Chapter 412

For the fifth floor of the dungeon the team collectively decided to go with one of the random arches. The reason it was random wasn’t that Ajax couldn’t feel what the predominant mana types were, it was simply that he didn’t know those represented. He had felt them in present in small quantities on other floors but he hadn’t been able to get a clear reading on what they represented. 

Since the floor would only have levels up to sixty two it would be a perfect warm-up for Anna, Lexi and Xavier. Benedict knew that with his physically focused build he wouldn’t have a chance at tackling the following floor, it wasn’t something he was happy about but it was something he had accepted, as a melee physical combatant the fight would simply last too long for any boosting potion to remain effective and the level difference was too much to overcome for him. 

“What is this?” one of the rangers asked as they noticed a sticky substance on the ground. 

“Ajax, is this what I think it is?” Lexi asked as she took in her surroundings, she was pretty sure she was right with her guess but wanted Ajax to confirm it for her. 

“Yes it is.” Ajax confirmed excitement and awe in his voice. “Judging by the size of the honeycomb I’d say we should be expecting them to be about four feet in length.” 

“Honeycomb?” Anna asked confused for a moment before her eyes opened wide in surprise. “Is this entire floor a big hive?” 

“I’m not sure about the entire floor but this part of it certainly seems to be.” Ajax said as he looked at the sheen of what he very much suspected to be honey glistening on the walls. “Anna also do be careful with your fire, pure honey like this is flammable.” 

“You think the minibosses might be swarm types?” the prince asked Ajax.

“Could be.” Ajax nodded. “That would mean that their defense and endurance is low so they should be no issue for any of us.” 

“It’s an interesting floor I’ll grant you but can we get going.” Aranor said. “I’ve been in an anthill version of this floor and they are dangerous, after a certain point it's like the obelisk was activated on you and the entire floor swarms you.” 

“That’s because they have a hive mind.” Ajax said. “If you’re careful that won’t happen.” 

For the next five minutes Ajax very loosely explained how a hive worked as one organism and that if they wouldn’t let any bees live long enough they wouldn’t be able to communicate their presence throughout the hive.

“Anything you want off this floor Ajax?” the prince asked, knowing that Ajax’s ideas could be a little out there.” 

“Oh yes.” Ajax nodded rapidly. “There has to be some honey we can take out and I’ll want some of that. Less likely to be found are eggs or royal jelly.” 

That comment brought everyone up short, not because of the food or the presence of a type of jelly they hadn’t heard about but the eggs. “You think there could be eggs?” Aranor asked, his words coming out slowly one at a time.” 

“Most likely not ones we could take with us.” Ajax sighed as he admitted, he had found floors that seemed to have shrunk the person entering before and while they had found eggs of creatures on those floors they weren’t ever able to take them out. “The dungeons don’t seem to allow that.” 

“Then what do you want to honey?” one of the rangers asked. “Or the… what is royal jelly?” 

Lexi was quick to catch on why Ajax wanted both the honey and the royal jelly. Ajax had explained how bees worked before and she knew that if Ajax managed to get any of the honey from this hive and feed it to his bees he might be able to get them to integrate the mana infusion quicker, the royal jelly would be especially valuable since that would should be able to boost a future queen helping speed up the process by a few generations.

“He’s an alchemist, you know how they are about odd mana-rich ingredients.” Another ranger whispered to the nod of everyone who heard. Even Lexi was nodding along not just because she didn’t want to explain everything she knew about bees but she actually agreed with the statement and knew that Ajax would also keep some of the honey for his [Alchemy].

“We’re clearing the entire floor anyway so what does it matter.” the ranger squad leader said, all the royal ranger squads had standing orders to scour floors where there was a reasonable suspicion that eggs of magical creatures could be found. “What does this royal jelly look like?”

“It should look similar to regular honey only instead of the golden color it would be more like milk it's surprisingly sour, it’s actually how the bees-” Ajax started to explain only to be interrupted. 

