A few days passed after Matt’s evolution. During that time, I tried to keep myself busy. Actually, saying that I “tried” is not exactly right. I buried myself in work so deeply that, at some point, I think it stopped being a choice and became a habit. If I had something to do, then I did not need to think too much. If I had something to fix, then I did not need to remember what I could not fix. If I had a plan to make, then I did not need to sit still and feel useless.

I know it is not healthy. I know that very well. But knowing something and being able to stop doing it are two completely different things.

There are too many problems around me. Too many things that can go wrong if I stop paying attention for even a moment. The camp is still not close to what I would call safe, our food production is still too dependent on the internal gardens, our defenses are incomplete, our storage system is still messy, and the chain of command is... Well, let’s just say it is undergoing changes.

The biggest problem was structural. Until recently, most of the information in the hive passed through Steve before reaching me or anyone else who needed to make a decision. That was useful in the beginning. Steve is extremely competent when it comes to collecting, organizing, and distributing information. He is fast, precise, and good at understanding what matters and what does not. The problem is that this also gave him too much control.

If all information passes through one person, that person does not simply organize the hive. They shape the hive. They decide what is important, what can wait, what should be softened, what should be hidden, and what deserves to reach me. At the time, I did not think of it like that. I thought I was being practical. Delegating specialized work to someone who was clearly better than me at doing it seemed obvious. Why would I try to manage every message, every report, every warning, and every small conflict when I had someone like Steve to do it?

It was a good decision.

Until it wasn’t.

After I removed him from that central position, all information started passing through groups of [Archivists] responsible for validating what was sent through the Link. In theory, this is much safer. Information is checked, compared, organized, and only then passed forward. The problem is that validating information is slow. Very slow. Painfully slow.

If a [Worker] says there is a strange plant growing near the eastern storage area, the [Archivists] do not simply send me a message saying, “There is a strange plant near the eastern storage area.” No. They ask what kind of plant it is. They compare its smell, color, shape, mana reaction, soil condition, growth speed, possible toxicity, and whether anyone has touched it. Then they ask for another [Worker] to confirm the first report. Then, depending on the result, they classify the report as food-related, medicine-related, construction-related, danger-related, or “uncertain but annoying enough to bother Mother.”

By the time the report reaches me, the plant may have already withered, spread, been eaten, or tried to eat someone.

So, while the new system is safer, it is also too bureaucratic. And I hate that. Not because I hate organization. I actually like organization. I was a librarian. Organization was basically half of my old life. But there is a difference between organization and paralysis. If the hive needs three confirmations and a small meeting every time someone finds a weird mushroom, we are going to die buried under very accurate reports.

So I decided to change the structure again. Instead of one inner circle where each important individual controls an entire area alone, I started creating committees for each vital function of the hive. The old model was simple. One person was responsible for one area. Keb handled medical care. Steve handled information. Hans handled defense and physical security. Others handled construction, food, scouting, resources, and so on. This worked when the hive was smaller. The problem is that it gave too much power and too much responsibility to a single individual. If that individual made a mistake, the entire area suffered. If that individual hid something, no one noticed. If that individual became overwhelmed, everything under them slowed down.

So now each area will be controlled by a group of five to seven individuals. Always an odd number. I refuse to deal with tied votes. If the hive ever fails because six idiots looked at an emergency and split three against three, I will personally haunt them.

Keb was one of the first to receive a committee. He is still the main specialist of the nursing area, or the Nursing Club, as some of them started calling it. I’m not sure when everything started becoming a “club,” but at this point I do not have the energy to fight it. Alongside Keb, I assigned three [Archivists] and one [Strategist]. Keb is responsible for medical decisions. He understands injuries, poison, illness, fatigue, molting issues, and the differences between a child who is actually fine and a child who is pretending to be fine because they do not want to worry me.

