Path of the Hive Queen

One day. The monsters left them in peace for most of a day. Well, more like a night and some change, really.

As Regina stared out at the group of monsters approaching the village now, she couldn’t help but feel that it still wasn’t enough. But she hoped she was wrong. It wasn’t like she only had her hive to fight them off. And they’d used the time they had well.

The morning sun was only just cresting the horizon, but thankfully it came from the side, so she still got a good look at the pack of monsters drawing closer. They looked like overgrown, rabid dogs, except that there were odd spikes and plates of bone growing out of their bodies. Regina leaned her arm on the earthen rampart they’d built and glanced around for a moment.

Quite a few of the baron’s men covered this post, the main road leading into the village. They had, with the help of her workers, built a palisade together with a ditch. It was rough and quick work, but it should hold for a while. Or so she’d heard the commander saying, at least.

Her hive had used the night to recuperate, although they’d had one or two members at a time out to patrol the village. Regina took the last shift and didn’t move much from here until the others arrived. The evening before, Mia and Tia worked hard with the locals to build their improvised fortifications.

They’d both hit level 5 yesterday and, although Regina had missed it in the commotion, they’d gotten a new Ability. According to Mia, it was called ‘Meld and Merge’ and it basically glued things together magically. That would be very useful for crafting and had even come in handy with building the palisade. And even better, unless she was greatly mistaken, they would both get experience for that work.

That was one of the things she’d been able to confirm by watching and listening to the villagers: Combat wasn’t the only way to level, even if it was by far the fastest, and Classes with a non-combat focus, especially, gained experience by doing tasks that pertained to their Class. In her case, Regina suspected she’d get experience for doing queenly things — leadership, presumably — and perhaps for growing her hive.

She shook her head and focused on the coming fight. Behind the horde of dogs — which she could now see were called ‘Spike Dogs’ by the System, very creative — other monsters were moving closer, too. This wasn’t the occasional stray monster they’d faced in the night, but a significant part of the horde in the area coming for them.

Suddenly, one of the human fighters in the group opened fire. Regina resisted the urge to turn and stare in surprise. She didn’t think they were in a reasonable range already, but his arrow shot out like a bullet and hit the closest dog right in the throat. It collapsed where it stood. The rest of the pack started to howl, but they didn’t change course.

Other fighters joined in, everyone with a ranged option unleashing it on the monsters. Regina resisted the urge to fire a Magic Missile. She needed to conserve her mana today. Even without the eggs, there was no way her mana regeneration would be able to keep pace with the fights.

Only two of the Spike Dogs survived to reach the palisade. There, two of the human warriors captured their attention, while Max and a human swordsman cut them down quickly. Regina wasn’t sure if they’d used Skills or not.

But they didn’t get much time to rest. The next group of monsters, a mixed pack of hyenas and feline monsters, was approaching already. This time, the soldiers took fewer of them out at range, probably because their more powerful abilities were spent or needed to recharge. Half a dozen of the monsters charged at the fortification at once. One got stuck in the ditch and three tried to scramble up the palisade, but one large black cat managed to vault it with a leap supported by a sudden gust of wind.

Regina thrust with her spear, but the monster dodged. Then Tim caught it in the side with his sword, almost ripping it open, just before a human warrior appeared at his side and skewered the monster. Regina assumed Tim had used his new Skill. He’d chosen to go for Strength of the Hive, and even with only one other Warrior present, the baseline buff wasn’t so bad.

Max used the shield he’d been given to bash a hyena off the palisade, and the rest of the pack was quickly killed as well. But more and more monsters approached the fortifications. Just as Regina considered moving her position, two black forms fell from the sky, quickly growing bigger, and resolved into large birds of prey. One falcon opened his beak and spewed a fireball right at their defensive emplacement.

Regina cursed and dodged to the side, wincing as a rush of air and heat shot through the space beside her and barreled into the side of a building. Shingles flew and tendrils of smoke curled into the sky.

She narrowed her eyes and focused on one of the birds, gathering her mana.

Her Magic Missile hit it in the wing and sent it plummeting downward, only to be engulfed by the Firebolt Janis sent up. The other bird was struck by an arrow and tumbled to the ground some meters away.

Regina stepped back and leaned against another wooden wall, taking a deep breath. The front-line fighters were fighting off the current group of beasts and seemed to have it well in hand, even if they fought half a dozen at once now and were clearly pressed harder than before.

