Belissar nodded in approval as he watched the first karnuq beekeeper feed the bees and back off. Velebee’s lessons seemed to have worked, the First of the Ninth had been wary but not overly aggressive. Though, he wasn’t sure if that was due to Velebee’s teachings or the more cautious approach by the beekeeper, but either way she seemed to have a plan and it seemed to be working.
Satisfied he wouldn’t need to intervene, he moved to finish up Beero’s barracks.
The First of the Fifth watched the first honeypots as they crawled out of their cells. They were roughly the size of a newly born queen, with large abdomens to match, though their abdomens featured several depressions ringed by large hairs. They didn’t cost quite as much as a soldier, but closer to that than to a worker. It was a notable expense, though one she could manage. And since she had workers on full-time honey processing, her hive already had suitable candidates for the evolution. She had been able to start evolving them immediately.
And now came the moment of truth. The First of the Fifth would not pass up any opportunity to improve her honey quality, but she still had her apprehensions. She was introducing an entirely new factor into her well-tuned processes, even giving up some of her most skilled and experienced workers to do so. Would these new bees fit into her process, or would she need to rework the entire method to accommodate them? If so, would it be worth disrupting her entire production line, especially at a time when the soldier bee army needed to replenish losses and new bees had joined the hive of hives?
Her eyes were glued to the honeypots as they crawled out of the nursery and towards the honey production lines. They were slower compared to before, unused to their greater size, which only increased the First of the Fifth’s worries, but they made it. They took up positions right in the intake lines, where the foragers would drop off the nectar and pollen. A moment later, foragers were passing them resources.
The First of the Fifth was taken aback as she felt the honeypots’ mana stir. She watched as the honeypots began the process of bubbling…but not solely with their mandibles. No, bubbles of nectar began to form in the depressions on the honeypots’ abdomens, held in place by their specialized hairs. They began to vibrate their bodies as well, increasing their own temperature to the precise level the First of the Fifth preferred for evaporation.
Then, the bubbles shrunk down as the honeypots pulled the nectar back inside…and formed again in another row of depressions after some time digesting. The First of the Fifth buzzed her wings. The honeypots could apparently perform multiple rounds of digestion, bubbling, and evaporation within their own bodies, a process that normally required several bees for each bit of honey. And, with each stage of the process, the mana density of the nectar grew as the honeypots’ own mana constantly circulated through it.
When it was done, she watched as the honeypots pooled the completed product in a cup of chitin where their stingers would normally be. Regular workers could lap up the honey with ease, and then transport it to the cells for to either raise brood, refill the long-term stores, or prepare deliveries for other hives.
Before any workers did, the First of the Fifth crawled to the nearest honeypot and sampled the honey herself. Her workers knew to wait for her to test the honey, only once she had determined its quality would she decide where it would go, and only then would they resume their work.
The First of the Fifth staggered back towards the nursery as her children all saluted and rushed back to work. Because if her calculations were correct…the honeypots could produce enough mana-dense honey for queen evolutions far sooner than she had planned.
Which meant that she had a lot of work to do, and a great opportunity to bring the King’s plans to fruition that much sooner…
A gardener buzzed her wings as she landed on her target flower. She was a child of the First of the Fourth, one of the queens of the Flower Meadow and leaders of the soldier bee army. And she…had been born too early. ȑ𝘼Νô𝐛Ê𝒮
Her queen mother felt there was no higher calling nor greater joy than to defend the hive of hives. But she, unfortunately, had been born in the days when her queen was still young, and so she had been born a worker. She was simply too small and weak to join the fight. Oh, how she wished she had been born a soldier, so that she may join her queen in the grand battles and so fulfill her queen’s greatest desires.
But she was not. She intended to do the next best thing and worked as hard as she could to make as much honey as possible. If she could not be a soldier, than she would work to raise and Continue reading more chapters on NovelHub for the best experience. Try as she might, there was a limit to how much a honey a single worker could make. Worst, her queen’s workers even as a whole could not produce enough honey to raise the number of soldiers the queen wanted. And once the Apiary queens began donating their endlessly flowing honey…well, the worker’s efforts became a literal drop in the ocean.
But hope sprang anew. The King saw fit to grant workers evolutions. She had become a gardener, hoping her new size and insights would enable her to expand her honey production to unforeseen levels. Maybe even enough that she could Continue reading more chapters on NovelHub for the best experience. Her new insights not only did not produce more honey, they warned her that the Flower Meadow’s mana flowers were overworked. The Flower Meadow hives had to cut back their own honey production to ensure a healthy supply in the future. She was not only not doing more, she was doing less than before her evolution.
So, what then, could she do? How could she contribute to her queen’s great mission? How could she, a mere gardener, help to defend the hive of hives?
She had focused her attention on a certain set of flowers, flowers not particularly popular among the foragers. These flowers had spines like stingers, hardened by mana past what one might expect from a flower stem. The gardener thought that maybe they might improve the strength and penetration of soldier stingers…but the nectar of the flowers was as mundane as any other. This, too, was a failure.