The [Archivists] are responsible for records. Treatment history, symptoms, resource consumption, which medicines worked, which did not, and what injuries are becoming too common. The [Strategist] deals with priority, conflicts, and situations where there are not enough resources or time for everyone. Keb cannot simply ignore the [Archivists]. The [Archivists] cannot override Keb’s medical decisions. The [Strategist] cannot command the others alone. If there is disagreement, they vote, and if the situation is too serious, they bring it to me.

It is not perfect. But it is better than one person carrying the entire infirmary on his back.

I started applying the same model to the other areas. Construction has its own committee. Food production has its own committee. Foraging and scouting are being separated, because apparently I was treating “finding food” and “finding danger” as if they were the same job, which they are not. They overlap, yes, but they require different priorities. The [Collectors] care about what is useful. The scouts care about what is dangerous. Those are very different ways of looking at the forest.

The Defense Committee is still a little complicated because Hans is... Hans. He is not stupid. Actually, he is much smarter than people might think from looking at him. But his solutions to problems usually begin with “kill it” and then develop into more complex variations of “kill it before it becomes worse.” Which is useful. Sometimes. The problem is that I cannot let Hans solve every threat by turning the surrounding forest into a graveyard. That would create other problems. Rot, disease, stronger predators attracted by corpses, unnecessary risks, and possibly whatever ecological disaster comes from killing too many things in a magical forest I barely understand.

So he has [Archivists] and [Strategists] around him now. Mostly to slow him down before he decides that genocide is an acceptable form of pest control.

As for Steve, he is still responsible for the traffic of information inside the hive. I did not remove him completely because that would be stupid. He is still the best person for this function. Even if I do not fully trust him right now, pretending that he suddenly became useless would be childish. But now he has company. A large group of [Archivists] from the Whisper Club is working under his “command.” I say “command” because they are not really there to obey him. They are there to observe him.

Every important report that enters Steve’s area is registered. Every version that leaves him is compared. If something disappears, changes too much, gets delayed without explanation, or is classified in a strange way, they report it to Yan. Yan reports it to me. So far, Steve has not done anything obviously wrong. That should make me feel better. It does not.

Most of what he does is normal. He compresses information. He removes unnecessary details. He changes the tone of some messages to make them easier to process. This is not unusual. Most [Archivists] do the same thing. The Link carries too much information. If every small detail was sent with full context, emotion, and explanation, everyone would go insane.

For example, when a [Worker] walks too far from the safe area, no one sends a full message like: “Excuse me, you are currently moving outside the assigned gathering zone, please return to the approved area before something dangerous happens.” That would be a waste of time. Instead, they receive something closer to: Danger. Return. Along with a small pulse of fear. Not enough to hurt them, only enough to make them understand that they should turn around immediately. And they do.

That is normal. It is efficient. It is also a little disturbing if I think about it too much, so I don’t.

The problem is that this same logic can be used to justify almost anything. A message can be shortened to save time. A message can also be shortened to hide something. A warning can be softened to prevent panic. A warning can also be softened to control someone’s reaction. A report can be delayed because confirmation is needed. A report can also be delayed because someone does not want me to see it yet. That is why I cannot simply trust Steve’s judgment anymore. Not completely. Not yet.

Still, I have not confronted him directly. I know I should. Every part of me knows I should. But I do not know how to handle that conversation without making everything worse. If I accuse him too strongly, he may shut down, or worse, the hive may react as if I am declaring him a traitor, and I don't want it to come to that. If I am too soft, he may think I am willing to ignore what happened. If I ask for an explanation and he gives me one that makes sense, I may have to accept that he betrayed me for reasons the hive considers valid.

And I do not know if I am ready for that.

So, for now, I work. It is easier to build walls than to fix trust.

Speaking of walls, the camp is finally starting to look less like a desperate temporary shelter and more like something that might survive a bad week. The first major change is under the ground. We started spreading roots beneath the camp floor. At first, this might not sound impressive, but these are not common roots. They are roots grown with Life magic, reinforced with mana, and shaped to form a thick layer between the surface and the soil below.