She frowned and absently poked at the feeling of the mana in her body and whatever else she could sense. There were the three eggs, hopefully safe deeper in the village. It would still take some time until the eggs hatched, but they could use the reinforcements. The more the better. Experimentally, Regina poked at the feeling inside her that was the call for new eggs. A System prompt popped up, and Regina grimaced, feeling the exhaustion from before again.

She still felt drained and knew that even if she could push through this, that wouldn’t be a good idea. So she focused on closing the window and took a deep breath, regaining her mental equilibrium. Apparently, there wasn’t a System-enforced limit on how many eggs she could lay at a time, but a soft limit imposed by her own biology. Or the mana drain.

Regina frowned as she considered the message. She didn’t think a scout would be much use at the moment, even if she was curious about how one would look like. This also indicated that unlocking new Templates for her drones wasn’t just a matter of reaching the right level, but that there were other prerequisites. Probably something like having three or four Warriors for this, if eggs counted.

Just then, a System window popped up with a new notification.

Regina blinked and shot upright, looking at the palisade. Max was just removing his ax from the corpse of a large crow monster with what looked like pebbles stuck between its feathers. More monsters were approaching, she smelled several new scents she hadn’t encountered before, and another hyena just vaulted the palisade while something big and heavy crashed against it.

Regina jumped forward, trying to help where she could. Thoughts of how this confirmed that she got experience from her drones were pushed to the back of her mind as the fight continued.

As time wore on, the number of monsters coming for the village seemed to increase instead of leveling off. She occasionally heard sounds and saw flashes that showed the other positions were also having trouble, but she focused on the problem in front of her.

Regina had been given a spear with a fancy steel spearhead, which she suspected came from someone who’d died in the castle. She mostly used that, since it wasn’t a limited resource like her magic. Fighting in a group, if not quite in formation with others was a new experience for her. She rarely got a hit in, since most of the human fighters were faster and better coordinated. Max used the new Ability he’d chosen, Warrior’s Charge like Tim’s, a few times to get a strike in and take on a monster that might have attacked her, too.

The palisade didn’t survive the fight for long. A bigger Troll than she’d seen before started ripping out posts, and some small level 6 Dirt Elemental actually produced earth to fill in the ditch. Most monsters were only slowed down by it, anyway. Slowly, the human and Hive defenders retreated, seeking the shelter of the narrow opening where the street led into the village.

Regina took to using Spark to light some wooden scraps she found on fire, mostly from the houses which were a little worse for wear, and tossing them at the monsters. She managed to distract them and even singe a level 8 Shadowing Stalker, burning some of the darkness covering it off and letting a human defender cave its head in.

That almost cost her a hand when another fireball from overhead crashed down into the group. Regina yelped and jumped back, stumbling over a broken tile on the ground. She glanced at the Fiery Falcon overhead, but it was already winging away and disappeared over the village’s houses.

A stone crashed into her shin and Regina fell to a knee, gasping in pain. She pushed herself upward, just in time to dodge the charge of a Lionit like the one she’d seen in the forest. Regina thrust with her spear, but it retreated and she only scored a shallow gash along its back.

Then Tim charged at it, throwing it back with a sweep of his blade-arm and sword at the same time. Regina retreated a step. Then she saw another black form darting at Tim from the side and jumped forward, thrusting with her spear.

She didn’t manage to arrest the panther’s momentum, but the cat’s lunge missed Tim. The Warrior retreated. The Lionit tensed in preparation for another pounce. A moment later, Tia’s work-limb swung at it and it turned on her, growling.

Regina watched the other monster carefully for a moment, then thrust out with her spear again. The panther was just dodging another swipe from Tim and ran into her thrust. Regina put all her strength into it and twisted. She’d caught its shoulder, but the wound bled heavily. Tim stepped in and, with another combined swipe, stabbed into its heart.

Then Regina felt something like a cold breath on her neck and turned. Her eyes widened. “Tia!”

The Worker was stumbling to the ground, blood flowing heavily down her side. The Lionit shook its head, teeth dyed red, and followed.

Regina’s spear caught it in the side and it hissed, turning. She smashed the Magic Missile she’d just formed into its head and it lurched to the side, where Tim waited for it.

Regina didn’t wait for him to stab it in the heart. She hurried over to Tia. The young drone was lying on the ground now, pressing a hand to her side. Regina fell to her knees beside her, wincing as she saw the cracked shell and bloody mess beneath it.

“It’s okay, just hold on,” she told her, tearing a strip from Tia’s dress to press against the wound. “We’ve got this.”

