Aurum - Year 2 {2 Weeks later }

 

"So are we really going to help them at this level? For me this is very dangerous, we shouldn't get involved with "outsiders"." Hans said.

"I agree with Hans point, one thing is offering some resources without much value in exchange for Xp sacrifices, and another thing is send our troops to provide them with full-time support." Steve said.

"I think this is a great opportunity for all of us, we can learn more about them, as well being able to increase our Xp receipt." Ken argued.

"This is very risky, our collaboration was built on lies, they still believe that we praise this Astrawoul the god of something, soon as they discover that we know nothing about this god they may revolt against us." Said Carl while eating a snack.

"I don't think that's possible, they think of us as stupid beasts, so we can continue with this role as servants of Astrawoul, as beasts they shouldn't expect us to create churches and pray every day, just our appearance and powers should be enough to convince them." Miles said.

"But if we start getting involved with them, they'll soon find out that we're not as stupid as they think, so what will we do?" Hans asked.

"To begin with... What is a god? So, I know they are powerful beings, or something like that, but are they something else in this world?" Yan asked.

"I don't know... But where are you trying to go with this?" Steve asked.

"If Gods are tangible beings in this world, powerfull being that are always watching over us, I think it will be very difficult to invent a lie that lasts for a long time, but if Gods are like "fables" and "beings to be praised", entities that are not tangible. We can make up whatever lies we want, we can say that Astrawoul created us for the sole purpose of protecting these lands, or something like that. And no one other than Astrawoul himself could come here and say that we are lying." Yan specified.

"That... It could work, lies built with more lies, to the point of becoming a truth. Only someone who is capable of identifying lies, or can speak directly to this god could discover the truth." Steve said.

"That way we wouldn't have to continue with this stupid act of pretending to be stupid, and we could fulfill mom's wishes." Miles said.

All this discussion was now happening because I desperately wanted to hold on to what I had left of humanity, so I decided that I would help the kobolds without any ulterior motives. I wanted to see them thrive and grow, so they could be my anchor, something that keeps "Hana" alive.

The problem with this was that our relationship started with lies, and now we only had the option to keep lying, lies are like snowballs, they keep growing and growing, until one day you can't go back, your only option is to continue lying, creating better versions of that lie, and refining them until they are perfect.

We were afraid to tell bigger lies to the kobolds, because our lie was so blatant and shameless, that it seemed impossible to remain covered for long, but if this world really has no gods present, then who cares about a little lie here and there? ?

So we debated what the new lie would be, we interviewed Hilda, we did research, we probed and analyzed everything we could, and with that we discovered that the gods of this world were not really present.

According to Hilda, the gods were sitting on the clouds, just looking at everyone and looking for our good. They were entities capable of granting unique [Classes] and powerful [Skills] to their followers, but they weren't really here, they were somewhere "in the clouds".

This confirmed our suspicions that gods weren't really scary as they seemed, from the beginning I thought that some god or entity had made me reincarnate in this world, and they were out there, just looking at me and laughing at my misery, but It seems that gods have more important matters to resolve.

When Ciel asked Hilda why the gods didn't make public appearances, Hilda said that her god was always watching, every beast, every animal and monster were Astrawoul's eyes, they were his messengers, but it seemed more like an "God is watching" thing  for me, Hilda also told us that other gods were inferior, and weaker than Astrawoul, but I think it's just something Hilda believes in.

Because of this information, we now had a plan, soon as I evolved, and the hive "acquired greater intelligence", we would tell the kobolds that we were created by Astrawoul for the sole purpose of growing. We didn't know the meaning of this, or why we were asked to do this, but we had to grow, we had to expand and prosper.

Keeping things vague helps a little, so we opted for that, we could then continue with the lie, and we could live with the kobolds, we didn't need to know about Astrawoul's "graces", because we were beasts, and if Hilda told us about his texts We could learn a lot about this world, after all you need to understand religion to understand things like the history, economy and politics of a nation. So I would happily devour any scrap of information Hilda was willing to spew.

The problem now was for me to evolve, it's been so long since I last evolved, and I'm still only at level 12, I spent all my XP creating [Life Drops] and that's why I hadn't achieved much until now, But it was worth it for me, because everyone in the hive had already gone through at least the 1st evolution. I also got level 4 in [Life Exchange], and a lot of amazing data on the potential of life essence.

Now, in terms of personal growth? I was very late, as the queen of the hive, I earn a small amount of Xp from everyone in the hive, but I end up distributing a lot of this, since I'm just a supporter i focused more on the growth of Lifeguardians and unique members like Steve and Ken.

