Chrysalis

Chapter 322

"With your permission Eldest, I will leave the council and begin to organise a workforce to prepare our initial fortifications" Tungstant said.

I waved an antennae in approval and the small, dextrous ant climbed up the wall and out the roof of the chamber in a moment.

"Alright then. Pitfall traps, tunnels to attack, I like all of these ideas. What else have we got? How is our magic firepower coming along?" I asked.

The two mages in the room, Propellant and Coolant, shifted on their feet as they became the centre of attention for the council. The mage caste hadn't had a lot of time to build up their raw magic handling skills, and were without the benefit of my own extensive spending on brain power when it came to evolutions. Having said that, they were no slouches in the brain game and were able to choose their own elemental gland on evolution. So there had to be some juice there.

"The number of mage ants we have to work with is still limited" Coolant hedged.

There were over a thousand ants in the colony at this time, there were like a hundred new ants being born every day. How few mages could there be?

"How many are we talking about?" I asked.

"Five" Coolant said flatly.

"Five?!" I sputtered.

"Oh, seven including Coolant and I" Propellant offered helpfully.

Holy moly.

few mages? When fighting against a huge horde, like

in my mind's eye already. Tunnel entrances falling in to reveal teams of mage ants who blasted the front ranks of the horde with deadly fire, torching dozens of

the hatchlings move into the soldier caste recently" Antionette informed me, "Large

I could understand, but

to map out the skill paths from scratch and explore methods to raise up the future generations of mage ants" Propellant told me ruefully. "We didn't anticipate a need for

enemies they would have been indispensable. There may be a use for the mages

say: Quantity, is a quality all of its own. That's practically the

coming our way, I need to help with that so I can reach my second objective,

close to your next evolution, Eldest?" Victoriant asked,

six more levels. If we're going to battle

of weaker monsters but tackling anything stronger is going to be beyond us for a

onto me, didn't you? She's technically correct, but that

lead up to this crisis?" I asked the gathered council, "If

surely?" protested Florence, the to this point silent Brood Tender, "without food the larvae will

completely" Sloan assured her, "but rather that we divert a significant portion of

she and her fellow Brood Tender were clearly not happy. I understand it, less food coming in means less brood. What else is a Brood Tender going to

to ensure that the hatchling training program continues to run unabated. Each new hatchling deserves the best possible

something you can only do with extensively upgraded compound eyes,

in agreement, more to appease me than anything else. My insistence on equal treatment for the hatchlings still makes little sense to them I suspect, thankfully by virtue of being old they have to listen

out for a few hours will you,

"That's right. Crinis needs to evolve and we all need some rest. We've been pretty flat out for the

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