The Worker looked pale. She hadn’t even known they could do that. “Don’t make yourself a target, my queen,” she gasped.

“Shush,” Regina answered, “the others have it in hand.” A quick glance to the side confirmed that. They were holding the monsters off for the moment.

Regina looked at Tia’s injury and reached for her mana. She would not let one of her drones die like this!

She inhaled deeply and focused, trying to direct her mana through her hands into her. It was the only thing she could think of. A gut wound like Tia’s might be lethal even if it didn’t become infected. She didn’t have any medicine or even bandages. So Regina ignored the smell of blood and worse and focused on what she could tell of her drone’s anatomy.

She knew a lot more about how the body worked than she’d even realized. Granted, mostly the human body, but some things couldn’t be too different. Regina focused on the tissue and cells in the affected area, trying to visualize them. The various organs, liver, kidney, spleen, intestines, the smooth muscle cells, the nerves, the endothelial cells of the blood vessels and their counterparts in the intestines. She lost herself in trying to remember how they regenerated from injury before she pushed that aside and just visualized them whole. Natural healing couldn’t deal with this, she needed magic.

Regina felt the little bit of mana she had leaving her, and suddenly grew dizzy. But she didn’t stop, eyes fixed on her target. She focused on the tissue beneath her hand, trying to shape mana and make it make her vision a reality. Was the blood flow slowing? A section of the wound slowly grew closer together, but it was such a small one. Regina swayed on her knees. It needed to be more, but it was so hard to focus.

Then suddenly, someone grabbed her shoulders and pulled her back. Regina blinked. It took her a long second to process what her senses were telling her. When she did, she stiffened up immediately.

Two men had grabbed her. They wore heavy plate armor, with visors covering their faces. There was another man looking at her, holding his helmet under his arm. His eyes were narrow and she had a feeling it wasn’t just the scar running down the side of his face that made his lips curl.

“So, you are the little monsterblood they told me about,” he said. Then his gaze moved down to where Tia lay, still gasping. “It seems you had a turn of bad luck.”

Regina gritted her teeth. “What do you want?” She started struggling, but the two others — presumably Delvers, going by what she’d heard before — didn’t move a centimeter.

“I want to protect the people of this village,” their leader answered seriously. “Against all threats that may have come to them.”

“Oh, fantastic,” she snarled. “And that gives you the right to come and harass the people who were protecting them?” She jerked her head back, trying to headbutt one of the men holding her. But she only struck something hard and unyielding that sent a stinging spike of pain through her head.

A commotion to the side made her look up. More of the Delvers were holding their weapons at Max and Tim, who had turned towards her. The two bristled, but kept standing where they were. Probably more because they didn’t want to endanger her further than because of any danger to themselves.

“Don’t struggle,” Trito said. “If you want your underling healed, stop distracting us.”

Regina stilled. “Then heal her.”

Trito held her gaze for a moment longer, before Regina made herself look at Tia with an effort of will, breaking the staring contest. Then he crouched down beside her. His gloves lit up faintly as hazy light spilled around and over the wound.

Regina took a deep breath, watching as the wound started closing before her eyes. She could sense his mana at work, but only very faintly. It took at least a minute until Tia looked like she was in reasonably good shape, although there was still a lot of blood.

She sat up and he stepped back. While Tia struggled to stand, Mia rushed forward, finally let through by another fighter.

“Gather them up,” Trito commanded. He looked at Regina again. “Don’t resist.”

She stiffened as she realized what he intended. After a moment, she started gathering magic.

“Don’t,” he warned her, coming closer and grabbing her chin. “You only risk your followers getting killed in a fight, and you couldn’t defeat us anyway.”

Regina looked at the drones, breathing hard. What the hell does he think he’s doing, anyway? Is he holding them hostage to get me to cave in? Would they kill them?

“Don’t be stupid, girl,” one of the men holding her spoke up. He sounded annoyed. “The weakest of us is twenty levels above you, there’s no way you could fight us. You might be a monsterblood, but I’m sure you’re smarter than that.”

After another long moment, Regina sighed and nodded slightly. She swallowed bile in the back of her throat and her pulse still hadn’t calmed down, but she knew she really couldn’t fight these people.

She just needed to find a way to either convince them that they shouldn’t mess with her or to escape.

The two warriors started dragging her down the street. As they turned, she caught sight of the remains of the palisade. The bodies of monsters littered the ground. None of them moved.