Belissar had a big grin on his face as the day wrapped up. He couldn’t keep the ball away from the bumblebees or even the karnuq kids for long, but he enjoyed it nonetheless. More and more bumblebee soldiers came to join them over the day and the spiderkin children showed up too once they saw Belissar taking part. The spiderkin were fast and nimble and dominated the field…until Belissar, the Circle masters, and the bumblebees allied with the karnuq to box them in.
He would have to do this more often. It was quite fun and it was nice to see the bees, the spiderkin, and the karnuq all getting along.
Niobee, the hive of hives, and Belissar’s allies handled all the daily purifications without him, so all he had to do was pick more max mana and host the victory dinner, then the day came to a close. Belissar slept well that night.
Then, a new day began. Belissar found himself feeling light and refreshed and he was eager to see what his bees were up to.
Especially when the Tower chimed in.
A monster has evolved!
Alchemical Monster Bee Queen now available!
A monster has evolved!
Poison-Brewer Monster Bee Queen now available!
Not just one but two queens had evolved today! Belissar all but ran over to the Bee-City, ready to greet the queens in question.
The First of the Fifth met him, as she always did when he entered the Bee-City.
“King! Third Daughter and First of the Eighth made new honey type, then evolved! Amazing, incredible!”
Belissar grinned.
“That’s indeed amazing! Are they at their hives?”
“At my hive! Came to thank for help!”
Belissar found the two queens on the First of the Fifth’s hive tray. They both now had similar bodies to the honeyswirling First of the Fifth, with large bodies and larger abdomens that had the honey-drying grooves normally found on honeypots. The First of the Fifth’s Third Daughter was still the same black and yellow of normal monster bees, while the First of the Eighth retained the black and purple coloration of maddening bees. Both danced happy salutes as he approached.
“Congratulations, you two!”
Both bees responded with “King is best king!” dances. Belissar took the opportunity to look up their descriptions.
Alchemical Monster Bee Queen
Vitality: Small
Strength: Minor
Speed: Minimal
Magic: Above Average
Defense: Minimal
Resistance: Minor
Special: Above Average
Notable Skills: Brood Mother, Command Offspring, Reagent Honey, Sealing Wax, Potion-mixing, Potion Sting
Spawner Upkeep: 40 (20 with Blessing of Bees)
Evolves From: Monster Bee Queen
Description: A monster bee that has learned to mix its honey with other ingredients to form potions and that has evolved to pursue that craft. The alchemical monster bee creates a unique form of mana honey that is exceptional at binding with alchemical ingredients, activating their effects, and mixing them together. It is a perfect catalyst for alchemy, its effects changing based on the potion-maker’s mana and will. The alchemical monster bees are also especially attuned to the mana of the honey and any ingredient within it, allowing them exceptional control and precision when turning their honey into potions. Additionally, their wax and propolis is completely alchemically inert and perfect for storing potions and ingredients.
Alchemical monster bees replace their venom sacs with a potion-storing sac. While they no longer produce venom, alchemical monster bees can store any sort of potion or poison made with their honey within the sac and can deliver the contents through their stingers, allowing them to produce as wide a variety of effects as the ingredients they have access to. The sacs are specialized in potion storage and can hold volatile potions separate from each other and the environment, to be activated only when the bee wishes.
This one is a queen who can raise a hive of alchemical monster bees. Additionally, the queen gains the abilities of the honeypot to enable potion-mixing within her own body, allowing her to mass produce special royal potions with more powerful effects. Modified communer antennae allow the queen to participate in potion-making across her hive from a stationary position.
As an evolved monster bee queen, the alchemical monster bee queen also has a superior ability to raise evolved bee types and can lay monster bee types in her evolution lineage in addition to alchemical monster bees. Alchemical monster bees are also excellent at mixing honey and pollen from different flowers to raise hybrid-type bees.
The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.
Poison-Brewing Monster Bee Queen
Vitality: Small
Strength: Minor
Speed: Minimal
Magic: Above Average
Defense: Minimal
Resistance: Minor
Special: Above Average
Notable Skills: Brood Mother, Command Offspring, Poisonous Reagent Honey, Sealing Wax, Poison Wax, Poison-mixing, Poison-Honey Sting, Poison Resistance
Spawner Upkeep: 40 (20 with Blessing of Bees)
Evolves From: Monster Bee Queen with Poison-Attribute mana
Description: A variant of alchemical monster bees that focuses entirely on poisons. The poison-brewing monster bee’s honey acts as a reagent to greatly enhance the toxicity of any ingredients added to it, or to form new, even deadlier poisons from the mix. Their wax and propolis can be made either to be completely inert, for safer toxin storage, or to absorb poisons and become toxic themselves, making a bite of poison-brewing honeycomb especially dangerous. The poison-brewing bees are themselves highly-resistant to toxins and so can make their entire hive poisonous if they wish.
Poison-brewing monster bees, unlike their alchemical sisters, do continue to produce venom naturally. They can also add honey from their honey crops into their stings to enhance their own venom, or can store brewed poisons in their honey crops for this purpose. The sting of a poison-brewer is thus always dangerous and may come with any number of detrimental effects depending on the ingredients the hive has access to.