After the attack by the {Valley Nymphs}, I realized that a wall is useless if the enemy comes from under your feet. I had been thinking too much in human terms. Walls protect the sides. Roofs protect the top. Doors control entrances. But this world does not care about those assumptions. Creatures can fly, dig, climb, melt, crawl, hide, and probably teleport if the universe feels like ruining my day badly enough.

So now we have a root layer. It works almost like a living net. If something tries to dig upward, the roots should slow it down. More importantly, they should let us feel the movement before the creature reaches the surface. It will not stop everything. A strong enough monster could tear through it. A creature with fire, poison, rot, or some kind of magical corrosion could damage it badly. But it gives us time. And time is useful. Time lets us move the children. Time lets Hans prepare. Time lets the [Soldiers] gather. Time lets me panic privately instead of publicly. That alone makes the entire project worth it.

We are also building a wax covering around the base. Calling it a dome feels too generous. Right now, it is more like an unfinished shell. A half-closed structure made of wax, wood, resin, plant fibers, and whatever else we can force to stay in place. The intention is to eventually close the entire camp from above, reinforcing it with plants and magic to protect against flying monsters, falling projectiles, rain, and any other nonsense that decides to come from the sky.

Unfortunately, we cannot close it completely yet. The internal gardens are still inside the camp. Those gardens are not decorative. They are food, medicine, nectar, pollen, experimental plants, and several things that are probably not safe but are too useful to remove. If we close the camp before moving the gardens outside, the plants may suffer from lack of light, airflow, or space. If the plants suffer, food production drops. If food production drops, the hive suffers. So first, we need to clear and fortify a larger external area. Only after that can we move the flower fields outside the main protection area. Until then, the gardens stay inside, and the shell remains incomplete.

I don’t like it. But I dislike starvation more.

Another thing I created for security and construction was a golem. Not like Muck. I do not have the resources, time, or emotional stability to create something like Muck again. Muck was different. He was the only golem I created that could actually respond in a way that felt natural. He had instincts, but also something more than instincts. He listened. He moved. He understood enough to be useful without needing me to control every single action.

And now he is somewhere northwest of here. I can still feel him faintly. Far away. Alive, I think. But too far for me to reach safely. I try not to think about that too much. I fail often.

The new golem is different. It has no real autonomy. It does not listen to verbal commands. It does not respond properly through the Link. Even the golems born from plants only follow simple instincts, and they usually ignore my orders unless those orders happen to match what they already wanted to do. So, instead of trying to make a golem that obeys me, I made one that can be controlled directly.

A remote-controlled golem.

Its name is Mark-1. Yes, the name is stupid. No, I don’t care.

Mark-1 is about two meters tall, almost the same height as Hans. Its body is made of wood, wax, moss, and reinforced plant fibers. The core takes up almost forty percent of its body. That sounds absurd because it is absurd. But there is a reason. Large cores are easier to build than small ones. More expensive, yes, but also easier to inscribe. A larger crystal disk gives me more space for the circuits and symbols, which makes the whole thing more stable. Small cores need much more precision, and I do not have enough skill to make something small, powerful, and safe at the same time.

So I chose large, ugly, expensive, and functional. A good summary of most of my recent work.

Mark-1 works through a cable connected to a controller inspired by an old PS2 controller. The cable is about fifty meters long, which gives it enough freedom to move around the camp. If the cable is damaged, control is lost immediately, which is a huge weakness, but for now I prefer that over trying to create some kind of wireless magical signal and accidentally frying someone’s brain. The controls are simple. Too simple, honestly. Right now, Mark-1 can only walk forward. To turn, the controller changes the axis of movement, which means the pilot needs to redirect what the golem considers “forward.”

It works. Technically. In practice, it is very annoying.

