BD - Chapter 223 - Metallur-Bee

Tamosmed left after promising to bring by some metal mana flowers as soon as possible. The black elves apparently considered them as a weed and purged them regularly so he didn’t have any on hand, but assured Belissar that they always found more.

Belissar wasn’t particularly worried about it, but more flowers were always nice so he awaited Tamosmed’s return. Besides, he had another idea on how he might acquire either metal slime bees or metal golems. Tarwantrad was still hanging around so he ran it by her.

“I just thought of this, but what about the thermal mining bees? The description says they mix minerals and metals into their wax, so maybe we could hybridize them with the slime bees? Or would making golems with their wax work?”

Tarwantrad’s eyes widened.

“Oh…I hadn’t considered that.”

She then grinned.

“I think Tamosmed will be in for another big surprise when you show him. I’m not an expert on golem crafting or mining and slimes for that matter, but I imagine either of those options would be of great interest to him and his people.”

Belissar nodded.

“In that case, would you like to check on the thermal mining bees with me? I was going to head over there to place this mithril anyways.”

Tarwantrad beamed.

“I would love to!”

Belissar and Tarwantrad thus headed over to the Dirt Tunnels connected to the Apiary, and to the open cavern where the digging and thermal mining bees lived. As they walked, Belissar went ahead and absorbed the mithril.

Sufficient samples gathered. Mithril is now available.

Current Applications: Dirt Tunnels, Lava Field (*=Resource Node only)

Belissar also checked the description of the metal itself to see how much of the legends were true.

Mithril

- Mana Upkeep: 50 per node, 25 to enable in compatible rooms

- Description: A mystical metal that can only be found in locations with heavy mana density. Lighter, harder, and tougher than most other metals and possesses far superiority mana lababsorption and conductivity. An ideal material for enchanting.

Well, it certainly had a mythical cost, as much as a Fairy Grove or a mini-volcano for each node. It certainly sounded powerful, even though Belissar didn’t know about metals or enchanting to say how powerful. He guessed Tamosmed would help with that. He guessed he would try one for now…

As soon as Belissar started to place one, he ran into a problem.

Available Resource Minerals for Dirt Tunnels:

- Mithril Ore (Mana Upkeep: 50 per node, 100 due to unsuitable environment)

One…hundred mana for a single node. Belissar currently had a bit over two hundred so that was nearly half his available mana. He checked the Lava Field as well and found it the same cost there, so there was no getting around it. Could he really justify spending half his mana on a single mineral node? When he would need to create butcher bee spawners and new rooms and features as well? Was mithril powerful enough to justify that cost?

Tarwantrad paused and turned around as she noticed Belissar come to a sudden halt.

“Belissar, is something the matter?”

He was startled out of his thoughts and took a moment before frowning.

“Mithril is really expensive.”

Tarwantrad tilted her head and hummed for a moment.

“That makes sense. It is one of the most prized possessions of black elves as a people. I’m guessing none of your rooms are suited to it?”

Belissar nodded and read out the description of the ore, the available rooms, and the costs involved. Tarwantrad crossed her arms and hummed to herself again.

“We’ll have to ask Tamosmed for the specifics but…if I had to guess it is likely that the Dirt Tunnels and Lava Fields are both too mundane and don’t fulfill the mana density condition. The only room you’ve showed me that might are the Fairy Groves.”

Belissar frowned.

“But it’s not available in those?”

Tarwantrad rubbed her chin.

“No, but perhaps you could make use of them? Perhaps if you placed a Dirt Tunnels or Lava Field close by, with as many entrances between them as possible, and then added as many mana-producing features as possible, you could increase their mana density? It would probably be easier with the Dirt Tunnels, though the Lava Fields lend themselves better to mineral creation.”

Belissar tilted his head.

“Huh, maybe?”

Tarwantrad shrugged.

“Don’t take my word for it though, I only concern myself with geology to the extent that it impacts soil fertility. I’ll ask Tamosmed again and see if he has any advice.”

Belissar smiled.

“Thanks.”

The two arrived at their destination as they finished their conversation. The thermal mining queen, the First of the Fourth’s First Daughter, flew out to greet them. Belissar smiled at her.

“Hi there, do you mind if we check on your hive?”