To solve this I had to resort to more desperate methods, using the [Life Drain] spell on living creatures, such as aphids, crickets, mantises, and Wappos. Then I used all the mana I could to grant blessings and buffs to my soldiers and continued the cycle, I could use a less lethal version of the [Life Drain] spell, sucking about 90% of the target's total health and letting him escape with his life, for recover to later be used again, but then I wouldn't gain the XP.

And I said the kobolds would be my anchor, not all the life in the world.

---

 

 

A few days had passed since the "Evolve quickly" project, and in the meantime I reached level 15, but no evolution for me. But in contrast, Hans became the first member of the hive to achieve his third evolution.

"Wow! These options are tempting! What do I choose?!"

As I waited for Hans and pondered my options, soon the doors to my room were opened by the royal guards, and between them entered Hans, a strong, well-toned bee covered in green blood and what appeared to be the visors of some animal.

"Hans!?! Seriously? Why didn't you take a shower before coming?! You stink to death..."

"Really? I didn't notice, it didn't seem like a big deal to me, I ended up killing a weird frog and didn't remember to clean myself up afterward, I was just worried about evolving." Hans said.

The royal guards were really upset with Hans, they were soldiers who had dedicated themselves solely to protecting and serving me, voluntarily choosing to evolve into [Royal Guards] and [Royal Knights], so they were very zealous about their jobs and duties, so when they saw Hans entering and dirtying the entire throne room with visors and the blood of an unknown monster. They were very angry, but they didn't say anything out of respect for their older brother.

"Anyway, congratulations on your progress Hans! You are always the most dedicated in this colony! Thank you for that."

"I'm not doing anything other than my duties." Hans said.

"Stop the nonsense, take some vacation, have some fun, you deserve it more than anyone else, you can sit back and wait for others to catch up to you for a while~"

"Never! I need to evolve more! I need to become stronger!" Hans said finally.

"H-Um... But why is that, Hans? We're not at war or anything like that, there's no need to keep worrying about it."

"I need to be the best, I have to always be the perfect example and the most powerful member of the hive! Everyone counts on me, and I need to keep everyone safe! I can't do that by being so weak! I need more power, I need to be more strong!" Hans said as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.

"Hans.. You need a vacation urgently, no one expects you to be perfect, no one is perfect, if you're not working enough, then everyone is a bunch of lazy people, relax, take it easy for a while, ok?"

"But..."

"No more, now it's an order, when you evolve, I want you to keep an eye on the vanguard and the patrollers, don't work more than 8 hours a day, and I want you to stay away from the coliseum for at least 1 month."

"...I understand." Hans said.

"That aside, which class do you prefer dear? I really liked [Head Knight] and [Champion Knight], but the others seem very... problematic."

"I know! I definitely don't want to be a [Group master], not being able to fight is more of a curse than a blessing, [Rapier adept] isn't my style, I'm not the hit and run type, I prefer a fight of attrition. And [Mad champion] seems to be very extreme, I like the bonuses they offer, but I don't want to fight like Trouble."

"I see... So what will it be? [Head Knight] or [Champion Knight]? They both look cool to me."

"After thinking about it for a while... I think I prefer [Head Knight], with him I can help my group more and teach the young knights, I also like being able to provide buffs to my brothers." Hans said.

"Understood, then let's go [Head Knight]!"

Doing the mental excavation, I could soon see Hans falling to the ground like a ripe watermelon, and exploding into a golden chrysality with shades of silver and black. His empty shell was left behind in a pile of blood and monster visors, and soon a group of nurses accompanied by workers entered the room, the nurses picked up Hans with the help of some royal guards, while the workers collected the dirt and put it away. in buckets of wax.

"Well, quick as always, thank you [Life] affinity, you certainly have your uses."

---

 

"So... That's what?"

"A catalyst!!!!" Max said excitedly.

A few days ago I had a serious problem when creating a magic wand for myself, putting a mana crystal on a branch does not make it a staff, at least not a functional one.

The concept of a staff is something that facilitates or helps when casting spells, but the "staff" I created couldn't do any of that, it just stored a little mana (which decays very quickly), and gave me wood to charge a mana crystal without directly touching it, (something I've been doing for ages).

Because of this, I sent this problem to the magic club, and they started thinking about solutions, I asked them to create something capable of facilitating the casting of spells, and they ended up creating a Mk2 mana core.

The new mana core was made from a very small gourd that was loaded with an alchemical liquid created from the "secret ingredient", essence of life, mana fluid, and several other things. This nucleus was then placed inside a root ball and fixed to a wooden branch.