“Now isn’t the time for a lesson on bees Ajax.” Lexi said.

“So white honey.” the ranger leader nodded. “No offense but if I find some white sticky substance I won’t be tasting it.”

With a few chuckles both rangers' squad started to head out and clear the floor. “Don’t forget to leave a few of the arch guardians alive, some of them still need to clear the floor.” the prince called out.

“Anything we should watch out for?” Benedict asked Ajax, recognizing that this time his friend might actually know a lot more about their enemies.

“Yeah the stinger.” Ajax said. 

“You don’t say.” Xavier chuckled along with Anna and Lexi.

“I mean it.” Ajax said in a serious tone. “Judging by the size of the hive these bees are maybe sixty times larger than the normal ones, bee stings hurt and itch for so long because they inject venom. With this much more venom and the mana concentration one sting might not be immediately fatal but it would incapacitate any of you, two or more would be fatal regardless what body part they hit.” 

This information brought the joking to a halt, a swarm type enemy with this strong of a weapon was a real threat for all of them. “Anything else, weak point?” Benedict asked. 

“Yeah their jaws.” Ajax nodded. “Bees have an exoskeleton, if you put a sword or spear through their mouth you won’t hit bone so you can crush their brain. Ice magic should also work well but I’m not sure how that works with the mana they have access to now.”

Ajax was the first of them to go up against the bees to see what they could do. A miniboss swarm seemed to be made up of seven four and a half feet long bees. Ajax wasted no time and made short work of them, with his speed and power half of the bees were dead before they even had a chance to react to his attack. Before killing the last bee however he did let it sting him in the thigh, it wasn’t often that he could find a chance to expose his [Poison Resistance] to such an odd venom. 

“Argh.” Ajax groaned as he endured the pain while also crushing the final bee with his hammer.

“Are you sure that was a good idea?” the prince asked Ajax, only slightly worried about him willingly being hit with a venom.

“Actually I’m starting to regret this already.” Ajax said while keeping his voice as emotionless as possible yet his hands had started clenching and unclenching.

“Are you in danger?” the prince was a little worried but because of the calm look on Ajax’s face he hadn’t started panicking. 

“No, I just failed to consider the aftereffects of the poison.” Ajax said. 

“Oh god it must itch like crazy.” Lexi exclaimed as she remembered how the pain from the sting wasn’t pleasant but it faded quickly.

Anna and Lexi had no issue dealing with their own swarms. While Vibration wasn’t all that good against an exoskeleton, both of the girls were powerful mages that had a very strong advantage by opening the fight with a very powerful spell that hit the entire swarm. Lexi went with ice while Anna stuck with her trademark fire

Xavier and Benedict didn’t have such an easy time, both of them started with a very aggressive opening attack and then switched into a defensive fighting style as the slowly killed off one bee at a time while keeping well away from the stingers. Both of them were a bit roughed up from where the bees had managed to gnaw on them a little but neither of them had gotten stung. 

The ranger squads had also shown their prowess as it barely took four hours for them to clear and scout the entire floor. “You were right, no eggs.” the rangers said as they returned. “At least none that we can take out.” 

“What about the honey and royal jelly?” Ajax asked, only slightly disappointed with the news about the eggs since he had been expecting them.

“We did manage to find about ten… honeycombs, you called them, of honey and one of the royal jelly that we can take with us.” the ranger nodded. “The honey ones were scattered all over the floor.” 

The amount was something Ajax was very happy with. Each honeycomb could hold about fifteen gallons so that was a lot.

“Anything specific you are planning?” the prince asked him as he could tell Ajax was holding something back. 

“Yeah, we need to be careful with the royal jelly.” Ajax said. “With it a dedicated farmer could raise his own queen, with the right skills they might be able to tame it even if they won’t Bond with it and through it they would control the entire hive.” 

“As long as they grow to this size I’m sure it’ll be fine.” the prince said. “Lets go to the next floor.”