Chapter 377: The Wrath of Royal-Bees |
The First of the Fifth’s First Daughter stewed in the center of the Beecity, heavy mana and attack pheromones spreading out from her. Every bee that strayed near her started the buzz and swarm around her.
The Fourth of the Seventh was in danger. The hive burner had put her at risk, blown her away. It would not be forgiven.
But the monster bee empress was not certain how she would enact her wrath. The bees were all too light, not even the Firstborn could fly through the gales pushing the bee army back. Beero and the battlecasters couldn’t pull off a mana dance while tumbling around, the archers couldn’t get close enough to launch their stingers, the lancers couldn’t start their dives. The Fourth of the Seventh and her nomadic bees would’ve been the First Daughter’s first choice to deal with such powerful winds…but it turned out the nomadic bees were too good at flying with the wind.
So, what could the hive of hives do? How could they fulfill King’s trust and protect their home and allies?
It was then that a communer reached out to her. The First Daughter found bumble helper explaining an idea.
The First Daughter buzzed and immediately sent her mana out through the hive of hives. She not only told the bees bumble helper had requested, but alerted the Firstborn and the entire hive of hives to the plan. Bumble helper had found a way that the bees might approach the hive burner.
A way for the hive of hives to wreak their vengeance upon those who would burn their hives.
Finnakynne had to constantly hold the bumblebee soldiers back, reminding them over and over that she had a plan now. Eventually, though, a decent group of gravity bees, battlecasters, and breeze bees had gathered behind the bumblebees. The Firstborn had joined as well with as much of the bee army as she could rally, more and more bees were flying towards them every minute but Finnakynne now had enough to enact the plan.
“Ok Bumbly, onwards…no! Not towards the mortal! Up! Up! That way!”
“Ok! Bumbles! Stick together and grab onto each other! Don’t worry about flying, I’ll use the gale to keep you in the air! Gravity bees! When I say go, pull the bumbles down as hard as you can! Magic bees! Make magic wings for the whole bumble group! Breeze bees, wrap Air mana around the bumbles! Don’t try to fight the wind, just encourage it to go around! All you other bees, grab onto the bumbles and hang on!”
“Ok!”
All the bees danced a salute and did as Finnakynne said. The bumblebee soldiers all flew into one another and wrapped their legs around the next soldiers, forming a wall of chitin and fuzz. They weren’t able to fly on their own like that, but the gale was pushing them up anyways so all Finnakynne had to do was keep them stable. The gravity bees, breeze bees, and hive of the fallen landed on the top side of the bumblebee wall and stirred up their mana. The First Dronecaster and Beero led the battlecasters in the new magic dance, creating two giant and ethereal wings of Air mana on either side of the bumblebee wall, spell wings that didn’t catch the physical wind blowing towards them. The breeze bees formed a light barrier of Air mana in front of the bumbles, shaping it into a round cone not unlike the front of a bee so that the incoming gale would wrap around it.
The Firstborn and her monster bee knights landed on the bumblebees next, grabbing onto the wall. All the bee army nearby followed suit, grabbing onto every spare bumblebee save the areas the battle casters needed to dance. When every bumblebee was occupied, the soldier bees started grabbing onto each other as well, creating a big ball of bees behind the fuzzy bumblebee wall.
Then, Finnakynne squeezed in-between the bumblebees so she could point down at the mortal.
“Ok, gravity bees, now! All bees, forward!”
The gravity bees unleashed their mana, increasing the ground’s pull on the bumblebees as much as they could. The battlecasters made the magic wings start to beat, pushing the entire mass down as well. Every bee with their wings free started to beat their wings too, contributing whatever they could to the effort.
The mass of bees began to fall through the gale…
Back in the battle Fairy Grove, Belissar frowned as he watched the battle taking place. In particular, he watched Nenavann dueling with Starami, Urubran battling an elite Air Tower Guard, Finnakynne trying to help the bumblebees, and Hesfalle and Lomedys moving to help the fair folk and karnuq engaging the Water Tower Guard.
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It felt wrong for all these Circle masters to be fighting while he, the keeper of this Tower, hung in the back. His heart ached as he saw his bees tumbling around in the gale, he wanted nothing more than to help him.
But he knew he had to stay here. The bees would hate it if he exposed himself to danger, they might even panic and swarm if he were to be hurt. Besides, they would need the fairy circles and the wards in the battle Fairy Grove if they couldn’t defeat the Tower Lord outright. Belissar knew that the best thing he could do was stay here.