This one is a queen who can raise a hive of poison-brewers. Additionally, the queen gains the abilities of the honeypot to enable poison-brewing within her own body, allowing her to mass produce royal poisons that are exceptionally deadly. Modified communer antennae also allow the queen to participate in poison-brewing across her hive from a stationary position.
As an evolved monster bee queen, the poison-brewing monster bee queen also has a superior ability to raise evolved bee types and can lay monster bee types in her evolution lineage in addition to poison-brewer monster bees. She may also mix honeys with particular poisons to evolve specialized Poison-type bees with greater ease than other evolved queens.
Belissar chuckled as he finished reading the descriptions. He suspected Juosiutik was going to be pleased; very, very pleased. They now had bees specialized in creating potions and poisons, he could only imagine what the blessing of the honey herbalist could do with reagent honey made by alchemical and poison-brewing bees!
As well as what he could do with their products. The poison-brewing bees, in particular, sounded perfect for suppling the Tower’s traps. Sticky honey traps and beeswax candles might become significantly greater threats now that the biggest maddening hive could make all sorts of poisonous honeys and waxes.
Though, he had a thought that made him rub his chin.
“Hm, I wonder how toxic and poison-brewing bees are related? Would you like each others’ honeys? Will your honey make their stings deadlier?”
The First of the Eighth paused dancing for a moment.
“Could…try? Could…help toxic bees? Make toxic bees stronger, like made bee army stronger?”
Belissar smiled.
“Or maybe they could give you their venom to make poisons with?”
The First of the Eighth started zipping around.
“Amazing, incredible! King is best king!”
Belissar laughed at that, then turned to the First of the Fifth’s Third Daughter.
“Before that, though, let’s go find Juosiutik. We should definitely let her know what you can do now.”
The Third Daughter started zipping around too.
“Yes! Will! Will tell dangerous one can make better honey now!”
Belissar led the bees to the Apothecary’s Hut and introduced the new evolutions to Juosiutik.
She was as pleased as Belissar suspected…more pleased, even. Her laugh as she speculated on uses for the new honey types made Belissar think the “dangerous one” nickname was well-earned…
***
Belissar left a cackling Juosiutik to catalog her poison ingredients and the two evolved queens to evolve the rest of their hives and considered what he should do next. The bees were clearly hard at work, so it was time for him to get back to it!
And he suddenly realized that there was a bee type he hadn’t addressed yet. One that had been glossed over due to other evolutions. One that hadn’t had a chance to even hatch or spawn yet.
The flowering bumblebees.
Belissar and his allies had all been focused on the divine bumbledryad…but the Tower had said the flowering bumblebees were unlocked too. Only, since the divine bumbledryad had immediately evolved twice more, no flowering bumblebee had actually hatched.
The divine bumbledryad did not come with a spawner and Belissar had not expected to be able to spawn demi-gods. The regular bumbledryad queen also didn’t come with a spawner, maybe because they needed to bond with plants first? So, Belissar had put spawning more of them out of his mind.
But now, he realized, he had never actually checked if flowering bumblebee queens could be spawned or not. And now that he focused on them…
Place Flowering Bumblebee Queen spawner? Upkeep: 50 mana per spawner (25 with Blessing of Bees)
…they could. Belissar could bring a new bee to his Tower, right away.
So, Belissar gave a forewarning to the bumblebee queens and Finnakynne, then made his way over to the bumblebee meadow. The bumblebee queens started to zip around him along with Bumbly, who was carrying Finnakynne on her back.
“Beely, is it true?! We’re getting more bumbles?!”
Belissar made a self-deprecating smile.
“Once I remembered we had them all along. But better late than never, right?!”
Finnakynne grinned and swung her fists up into the air.
“Yes! More fuzz, more bumbles!”
Belissar laughed and then brought up the spawner, placing it near the existing bumblebee nests. Another pile of bumblebee wax pots appeared but covered in flowers that extended their roots into the pots. One of the pots glowed and out crawled the first flowering bumblebee queen…at least the first that hadn’t become a demigod.
The flowering bumblebee looked like a regular bumblebee queen at first, though her hairs had turned green, giving her black and green stripes. But, on her back was a flower bud whose stem was growing right out of her chitin. The bud slowly opened up, revealing a flower that spread out over her.
Belissar approached cautiously. This was, after all, a bee that had bonded to a flower symbiote, an experiment of the ancient Sorcerer Kings. He wasn’t sure if the monster was still truly a bee, or if the bee had been replaced by some sort of flower monster. Who knew how she would react to them…
The other bumblebees had no such reservations and all flew straight towards the flowering bumblebee, touching her antennae and then zipping around her in rapid circles. The flowering bumblebee stared at them, not reacting at first save for a slight twitch in her antennae.
Then she started flying around in circles of her own. She wasn’t as fast as the others with the flower on her back, but she did her best to follow them as she could.
Belissar smiled. The flowering bumblebee was a bumblebee after all.
Visit and read more novel to help us update chapter quickly. Thank you so much!
Use arrow keys (or A / D) to PREV/NEXT chapter