Beginners make it stumble constantly. If the pilot turns too early, it walks into something. If they turn too late, it walks into something else. If they panic, Mark-1 walks forward with the confidence of a creature that has never heard of consequences. Lifting it after it falls is terrible. The right arm has a large pincher hand that can open and close. The arm can move in the X and Y axes, and to compensate for the lack of proper depth control, I made it able to extend and retract. The other arm is customizable. It has a locking mechanism where we can attach different tools depending on what we need. A shield, a blade, a hook, a winch, a plow, or whatever else I can make without it breaking after three uses.

For now, we mostly use Mark-1 for construction. It lifts heavy objects, pulls carts, drags materials, holds beams in place, and helps move clay and wood around the camp. Levi is the one controlling it. Not because I planned that, but because he was the only one who managed to control the thing without making it look drunk. Honestly, he is frighteningly good at it. When I use Mark-1, it moves like a dying shopping cart with legs. When Levi uses it, it almost looks intentional.

I created the thing and he is better at using it than me. Children are cruel.

Still, Mark-1 will probably not last long as a model. The problem is the shape. When I started making it, I was too attached to the idea of a normal golem. A humanoid golem. Two legs, two arms, a torso, and a head. That was stupid. A humanoid body is complicated. It needs balance, articulation, weight distribution, and far too many moving parts. There are much simpler and more useful designs I could have used. A low transport platform. A six-legged carrier. A plowing machine. A lifting frame. A cart that moves by itself. A magical tractor.

But by the time I realized that, Mark-1 was already almost finished, and I did not want to waste the materials. So I completed it. Now we have a giant humanoid golem that is useful, but only because Levi is apparently a professional gamer trapped in the body of a bee child.

In the future, I want to create more machines like this, but with simpler forms. Since I cannot make golems fully autonomous, maybe I can make them semi-automatic. Instead of remote controls, I can use steering wheels, levers, pedals, and simple command systems. My children could pilot them directly. A tractor powered by Life energy seems possible. A cart that moves without being pulled also seems possible. A harvesting machine might be possible, although I would need to be careful not to create something that accidentally cuts my children in half.

A car is more complicated. Anything fast is dangerous. Our current materials are wood, wax, moss, resin, and plant fibers. They do not handle friction or heat well. If I try to build a high-performance machine with what I have now, it will probably burn, melt, crack, or explode. Maybe all of those at the same time. So for now, no cars. No high-speed vehicles. And definitely no mecha.

Probably.

Maybe.

The idea of bees piloting a mecha is ridiculous, but I would be lying if I said it had no appeal. A large armored frame controlled from inside could protect fragile bodies and allow smaller members of the hive to perform dangerous work. It could also be used for combat, heavy construction, or transporting materials in hostile areas. But that is a future problem. Or future temptation. For now, Mark-1 is enough.

While all of this is happening, another problem keeps pressing against the back of my mind.

Humans and Demon-Types.

Morthak’s explanations made something very clear. We are not living in an empty forest far from civilization and conflict. We are somewhere in a region where humans and Demon-Types may already be moving, fighting, scouting, or preparing for something worse. And we are right in the middle of it.

That is not a small problem. It might be the biggest threat to the hive right now. Wild animals are dangerous, but they are simple. Most of them want food, territory, safety, or dominance. If we understand their behavior, we can avoid, scare, trap, or kill them. Humans and Demon-Types are different. They have groups. Goals. Politics. Revenge. Religion. Fear. Pride. History. A monster may attack us because it is hungry. A person may attack us because they believe we should not exist. That is much worse.

The hive’s opinion is also not simple. Many of my children do not like the idea of approaching Demon-Types. Some fear them. Some hate them because of what happened in the past. Others think humans are the greater threat because humans are more likely to see us as monsters. Both sides may be dangerous. Both sides may be useful. Both sides may try to kill us. Wonderful.

I do not know enough to choose anything. And choosing too early could destroy us. If we approach humans, they may see us as monsters or Demon-Type allies. If we approach Demon-Types, humans may treat us as enemies before we even speak. If we hide forever, one side may eventually find us anyway, and then we will look suspicious because we were hiding. No matter what we do, there is a risk.