Needless to say the thermal mining queen had no issue with that whatsoever. Belissar walked over and removed the stone slab door from the subterranean hive. He and Tarwantrad were able to step right inside.

The First of the Fourth’s First Daughter had been busy. He found a swarm of workers flying in and out. Some had the usual pollen pants indicating they had been foraging from the flowers, but others carried little pebbles or chunks of ore instead. To Belissar’s surprise, both of these delivered their quarry to the honey production lines. The thermal hive had raised a few honeypots as well…and some of the workers delivered little ore chunks to them, using their heated mandibles to vibrate the ore and break off pieces small enough for the honeypots to swallow.

The honeypots then began to glow like the embers in the center of a fire. Bits of smoke bubbled off depressions in their abdomens before the honeypots blew them away with their wings. Honeypots that finished the process gave hot little bits of wax to the workers to carry away.

The workers then added to these the growing trays of honeycomb. Honeycomb that, rather than the usual yellow, was varying shades of dull, metallic colors, largely gray. Belissar leaned over towards one and poked it with a finger.

The honeycomb felt as hard as iron to him.

He turned to find Tarwantrad staring at the honeypots with wide eyes.

“They’re…they’re like little forges. Tamosmed would freak out if he saw this.”

Belissar and Tarwantrad soon left them be. The thermal mining bees were building their hive at a slower pace than the other bees, likely due to the more involved process required to make their combs, so Belissar didn’t ask them about golems or hybridizing with the slime bees just yet. The slime bees themselves had just moved to the Bog so Belissar wanted to give both hives a chance to expand their numbers first. But, suffice to say, Belissar now very much looked forward to the day the thermal mining bees could build a golem out of their wax…

***

With mithril waiting on Tamosmed’s recommendations and the thermal mining bees still building up, Belissar decided to tackle Nenavann’s advice first. But since several bees had already moved into the existing Bog, Belissar decided to add a second for the sake of defense. The first floor had an empty room slot so he added it to the defense rooms there, placing it after the battle Fairy Grove. He added a vaporous hemlock node for the poison mist and then spread out ten Pit Traps around the room as Nenavann recommended. He finished off by adding the usual shortcut to the Orchard’s travel wall.

Next, he added a Dirt Tunnels room to the currently empty fifth floor, then placed water stone and mana flower nodes within it, right next to each other. A Flooded Tunnels sounded like an excellent defensive option and was apparently necessary if he ever wanted to convert a Bog into a Fen, so Belissar decided to get started on that now.

Then, he paused. He was about to open a hole in the roof of the tunnels to let in sunlight for the mana flowers when he remembered the holes in other Dirt Tunnels were actually entrances to connected rooms. But this Dirt Tunnels didn’t have any other rooms on its floor, so would it actually work?

Then Belissar shrugged and tried it anyway, figuring the Tower would let him know if it was possible or not. And, lo and behold, a hole opened up and let the sunlight through. Belissar glanced up the hole with his tower sight and just saw an indeterminately long tunnel with the sun shining at the end. He smiled and shrugged again. Tower magic sure was convenient.

In any case, he had done what he needed to and now just had to wait for the stones to flood the tunnels. He was about to go check on the progress of the Death room when Niobee suddenly started dancing on his head.

“King! First of the Fifth asking if ok to try and evolve! Is ok?”

Belissar froze at that news.

Author’s Note:

Schedule Update: Hey everyone, forgot to mention earlier in the month but intended to take a week off at the end of the month. Need a holiday from the holidays lol. Well, that was my intention but I’m already pretty fatigued, so I am thinking of bumping it up to next week (1/20 – 1/24) instead. We’ll see how this week goes and if that whole jury duty summons comes to anything.

Now back to the story!

Oh Tamosmed. You thought the bees weren’t already making metal? If there’s anything I’ve learned while writing this novel, it’s that bees are already doing any sort of amazing thing you can think of. Drinking deathly poisonous flowers that are toxic even to pollinators? Check. Living on active volcanoes spewing out heated ash? Check. Generating lightning? Check. I am not sure I’ve even come up with a single original bee type yet. They truly are amazing and incredible. Bees best bees!

Anyways!

Will Tamosmed learn of what the bees are already doing? Will Belissar shell out for mithril? What’s going on with the First of the Fifth? Tune in next time, to find out!