of rainbow color across the dragon as the aurora shifted overhead.
He sat upright, placing his behind on the ground while pushing up with his front legs, looming over Belissar and company. He gazed down upon them and huffed.
Belissar started to greet his dragon.
“Hi there…”
But he was interrupted when the dragon made a rumbling grow. Some of the soldier bees hovered closer to the dragon and he bared his fangs at them. He was about to nip at the air in their direction…
Belissar scowled and made his mana buzz.
“Hey, stop that! Don’t hurt the bees!”
The dragon immediately froze and pulled his head back. He growled but stopped. He instead turned his gaze away from the soldier bees. Belissar crossed his arms.
“You’re both defenders of the Tower. You’re supposed to help them, so get along.”
The dragon rumbled once more, then dropped down to the ground. He crossed his front legs, then rested his head on top of them and closed his eyes. Belissar glared at him for a moment longer before he turned away.
“Well, good enough for now, I guess.”
Tarwantrad made a helpless smile.
“Nenavann’s warned us that dragonkin tend to be prideful and aggressive. He should still listen to what you say, but he might be harder to work with than your bees.”
Belissar sighed.
“As long as he doesn’t hurt them. I don’t know how I’m going to get him to fight with the army, though.”
Tarwantrad shrugged.
“If all else fails, you could just point him at an enemy you want distracted and let them fight while the bees take care of the others.”
Niobee then began to dance overhead.
“King, should ask nice one? Nice one rides other flying lizard-thing?”
Belissar froze, and a moment later smacked his head.
“That’s right! I should’ve brought Hirkolos!”
Tarwantrad blinked and then flushed.
“Oh, right. He takes care of wyverns already, doesn’t he? I…forgot you already had some dragonkin among your defenders…”
Belissar and Tarwantrad left the dragon alone for now and went to go speak with Hirkolos. Unfortunately, Hirkolos had no experience with dragons, having only worked with wyverns before, but offered to give it a shot. He also proposed asking General Rippotis, though, if there was a way to do so.
The First of the Fifth’s First Daughter confirmed that there was. She had sent one of her empowered communers along with the Fourth of the Seventh’s scouts for precisely that reason. Belissar thus resolved to ask the general how he managed his own dragon.
But ultimately, that would have to wait. Because as the sun began to set, the tunneling nomadic bees reported that Starami’s forces were moving towards the surface once again…
***
Belissar and his council returned to the alliance’s command tent. Given the situation, they skipped any greetings and launched right into planning their defense. Belissar had a big frown on his face, though, as an issue that should have been obvious in retrospect had now presented itself.
“The bee army…normally doesn’t fight at night…”
Wardmaster Varilold gave him a reassuring smile.
“Not to worry, Tower Keeper. We discussed and prepared for this. The Compact and the sigmaka will take the lead during the night, you only need to support us with the karnuq and your bees that can see in the dark.”
Belissar exhaled his breath and then smiled back.
“Understood, we’ll do what we can.”
Wardmaster Varilold made a light smirk.
“If all goes well, you may not need to do anything at all. Our enemy will do all the work for us…”
***
As the sun set and the dark set in, two dusk elves left Belissar’s Tower, their pale skin blending into the soft light of the moon. One of them spread their hands and cackled.
“Ah, a blood moon rises. Blood shall soon be split this night.”
The other narrowed her eyes as she opened a large book in her hands.
“The moon is normal. Not even a drop of red.”
Lomedys chuckled and shook his head.
“Come now, mistress of death, don’t tell me you aren’t excited about this night? Tonight we shall finally spread blood and death among the mortals as we please!”
Hesfalle refused to look at him.
“Come on, we’re wasting time, we have a job to do.”
Lomedys chuckled again but obediently followed along. The two dusk elf dungeon masters made their way to the site of Rippotis’ battle with Starami’s forces. As the Underway there had collapsed, Starami’s forces hadn’t been able to recover any of the corpses there…had they intended to do so.
Hesfalle walked up to the scorched corpse of a Ground drake and bent down beside it. She placed her hand against its head and closed her eyes, passing her mana into the corpse.
Whatever life it once held had long passed. If the creature possessed a soul, that was long gone too. But…the mana remembered. The mana within the creature’s body still remembered its last feelings.
Hesfalle frowned and rubbed the corpse’s head.
“Poor thing. You were born to fight, to be a proud defender of your home. And yet, you were treated as a tool to be discarded. They threw you at an enemy they knew you would never defeat, they sent you to die without a second thought. They did not even honor your sacrifice.”
Her eyes began to glow with a soft purple light…and then the drake’s corpse did as well. Purple light began to gather in its eyes.
“I will acknowledge your will and give you the chance you desired most. A chance to fight, to rampage as you please and show them your might. To defend a dungeon as you were born to do.”
Hesfalle held her book open and the light flowed from the drake’s eyes into the book. A painting of a Ground drake battling a dragon covered in flames appeared on the left page, while words wrote themselves on the right.
“And I will never forget your death, or your deeds thereafter.”
The drake’s corpse began to shudder…and then rose to its feet. It left out a soft whine and pushed its head against Hesfalle’s hand. She gave it a final pat and then opened her eyes.
All across the former battlefield, purple light began to glow in the eyes of drakes and kobolds and wyverns, every being that died unsatisfied with their treatment in both life and death.
A great many new pages appeared in Hesfalle’s book.