So the current plan is simple. Observe. Do not approach. Do not reveal ourselves. Do not attack unless necessary. Gather information first.

That is why Matt’s evolution matters so much. His new abilities are perfect for this kind of work. He can track, mark paths, identify trails, and most importantly, find his way back to a large concentration of our species no matter where he is. That means he can go farther than most scouts. Not alone. Absolutely not alone. I am not sending my recently evolved son into unknown territory by himself just because the system decided to give him useful skills. But with support, Matt can become the center of a proper exploration group.

Trevis is good at concealment and assassination. Matt is good at pathfinding. Those are not the same thing. Trevis finds ways to move unseen. Matt finds ways for others to move safely. That difference matters. I am already thinking about creating a Pathfinder Club, or maybe a Route Committee, or whatever name they decide to use before I can stop them. Their function would be to map the region, mark dangerous areas, identify safe paths, locate food sources, and monitor signs of intelligent movement.

Especially intelligent movement.

Because sooner or later, we will find humans or Demon-Types.

Or they will find us.

---

 

I was still thinking about that while checking the western root layer. Not because there was anything especially wrong with it. Actually, that was part of the problem. Nothing was wrong enough to justify the amount of attention I was giving it. The roots were growing properly. The mana flow was stable. The pressure sensitivity was not perfect, but it was good enough to detect movement beneath the camp as long as whatever moved was not too small, too careful, or made of some kind of horrible liquid nightmare because apparently that is a reasonable concern in this world.

The western section still needed reinforcement. The soil there was wetter than the rest, probably because of some underground water vein, and the roots absorbed too much moisture if I did not regulate them. Not enough to rot, but enough to make their structure softer than I liked. So I adjusted them. Then I checked again. Then I adjusted them again. Then I told myself I was being thorough. Then I lied to myself a little more and kept working.

The hive was busy around me. [Workers] moved materials toward the wall. [Builders] argued quietly over which section needed reinforcement first. A few [Soldiers] patrolled the unfinished edge of the camp, while the [Archivists] moved between groups, collecting reports, correcting mistakes, and making everything slower in the name of making everything safer. It was normal. Or at least normal for us.

Then something pulled.

Not physically. There was no hand around my arm. No hook in my chest. No root torn from the soil. But something inside me was yanked so hard that my entire body locked. For a second, I could not breathe.

The Link trembled.

Not loudly at first. It was more like a thread snapping somewhere far away, a vibration so thin and distant that I almost did not understand it. Then pain followed. Fear. Confusion. Smoke. The smell of blood. A flash of golden light.

Ciel.

The thought hit me before I understood why. I felt him. Not clearly. Not the way I felt the children inside the camp. Ciel had always been distant, a faint thread stretching far beyond where my senses should reach, weak most of the time, like a star hidden behind clouds. I knew he was alive. I knew he existed. I knew the mark was still there. But I had not felt him like this before. Not pain. Not terror. Not the awful, animal certainty that something was wrong.

My knees hit the ground. I did not remember falling.

'Mother?'

Several voices touched the Link at once. Yan. Steve. Keb. Hans. Others. I could not answer. The pull came again, harder this time, and with it came images. Not full memories. Not a proper vision. Just broken pieces forced through a connection that was never meant to carry so much from so far away.

Wooden walls. Kobolds. White armor. A pale griffon screaming. Fire. Children running. Ciel moving. Light chains. Pain. Fear. The golden thread between us being forced down. Something wrapped around him. Something holding him. Something trying to separate him from me.

No.

I pushed back through the Link. I did not know what I was doing. I didn't even have a direction. I just reached for him with everything I had, like a stupid, desperate animal clawing at the dark because her child was somewhere inside it.

'Ciel?'

There was no answer. Only fear. Then pain. Then the thread almost vanished.

Something trembled inside me.

Not the Link. Me.