"This is our newest invention! It can amplify magic, and make it work over large areas! The only problem is that it takes more mana than usual, and its effects are weaker, but we can still use complex spells in areas!" Max said excitedly.

Basically this "Staff" could serve as an amplifier of living mana, causing all the mana that reached the core to be "dispersed in waves". As if it were a radio antenna, and when we used spells in conjunction with the staff we could create waves of magic.

So i could use the staff in conjunction with [Wild Growth] to make all the plants around me grow slowly. Or use area versions of my common spells. It wasn't a big deal, but it was still a big step forward in the magical area.

The staff was like a "bell", the spell was the "sound" and the mana was the "hit" on the bell, every time I cast a spell with the staff the magic hit the "bell" creating large waves of " sounds", the problem was that like a common bell, if I stopped "hitting" it with mana, the sound would soon stop.

"This is incredible boys! I can't believe you managed to create this in such a short amount of time!"

"That was nothing! This is still in the development phase, and is very unstable, if you give too much mana to the core, it will break and produce an aggressive wave of mana, and all the magical reagent contained within the core is perishable, then after 2 days it starts to decay." Max reported.

"It's still amazing! Do we have other uses for this?"

"Yes! As the catalyst liquid is very good at reacting with living mana, we began researching infusing items with living mana! We first submerge the desired item within the catalyst and then overload the chosen item with living mana! The results are promising ! 1 in 10 items gain [Life] affinity properties, such as a flower that has gained the ability to regenerate highly!" Max said very excited.

'Damn! These guys created a more unstable and crazy version of the [life infusion] spell?!'

"This is really cool, boys... Anything else worth mentioning?"

"Yes! I say we should invest tremendously in creating a more powerful and more stable reagent! If we can create a more perfect version of that reagent, we could submerge the mana batteries with that reagent, turning them into more stable batteries, and super conductive! We are also working on a replacement for life essence that serves as an insulator for the mana pool! Since life essence isn't very good at containing living mana!" Max replied

"Amazing Max! Of course! You can take whatever you need, as long as it doesn't interfere with the productivity of other departments, you can ask for whatever you want for your research!"

"Thank you! If that's all, I'll go to my room immediately!" Max said.

"Yes, you are dismissed!"

Soon I was left in the room with my guards, and the new staff, to me, looked like just a very large stick with a strange ball on top, but it was in fact a magical item. A true magic wand, even if it was an incomplete and flawed version.

"Wait a minute... I'm officially a magical girl?!"

I already had the wand, and the right sex, now all I need is a super cute pet assistant, and a cute dress.

"Does Muck count as a cute pet assistant? He's kind of a magical creature, so I guess he counts? I can ask the weavers to make me a super kawaii dress, and... What am I thinking? Seriously... "

The magic girl bee? What would I be called? Honey? What a cliche.

Hans still needed 6 days to emerge, I was at level 23, and nothing was happening.

'What to do... What to do...'

I don't have enough mana to risk [Living Echo] again, I don't feel like killing some more bugs, and I feel bored right now, I could create some spells, but I'm out of creativity.

'It's okay, Emi! Let's use this colony thing seriously.'

'-Yes mom? What do you want to do?' Emi asked.

'Send a request to Radyo, have him do a contest or whatever, something for everyone to create new spells for me, they don't have to be entire versions of the spells, just new concepts and ideas. Things I haven't created yet.'

'-Of course, I will convey your request immediately.' Emi said.

'Also give me something to watch, a memory of a bard show or something.'

'Immediately.'

Normally it was useless to watch the memories of a bard show, because you wouldn't get an effect from it, but I found it relaxing, like watching a video on YouTube or something funny on Tik Tok.

Soon my mind began to itch, I closed my eyes and when I opened them again I was in the theater, surrounded by dozens of workers, and looking directly at the pauco, where a lone bard was playing a poorly made wooden flute.

The whole place seemed faded, and surrounded by a gray cloud, but that was just an indication of memories being watched, everything seemed very real, but it wasn't, and that wasn't difficult to notice. You couldn't talk to anyone, move, or change events.

You are just a viewer.

Soon the bard began to play his flute, the sound was somewhat coarse, and lacked refinement, but it was still a captivating sound. The bard's skills with the instrument were real, the room was completely silent, and everyone listened attentively to the melody that the bard played, his sounds were slow and captivating, full of skill and mastery, showing all the time spent to learn how to play. technique. It wasn't perfect, or even wonderful.

But it still drew attention, perhaps the way a single lone bard played a flute alone in a sea of other individuals, or perhaps it was the morbid yet beautiful melody. But he looked so...

Alone.