Swarming Sovereignty

Lia was sitting at the head of a long table in one of the school’s offices. Over the past couple of weeks, the swarm had been working on two fronts – one focused on abducting monsters from the region just outside their portal, and the other focused on locking the dungeon down as quickly as possible.

And results had been mixed. While they had lost about an eighth of the scouts they put out, that was somewhat made up for with the quantity of cocoons they had obtained. Yes, it was only about the same as what they had lost, but in terms of raw stats those monsters were generally akin to a goblin knight.

Unfortunately, most of them were fairly useless when it came to actual abilities. By and large they had mostly picked up the herbivores and other monsters on the bottom of the food chain, so those had been repurposed as drones and other species fit for manual labor. They had obtained a few predators and scavengers among the lot, but those were…mostly not sneaky enough, so the scout force had been dwindling.

Which was why Lia had decided to hold this meeting. The team working on clearing the dungeon had finished clearing the dorms and moved onto other projects, starting with the school’s main office and branching off from there.

So, they now had a perfect place to conduct “official” briefings. It probably wasn’t necessary, given the relatively small number of sapient people in the swarm, but it made things feel…official. “Alright everyone, let’s get started.” Lia said. “First, status updates. Mom?”

“The monsters spawning in the library have slowed as of today.” Mia said, standing up. Over the course of the last couple of weeks she had been working extremely long hours, often alone, to the point where Lia had approached her with the intention of forcing her to take a break.

But Mia had refused. “I’m not working because I’m bored or because I feel I need to contribute or anything.” She had explained. “I’m trying to evolve as fast as possible, not only so I can better protect you all, but so I can feel…more like a person. My current form has many advantages, but it is somewhat embarrassing to be so much shorter and so…different from the rest of my family. I don’t intend to give up my wings or extra arms, but I would at least like to be able to pass for a person from a distance.”

And her work had paid dividends. While she didn’t level as fast as Lia, she had already been on the cusp of an evolution, and had obtained an additional one just the day prior. She had achieved her goal of being taller and more…person-like, but it was still abundantly clear that she was a monster; even though her carapace had all but vanished, her skin still retained its marbled yellow and black hue.

But that aside, Lia had been shocked to find that her mother had somehow ended up looking remarkably like she had before she had died. The basic build of her body and the shape of her face were all the same, and were it not for…well, the fact that she was an entirely different species than she used to be, Lia wasn’t sure she would be able to tell the difference between her mother now and the mother in Lia’s memories.

 “We’re estimating that it’ll stop spawning things completely tomorrow or the day after.” Mia continued, oblivious to Lia’s thoughts. “The subjugation of the greenhouses near the biology building is, similarly, going well, and we’re estimating another three days until they’re completely safe as well.” She sat back down, giving Lia a nod.

“Thank you, mom.” Lia said. “Lily, how are things on your end?”

“We have completely dismantled our old fort.” Lily said, pushing her glasses up. “And we’ve finished putting up a rudimentary barrier around the rest of the market, as instructed.”

About a week prior, Rose had floated the idea of using the market as a semi-permanent source of new monsters for the swarm. Lia had been under the impression that dungeons would stop spawning monsters so as to avoid this type of situation, but Rose had said there was a way; it involved letting the dungeon build up a supply of monsters over the course of a week or so, and then going through the area one time to kill all the monsters.

It wasn’t exactly a common tactic, since there was usually little merit in doing so, but in their specific situation, it was definitely worth considering. So, they changed their plans, effectively abandoning their old fort and repurposing the material for use in barricading the rest of the market off. That left the portal to the Spine in a bit of an awkward position, so they were planning to, eventually, close off a path to it while keeping their main barricade intact, just adding a door to the path.

“The burrowers are making good time in digging out those new storage rooms, but our modeling wax income is roughly equaling our expenditure, so we’re having trouble filling some of them. Might I ask that you convert some more gardeners and other plant-focused creatures so we can begin making some passive production?”

“I’ll do that after we’re done here.” Rose said.

“Thank you.” Lily replied. “Finally, we were able to locate a book on rat farming, and have begun construction of a large-scale farm in the remnants of the biology building. Construction should be completed within another two weeks, and it should be at full capacity within half a year, provided we have some method of increasing their fertility. I believe converted bees have some sort of potential in that regard? I would appreciate it if some of you would take some with you in efforts to level them faster, so we can see where that leads.”