The first sound came from my throat. It was small. Too small for what I felt. A short, broken noise, almost like a gasp, almost like a sob, almost like my body had tried to scream but did not remember how. I barely noticed it at first. I was too focused on the thread. Too focused on the emptiness where Ciel should have answered.

Then the sound passed into the Link.

The sound spread through the hive like a reflex. More like the moment one bee panics and the rest of the hive understands there is danger before knowing what kind of danger it is. One child felt my grief and cried. Another felt that child’s grief and answered. A group near the storage hollow stopped working. The Nursing Club went silent for half a second before the younger ones inside began to sob. [Workers] in the gardens folded inward, wings trembling. [Soldiers] stiffened, not because they were afraid of an enemy in front of them, but because something in their bodies recognized loss before their minds could name it.

The Link carried it faster than thought. A pulse of pain. A pulse of fear. Ciel’s name repeated through the hive, not as language at first, but as an instinctive shape. A missing thread. A child outside the nest. A child hurt. A child taken. A child about to disappear.

The hive cried.

Not for him, bur for me. It began in pieces. A sob here. A sharp insect-like whine there. A low buzzing hum from a cluster of [Workers]. A high keening sound from the nursery. A trembling vibration from the wings of those too shocked to make proper noise. Then the pieces found each other. The sounds aligned. My grief became theirs, and theirs returned to me, heavier, larger, impossible to contain. It moved through the Link, through bodies, through wings and throats and trembling limbs, until the camp itself seemed to hum with it.

I had heard bees panic before. I had heard my children call warnings before. This was different. This was not an alarm. This was mourning. A hive mourning someone who was not dead yet.

The sound rose. It rolled through the camp and into the forest, not as a human scream, but as something deeper and stranger. A layered cry made from hundreds of small voices, wings, mana, instinct, and the part of the Link that did not care about distance or logic. The wax walls vibrated softly. The plants I had grown shivered as if touched by wind. The forest went silent. Birds launched from nearby branches. Small beasts fled from the undergrowth. Even the insects hidden in the bark stopped moving for a moment, as if the world itself had paused to listen.

Still, I wasn't controlling it. That was the worst part. I wanted to stop it. I wanted to hold it back before the children became more afraid, before the Link drowned in my pain, before everyone felt the raw, ugly shape of what was happening inside me. But the sound had already left me. It belonged to the hive now. It ran through us like blood clotting around a wound, like nerves recoiling from fire, like a mother’s body reaching for a child before thought could arrive.

And far away, much farther than sound should ever travel, something carried that cry. I could feel it... as if I could see far beyond where I can see, across soil I had never touched, across air, forest, distance, and the strange invisible roads that connected my children to me.

The cry reached Ciel.

Then it went beyond him.

For the smallest fraction of a second, I felt someone else hear it. I could... See heR? A woman. Light. Gold. A small sun held between human hands. Fear. Not mine. Hers. The image slipped away before I could hold it, but the feeling remained.

Someone had him. Someone had heard us. Someone had taken my child and heard the hive crying for him.

My grief twisted.

For a few seconds, I was not thinking. That is the part that scares me now. I was not planning, not reasoning, not considering risks or consequences. I did not care about committees, walls, food, humans, Demon-Types, Steve, the western ridge, the camp, or anything else. I wanted to reach across the world and tear something apart.

Then the images came again. More this time. Not because the connection improved. I think it was because the cry had forced the connection betwenn us grow wider for a moment. Ciel’s memories, or impressions, or whatever fragments his small body could send back through the bond, poured into me in uneven pieces.

A village. Kobolds standing with weapons too crude for the enemies in front of them. White griffons. Heavy armor. Robes marked with gold. A woman in white. Golden light. A black-furred kobold thrown across broken wood. The gray-brown kobold woman screaming. A child running from a burning house. 

Then chains.