But still, he wished with all his heart that there was some way he could help too…
He glanced around. Tarwantrad was frowning and tapping her foot with her arms crossed, as upset as he was that she had to hang back. Wardmaster Varilold was kneeling by a pattern of mushrooms, making some last adjustments to the wards in the room. The light dragon hatchling was lying down on the ground, pretending to be asleep, but his tail kept swishing back and forth and he kept peeking at the room’s entrance. The venomous slime roses and monster nightshade summoners had planted themselves around him…it was too risky to send them into battle after what happened in the Bog, but if the enemy made it this far Belissar would need their help. The gardener bees zipped around them, trying to make sure all the monster flowers were as ready as possible. Some of the nightshade summoners even started to create their spell wasps…
Belissar froze. His eyes slowly widened until they were as wide as they could go.
“Wait a minute…couldn’t I send spell-bees through a shortcut?!”
Tarwantrad blinked…and then gasped.
“You could!”
She whipped around towards Wardmaster Varilold and glared.
“He can, right?! You’re not going to forbid him from that, right?!”
Wardmaster Varilold looked up and raised an eyebrow.
“Dungeon Master Tarwantrad, you know full well that every command I’ve given is for the sake of winning this battle and that includes holding you back. I will not risk Tower Keeper Belissar, his home, or the critical nexus door he protects based on your desire to rush into battle. So cut your snark and use your energy to improve our chances, understood?”
Tarwantrad mumbled but grudgingly nodded when Wardmaster Varilold gave her a look. Right after that, the Wardmaster smiled.
“That said, I’ll do more than that. Both of you, step over here. I’ve adjusted the wards to spread the room’s mana between the two of you. Tower Keeper Belissar, you can not only assist the battle from here, you can use the wards right now. The time has come to play our hand.”
Belissar and Tarwantrad both grinned and ran to the wards at the center of the battle Fairy Grove. Belissar created a shortcut right on the ground ahead of him, linking it to the roof of the Muddy Seabed, as close to the battlefield as possible. In the meantime, Wardmaster Varilold and her wardens stirred up their mana, activating the wards they had spread throughout the room.
A moment later, a torrent of mana hit Belissar and Tarwantrad. Tarwantrad grunted slightly…but Belissar felt no impact at all. Warm mana wrapped around and filled him, spinning around like a bee performing a salute dance. Belissar smiled…it felt like the room and the Tower were waiting for him to do this.
He wasted no time giving it what it wanted. He held his hands up and stirred up his mana. The air filled with the sound of buzzing as an entire hive of spell-honeycombs appeared all around him. Countless cells filled with spell-eggs that quickly began hatching into spell-bees.
Countless flowers bloomed around the hive as Tarwantrad cast her own spell. A thick cloud of pollen filled the air, attaching itself to every spell-bee as they climbed out of their mana cells. A swarm of spell-bees, now equipped with pollen armor created by a dungeon master of Flowers.
And as the two channeled all the power of the room, more spell-hives and flowers filled the forest. Soon, the canopy came alive as swarms of pollen-armored spell-bees rose up and covered the sky…
As Belissar cast his spells, Niobee stood on his head as always. When the wards channeled mana of the Fairy Grove towards him, Niobee helped! She danced and pulled in even more mana from the Tower, as well as helping King and flower one to process it.
But Niobee didn’t stop there. King was using the mana from one room…but the Tower had a lot more than that. Niobee began to grab excess mana from across the Tower: mana surging out from fairy circles in other fairy groves, the mana pouring down from the dragonvein in the Aurora Forest, the mana concentrating around all the various mana flower patches in the rooms King made for foraging.
And with all this excess mana, Niobee began to dance, as she had seen the dancers and the First Minister do. She sent the mana through the Tower, towards the hive of hives and towards all of King’s allies. Bees, fair folk, karnuq, and sigamaka all found mana from the Tower wrapping around them, subtly assisting their efforts and easing their fatigue.
And her mana had not gone unnoticed…
Starami spun out of the way of a powerful jet of water…only to find a massive wave heading his way. He clicked his tongue and turned around, flying away from the wave while gaining altitude until he could pass over top of it. The fey’s Tower Lord certainly had vast quantities of mana at his disposal. This battle would not end quickly.
Starami did have to wonder, though, why the Tower Lord chose to engage him here and not in the deep sea room. He assumed the fey had left that room and the water spirit behind to seal him off from reinforcements and retreat…but the fey had now brought the water spirit back to fight. So…why hadn’t he brought the room as well? Sure, he had some insect monsters and fey warriors with him this time, but wouldn’t it have been better to lean into the Water aspect? What were the insects contributing compared to the deadly water room?
But at that moment, a wave of mana surged through the room. Starami paused and his eyes went wide. The mana didn’t do anything to him…but he recognized it. He knew that mana, very, very well.
That wave of mana contained the same mana that had been present in his favorite mead. It had grown, changed, and been mixed with mana from a bunch of different sources…but Starami couldn’t mistake it. He had been longing for it ever since his fool of a son had burnt down the village that made it.
What did that mean? Did the bees that made his favorite mead get caught up in the Tower? Did the fey now own his favorite Apiary?
All questions that would have to wait…as a massive swarm of glowing bees burst out of shortcut and covered the sky.