“I can take care of that no problem.” Gwinn volunteered.

“My thanks.” Lily said, giving a grateful nod. “I have nothing further to report.”

“Good work. Thanks, Lily. Chrys, anything new to report before we get into the meeting proper?”

“None, Queenie.”

“Very well, then. I suppose the first thing to ask is if you have any suggestions for how to mitigate the losses we’ve been taking.”

“I…do.” Chrys admitted, shifting slightly. “But I’m not sure mom will like it.”

Rose frowned. “I’m open to ideas.” She said. “Let’s hear it.”

“Well, so, I was thinking that if we can convert that big thing we’ve seen wandering around, then we’ll have enough firepower to actually start performing a frontal assault on this place instead of these guerilla tactics.” Chrys said. “I mean, surely if we pump a bunch of resources into it, we can turn it into something battle-ready, right? We could even use it as a mobile base of sorts, it’d be awesome!”

“I’ve yet to see why exactly I wouldn’t like this.” Rose said cautiously. “You do have an idea as to how we can do this without sustaining massive casualties, right?”

Chrys went right back to being somber. “Well, yeah.” She said. “That’s kind of the part you’re not going to like. I’ve had the thing observed for a while, and I’ve decided that the only way we do this is if we dump a huge amount of modeling wax on it at once. I even had a couple of throwaway scouts attack it to see how it responded, and it seems its favored way of dealing with threats is to just tank whatever is thrown its way and retaliate. It’s not fast or nimble, so if we can get a colossal amount of the stuff on it all at once, then it’ll be cocooned before it can do anything, and we’ll have ourselves a brand new high-powered minion.

“But, um, the only way we have to do that is to either send in a ton of suicide units, which might well just get them killed on the approach and waste even more resources, or to have Queenie do it with her storage. I think the latter is the safest method, myself, but…”

Rose sighed. “Your idea has merit, but the risk we’re taking by sending Lia out there is gargantuan. What if she gets injured or, worse, dies? The whole swarm will fall apart because we took a risk we really didn’t have to take. We can always just wait and grab this thing later.”

“I think we should do it.” Lia said quietly. “I’m getting…restless. We’re making remarkably little progress in our quest into the Spine, and…I think people will have figured out Amelia’s not in civilization by now. With her not currently able to filter her presence from the eyes of diviners, I’m sure they’ll have found some way to, at least, detect the absence of her presence. And then it’s only a matter of time until we’re found. Camellia, you were able to get a somewhat decent bead on our position, right?”

Camellia nodded. “I believe we estimated that the normal dungeon exit is around three thousand miles from your homeland, as the crow flies, and our portal exit is about a thousand.” She said.

“That’s a lot of space.” Rose protested. “It’s not like they’re going to be able to head straight for us, they’ll have to comb through a ridiculous amount of space before they stumble upon our portal, and if we disguise it well enough, they might not even find it! We have at least a decade!”

“I’m sure they’ll be looking for something hidden by someone with much more sophisticated methods to hide things than us.” Lia argued. “And they won’t necessarily need to manually go through every inch of that space. They’re going to be looking for important things like dungeons or traces of odd magic. Technology has advanced a lot in the past five hundred years, I think a decade might even be too generous an amount of time to give us. And even if they don’t find us, and a decade passes, I’m willing to bet they’ll just summon a Hero instead. We’re racing against time, and any advantage we can get we should take.”

Rose bit her lip as she thought about that. “Perhaps. I…” She sighed, and then spoke to Lia privately via telepathy. Can you see if you can buy some information from the gods? See if they think this gambit would succeed?

That’s a good idea. Lia said. If I do that, will you agree to this plan?

Yes, provided the information is favorable. Rose said, then heaved yet another sigh. “Fine. For now, let’s proceed under the assumption that we’re doing this. How much modeling wax would we need?”

“More than we have.” Chrys said. “But if we stockpile for a couple of days, we should have enough.”

They spent another half hour or so hashing out specific plans and contingencies, and once it seemed like little progress was being made, Lia ended the meeting. Immediately after, she went to a private room with Rose and opened up a portal to the Dimension of Discounts and stepped inside, where Connie was waiting.

“So, you want information, eh?” She asked, placing an elbow on the counter and letting her face rest in her palm. “Well, that’s gonna cost you.”