Gold-white chains wrapping around Ciel’s body. Around his wings. Sinking os his flesh. I felt the moment the spell closed around him, not as pain exactly, but as pressure. Like someone had put a hand around a flower bud and squeezed just enough to keep it from opening.

The images continued. Dead kobolds. Smoke. The village broken. Some fleeing into the forest. Ciel inside a cage of light. The woman looking at him. The small sun in her hands.

The object was beautiful. It was small and golden, a sphere with eight thin disks moving inside it, each turning in a different direction. It glowed warmly, like a piece of sunrise trapped in metal.

The image burned itself into my mind.

The woman who took him. The woman who stood among the dead and held a little sun between her fingers as if that cleansed her of her sins.

I saw her face only in fragments. Pale skin. Light-colored clothing. Controlled fear. Faith. Doubt. Disgust. Resolve. But the Solarium was clear. Perfectly clear. Gold. Eight disks. Warm light.

I hated it.

The hate was immediate and pure. Not rational. Not even useful. I hated that object so deeply that, for a moment, it became easier to hate than to breathe. The Solarium became the shape of everything that had happened. Not the soldiers. Not the griffons. Not the flames. That golden thing. That little sun. That symbol of whatever power had walked into a village under the excuse of light and left with my child in a cage.

I will remember that.

The thought did not feel like mine. Or maybe it felt too much like mine.

The Link quieted. No. Not quieted. Listened. Every child felt what I felt, even if I tried to restrain it. I could have blocked more, maybe. I should have. But the first cry had already spread too far. They knew Ciel was alive. They knew he had been taken. They knew humans, or at

I lowered my head and forced air into my lungs. Once. Twice. Again.

"You wretch! How dare you, how dare you?! I'll tear you in two and... Ugh."

So much anger, so much hatred. I just wished I could do something about it. But there's nothing I can do for Ciel being so far away. The worst part is that I could feel the hive's conflict regarding this matter; for the younger generations, "Ciel" was nobody. And for the older ones, he was a traitor.

So, nobody but me seemed to feel genuine anger like I did. I tried to calm myself, and looked at my "Mask" that I had created to calm the hive; the knot I had tied in the link was almost completely undone, and I needed to bend it tighter to put it back in the "right place."

'Great... I can't feel anything too strongly, otherwise my mask will fall off. Damn it.' I thought as I tried to calm myself and get the hive back on track.

Whatever that collective crying was, it was powerful enough to make me see through Ciel's eyes once more. I so desperately want to save him, but... I can't... I just can't.

He seems to have been captured by humans and is being taken to who-knows-where. Besides not having the military power to organize a rescue operation, I don't even have the resources to move a small group through the region.

What are they going to do with him? If they wanted to kill him, they would have already done so. Do they want to use him to find me? But do they even know of my existence? And if they do, can they use Ciel to find me?

Rationally, the right thing to do would be to cut off a arm to save the body. If I severed the link between me and Ciel, he would no longer represent any risk to me, but... How can I do something like that? I can no longer protect him; all I can offer him now is this small, weak connection between us and the promise of one day finding him again.

Is this my fault? I can't say I didn't know the Kobolds would eventually meet a tragic end. After all, if that cursed forest were so easily conquered, other nations would have already claimed it. So, leaving Ciel behind, was it abandonment or liberation?

I don't know. In the past, it seemed like I was giving him the freedom to choose his own future. But now, it just seems like I abandoned him to die.

'No, as long as he's alive, there's still a chance.' I thought, biting my nails.

I should have brought him, even if it caused discontent within the hive. I should have dragged him here no matter what.

'Please, Ciel, stay alive. I promise I'll save you as soon as I can.' I tried to send it through the link, even if it was an empty promise, it was still all I could offer him now.

I'm detestable, hypocritical, a fucking bastard. I swore to protect these children, and all I've managed to do so far is make things worse. I need to change the scenario, I need us to grow more, faster, bigger, better.

Grow—more, more, and more. Big enough to tear apart those shitty bastards who dared to hurt my son.