CHAPTER 491: A SLOW ADVANCE

I wasn’t watching the advance of the anti-tree armies personally (they were going too far for me to follow even with an astral projection unless I left Hive Supremo again, and I was doing this too often in the last few days).

However, the entire Empire Council was tracking their progress with great interest based on transmissions from the telepathic messengers. They were received by Attendant Bearerma, who stood near a map spread on the Council’s table.

The Attendant was listening to the messages and accordingly moving a wooden piece that reflected the anti-tree army. Right now, it has almost approached the first grove of the ice-hole trees—those who were constantly sending their seeds flying our way.

"I’m so glad that the anti-tree armies won’t be straddled without any connection with the Empire. I’m also soooooo glad that we have telepathy," I said. "Our scouts can not only find the best routes for our anti-tree army and deliver it to its Grand Commander, they can do it all without entering the mountains..."

Bloodhero nodded.

"Yes, Father! Ever since most of our scouts could do their jobs from the safety of their camps, and they didn’t need to spend hours and days travelling to the points they needed to explore, their effectiveness grew ten times over. This freed more bees to work as saboteurs and increased the deadliness of our armies."

"It’s easier to find who DOESN’T benefit from telepathy, sister Bloodhero," Things-Things chirped. "No one! No one at all, yes-yes!"

Before Bloodhero could reply, Attendant Bearerma perked up and looked at me with excited eyes.

"Father, the anti-tree army cut down their first tree. You asked me to tell you when this happens."

I clapped my hands.

"Yes! Thank you. This is a wonderful moment... Undecided, all goes the same as you predicted so far?"

The Oracle Bee, who was hanging around the Council table for the last half an hour instead of sitting in her usual place at the side, nodded.

"Yes, Father. For the next week, the anti-tree army will slowly but steadily advance. There will be no storms, avalanches or other things that could interrupt them or us." Undecided paused, then shook her head. "Well, there might be. But the chances are incredibly tiny. I wouldn’t have found them on my own—my sisters had to help me, and we only searched in case there are metal-eaters or something like that..."

"They aren’t a problem anymore," Bloodhero cut in. "We spent so much time searching for every last one of their larvae—if they were STILL a problem after all this, I would have to leave my position out of my pure incompetence."

I waved my hands at her.

"Don’t talk like this, Bloodhero! Nobody is perfect. But yes, there weren’t any sightings of them... The adult metal-eaters that survived our hunts must’ve died from natural causes by now. We don’t have to think about them."

"That’s right. The main reason the Council gathered today was to make sure that our food stores will last until the next harvest," Ambrosia said. "Adviser Whisper, I got a report that humans complained about a flood?"

"Yes. It spilt over several fields and broke the main bridge leading from the Aveker City. A lot of nearby towns lost their biggest source of fresh fish..." the invisible, but present Agent Whisper responded.

Attendant Bearerma continued to slowly move her wooden pieces, while the rest of us returned to the routine of managing the logistics and supplies to keep the Bee Empire well-fed.

This was an increasingly tough task. In addition to all the problems we already had (beasts, evolving plants, having to send resources to the front of the anti-tree war), the weather reporting Oracles predicted a series of storms that would turn many major human roads into swamps and prevent many traders from reaching their targets.

The prices of food in the region were going to destabilise. Ever since the human kingdoms became an official part of the Bee Empire, this has become our problem.

"The cities need food, and they have enough in stores to survive until the roads dry up. They should just split the food they have among all the people in them," Workharder grumbled. "Money is so damn stupid! Humans can’t regulate their economics properly, and instead of stopping being so egoistical, they just come up with a way to make their economics even MORE egoistical!"

My girls knew what money was, but didn’t like it.

I sighed.

This wasn’t helping our case.

’We can order the owners of the grain silos and food cellars to open their stores to everybody who needs it, but without some regulation, it will be complete chaos. Humans are too self-centred to only take as much as they need,’ Whisper said. ’And the people who were told to share will try to keep some for themselves. If they weren’t greedy, they would’ve shared already.’

"Tell them to share their food with those who need it, Whisper," I said. "But the food should be given not by its former owners, but by priests in temples. And only enough of it at once to feed a man for a day. This way, nobody will hoard too much. The priests are all devoted to us and our orders, they won’t try to steal anything either."

’Good idea, Father! I will arrange that.’

"This isn’t all," Ambrosia said. "The next report is..."

The Council Session went on. Then the day, then the week.

Time passed.

Bearerma continued to move pieces on the map to track movements of the anti-tree army, and the Council watched them with great interest. And Tabletina was the most interested of these people.

By this point, I have mostly forgotten about her ongoing augmentation project—I had other things on my mind. But two weeks later, she asked me to come to the Hive Supremo main hospital so I could see for myself the results of her (and of some Craftsmen Bees) work.