“How did you know–”

“That you wanted information?” Connie interrupted, smirking. “If your reaction wasn’t clue enough, Rose very suddenly changed her tune about your involvement in this plan of yours, and you came here as soon as you could afterwards. It was a pretty safe bet. So, what do you want to know?”

“I want to know what you think the odds of our plan succeeding is.” Lia said.

“Figured as much. If you want that, we’ll call it…” Connie paused, deliberating on that for a moment, “well, since you’re my best customer, we’ll say an even ten grand.”

“Ten what?”

“Ten thousand.” Connie translated. “So, you want it?”

“Ten thousand? I barely have seven thousand!” Lia protested. “Surely you can go cheaper, it’s not like I’m asking for something big!”

“Aren’t you?” Connie said, arching a brow. “Need I remind you that you specifically came here for information you otherwise wouldn’t have access to? You may be my best customer, but the advice of the gods doesn’t come cheap. Prophets would fall over themselves to even have as clear a line of communication to me as you have, much less to get an unambiguous answer to a very specific question.”

Lia grit her teeth. “If I die, you won’t have any way of getting Blood Money anymore. My survival is directly related to your wealth.”

Connie chuckled. “Is that a threat?”

Lia paled as she realized just what she had said to a god. It was, at times, hard to treat Connie as a god rather than a person. She was just so…personable that it was easy to forget who she actually was. “No, I mean, I was just pointing out…”

“I’m messing with you.” Connie said, grinning. “As one of my followers, I would be upset if you didn’t use something like that to try and gain an upper hand in negotiation. But, no, you won’t be my only way of getting Blood Money. You’re easily the most convenient way of getting Blood Money, and you’re the only one that I know will work for sure, but given a few millennia, we’ll figure out how to make Blood Money ourselves.

“So, while I would be sad to lose you as a customer, you will likely not be irreplaceable. And, as a god, I am forbidden from simply dispensing free advice. Still, you raise a valid point, so I’ll go ahead and give you a discount. Give me every last drop of Blood Money you have on hand, and I’ll give you the odds.”

Lia frowned. “Is there any other advice you could give that would be cheaper?”

“Oh, sure.” Connie said. “Plenty. You asked for a rather conclusive bit of info that would potentially radically change how you approach the situation. How much are you willing to put on the table?”

“Say…twenty-five hundred Blood Money.” Lia said. “How helpful a fact would that give me?”

Connie tapped her chin thoughtfully. “One that will likely shape the discussion you and Rose have on this issue, but not one that will immediately resolve your concerns.” She said. “How does that sound?”

“That is acceptable.” Lia said, a slightly drained feeling washing over her as Connie took the Blood Money. “So, let’s hear it.”

“The beast you’re looking to convert will soon be out of your reach.” Connie said. “If you wish to convert it, it’s now or never.”

Lia frowned. “That’s it?”

“That’s it.” Connie confirmed. “Discuss it with Rose. You’ll see the value of that tidbit once you think about it a bit more. Now…is there anything else I can help you with?”

Lia shook her head. “That’ll be all, thanks.” And with that, she turned and left the Dimension of Discounts.

“Well?” Rose asked anxiously.

“I talked with her.” Lia said. “Spent about a third of what I had on hand for some info. I didn’t want to spend more in case we needed it to get supplies or something. She said, quote ‘The beast you’re looking to convert will soon be out of your reach. If you wish to convert it, it’s now or never’, end quote.”

Rose frowned deeply. “That’s…not good news. I hate to say it, but we need to get this monster converted ASAP, then.”

“What? I mean, if it leaves it leaves, so what?” Lia asked, confused. “We just come across it later and convert it, right?”

“It’s not about it leaving.” Rose said, shaking her head. “Though that is nearly as bad as the alternatives, as it would create a void that a new apex predator could fill. No, the gods are very specific with their wording; if she said that converting it is now or never, then we will literally be unable to convert it at a later date. Something is going to kill it, and whatever that something happens to be, it’ll almost certainly be far worse for us than this thing. When that time comes, I’d rather have this monster in our corner. If nothing else, converting it will likely provide us each with enough experience to evolve once again.”

“Oh.” Lia said quietly. “I see.”

Rose nodded. “I’m going to shift all the unenlightened members of the swarm into constant modeling wax production. We convert this thing tomorrow.”

“I’ll let all the sapient people know.” Lia said. “Let’s do this.”