Chapter 104: Bee-lazing Battle

Chapter 104: Bee-lazing Battle

Now that the honey had arrived, Belissar turned his attention back to the shade, trying to determine how long they had left to prepare.

It seemed they would have...quite a while. The turtle shade had barely passed the first section of the Dirt Tunnels...and had taken a wrong turn to boot. Belissar kept everyone updated as the turtle slowly reached the dead end and turned around.

And then, not so promptly proceeded down another wrong turn. And then another. And another...

Soon, the karnuq had begun to sit or even lie down around the field. Chief Rohsuak was just staring at the mana honeycomb tray in her hands. The soldier bees still maintained their formations, but their wings beat at a slower place as they simply hovered in place. Belissar was mostly pacing about. On the one hand, more time to prepare was useful. On the other hand, Belissar could not calm down with the shade present and the feeling of the Hunger crashing against the Tower’s mana.

He glanced over to Chief Rohsuak and then began to rub his chin.

“Sacred Den Master? Do you need something?”

Belissar shook his head.

“No, it’s just...you’re going to use fire, right?”

Chief Rohsuak nodded. Belissar then crossed his arms.

“Hm, maybe I should reinforce the fire ditch then.”

“Ah, that would be wise.”

Belissar began to add a second stretch of flower-less dirt across the Flower Meadow, this one in the middle of the room. And then a third, closer to the entrance. Anything he could do to keep a possible brush fire away from the Bee Barracks...and to give himself something to do in the meantime.

But then, finally, the shade approached the final stretch. Belissar’s eyes narrowed.

“Here it comes.”

Metsaitti rose to his feet and barked a command to the karnuq hunters, who began to assemble once more. They escorted Chief Rohsuak close to the entrance of the Flower Meadow. The plan was still to let the bee army make the first attempt, but if the bees either could not bring the shade down or could not do so with acceptable casualties, then Chief Rohsuak would strike with her magic.

And if that failed?

“Ah, I’ve missed this.”

The other karnuq watched her in awe as Belissar’s gaze was drawn to her as well. Metsaitti leaned over towards him.

“The chief was once called the Blazing Berserker. It’s been a while since we’ve seen her at full strength.”

Belissar just nodded as Chief Rohsuak stepped forward. The shade continued its slow and ponderous march, heedless of the karnuq woman approaching it ahead. But that changed as she began to stir up the mana now surging within her and cupped her hands in front of her.

“God of Fire, grant me your flames to burn my enemies. Let them perish in the blazing inferno!”

She barked the words with a growl as the mana burst into flames all around her. The flames began to flow down her arms and coalesced into a sphere between her hands. The sphere started large and red, but then began to condense down and change colors. It shrank to slightly large and yellow, then to medium and orange, then to small and blue, and finally into a tiny white sphere too bright to look at directly.

The shade very much noticed the mass concentration of mana ahead of it. It began to rush forward as quickly as its body would allow, which wasn’t very. It extended its head and took a deep breath, unleashing as large a cloud of mist as it could towards the growing threat. But the bee army did not remain idle and the queen ordered the sprayers to react. They unleashed a wall of toxic spray that collided with the black mist, killing its moment.

Chief Rohsuak then thrust her hands forward and the white sphere shot forward, leaving a trail of white fire in its wake. The shade pulled its head into its shell, but the sphere shot right into its neck hole before it could turn away.

The shade then explode into flames. Fire burst out of every opening in its shell, creating a pillar of white and blue flames that reached for the skies. The shade screeched like the sound of grinding metal as its tail and spikes flailed about. The flowers all around caught fire and a raging inferno surged across the field.

Chief Rohsuak then collapsed as the mana faded from her body. Metsaitti had already stepped closer to her and caught her before she fell.

“Thank...you...”

Her breathes were heavy and labored. Metsaitti began to take her away but she shook her head.

“Let me...see it through...to the end.”

Metsaitti slowly nodded and instead propped her up as best he could. Belissar, meanwhile, was staring wide-eyed. The inferno had grown such that the heat and the smoke had forced the soldier bee army to retreat. The shade was thrashing about as violently as it could, emitting as much black mist as possible, but nothing it did had any effect on the flames. Soon, it fell to the ground and black smoke began pouring out of its shell...until that, too, faded away and joined the smoke rising through the air.

Belissar was suddenly very glad the karnuq were on his side.