Chrysalis

"There's something really strange about those things," Brilliant said.

"No kidding?" I reply sarcastically, "I would never have thought that on my own, watching this damn garden of terror explode over the plains."

"That's not what I mean," the much smaller ant waves my complaint aside, "I'm talking dimensionally. Also, the Dungeon sense I have is going wild. It's as if a giant monster was just appearing out of nowhere in front of me. It's crazy."

"How big of a monster?" I ask, curious.

"Huge. It's like the entire garden in front of us is one monster. What's more, it isn't even growing through the ground, not really."

I look at the vegetation bursting through the black rock of the third stratum with vigorous energy as if it were a timelapse instead of real time.

"If it's not coming from the ground, then where in the heck is it coming from?"

The little ant stares carefully ahead, using all of her prodigious sensing abilities.

"There's something odd about the way it moves through space, similar to how the worm tunnel felt. There's a compression? Or a dilation? I'm not really sure."

"Dilation? Since when do we even have pheromones for that word? So you're saying that it might not even be possible to trace the roots back to the tree? That they're detached somehow?"

"I can't be sure. All I can tell from here is that it's weird."

It's a bizarre sight, seeing an isolated little forest grow inside the demon layer, even more so than the second stratum. I mean, here we are, surrounded by fire and ash, and here is this blooming patch of greenery, replete with flowers and trees springing forth for no apparent reason. How does she even do this madness, that tree? What sort of tier do you have to get as a plant to be able to do something like this? How the heck did she even survive long enough to be able to do this?!

I'm looking forward to the day when I track down her main body and get to have a chat.

… if she doesn't squish me first.

It takes a day for the garden to finish forming and when it's all said and done, a massive root, the same as I had run into before, has formed in the centre of a lush kilometre square green space. Another interesting thing I notice is the way the demon larvae ignore the place. As their rolling melee goes on, they scrupulously avoid falling into or going near even a single leaf. Even more telling, they don't even spawn in there. Every inch of ground the garden covers is now a demon free zone. It's unnerving.

feel like it's

She nods.

The amount of mana

Just how high a tier is the damn tree? I'd hoped that maybe she was two in front of me, perhaps? Now it seems highly unlikely.

time before we find out why. I don't know how she spits out the grove keepers or bruan'chii but I'm guessing the process isn't instantaneous, which means we'll have to wait.

to take a step forward into the garden and I swear the plants hiss at me,

right! Chill! I'm backing

no clue if she can understand pheromones, but she clearly responds to my retreat, the greenery relaxing back into

this plant to be

agree Crinis. I think she's

[Nuts?]

the confused blob attached to my carapace, [I get the feeling she's been in the Dungeon for a long old time, hundreds of years maybe. That's enough time to drive even the most

[What should we do?]

what she wants I guess? What else can we do? I'm not exactly going to try and blow up the garden, am I? As far as the Colony is concerned, the mother tree

you think they

[They?]

[Look.]

extends from my back, pointing and I focus my eyes to see something I'd really rather not see. A kaarmodo, along with its attendants is standing atop an outcropping

over there and see what

not turn into a fight. I've been so good! I have no doubt the council has been putting bets on who is going to break the

is currently sunning itself. True to form, the arrogant beast ignores us as it continues to stare down on the mother tree's work,

what you might be up to on this

the peace! Despite my best intentions

not. I mean, you’re a centuries old kaarmodo, no? Do you not speak

is boundless!] a

is it my fault if you

our enemies. Such faithless monsters. We

the lands of the Colony this time, friend. Just because your borders appear to be shifting, amorphous things, doesn't mean we can't keep track of our own scent trails, and second. What enemies? There's