Chrysalis

To my surprise, it’s Brendant, a soldier of the Council, who leads this expedition. Soft-spoken and reserved, she isn’t usually one to put herself forward for an operation like this, preferring to work diligently in the background. Not that I’m unhappy to see her, she’s steady and reliable, as well as powerful, being a tier six ant with maxed evolutions.

“Brendant, good to see you! Is this the whole force?”

She comes down accompanied by what appears to be five thousand ants, along with a force of five hundred wuffers. We aren’t holding back on this one. Those five hundred pets represent an enormous sum of cores, but purifying the mana of the fifth is far too difficult without something custom-built for the job.

“This is all of us. We aren’t meant to go too deep, or for too long. We’ve done a fair bit of testing to determine the potency of the mana and whether it's possible to survive down there, but we haven’t done any exploring. That’s what this expedition is for. Do some preliminary mapping and get some data back to the generals about the environment and the effectiveness of our countermeasures.”

“Hey, Brendant, why are you talking to me as if I don’t know what we’re here for? I know exactly what the mission is about.”

The smaller ant shifts a little on her six legs.

“It doesn’t hurt to have a reminder before the beginning of a mission, Eldest.”

“I’m not going to fly off the handle and invite some sort of invasion by insane slugs! I can be cool. Everything is going to be fine.”

“As you say, Eldest.”

Gah! There’s never any trust.

“How long until we depart?” I ask.

“Give us an hour or two for final prep and we should be ready to go.”

“Fantastic. I’ll leave that to you, I’m going to dip my toe into the fifth and see what it’s like in there.”

I can tell Brendant wants to say something, but she refrains, merely giving me a nod and turning back to her business.

I want to check out

I really

[Fight!]

[Yessssss, letssssssss.]

[Sorry Crinis, you’re outvoted.]

by myself, we rush over to the entrance and find two other ants peering down at the

Coolant. I didn’t expect to see you two down here

it has been unlawfully

by side, though the air swirls violently between them

some testing

wouldn’t let us go down there with you. Too much risk,” Propellant

precaution,”

Colony,

them. That little mad scientist is an expert

you to go down this soon,” I tell them. “Be a little

to establish any real foothold, considering the odds we’re up

nose in, see what the fuss is about,” I declare, only for the two mages to

“What? Why?” Coolant demands.

that mana will do to you?” Propellant bursts

mana of the fifth

Eldest,” Coolant insists, “this is the original item, not a reproduction produced

I’m constantly uncomfortable! Although, right now, as I’m on the verge of descending to another stratum, I’m in less pain from it than I’ve felt in ages. In fact, I’m almost free of pain! It’s such a wondrous, heady feeling, I honestly don’t care what the

there for just a few seconds. A minute,

Be ready with the healing magic,

on