Without further bloodshed or strife, April came to a close. A vibrant, full force, springtime May stomped hard on its heels, and Alexander was busier than an astronaut with three holes in his space suit. The orchard was growing rapidly, saplings already nearly his height, but still far off from producing fruit. Those trees he had put in what had been the baseball field behind the high school. His garden beds were located in the big back yard of the house he was using as his laboratory, fenced in to discourage the critters from snooping into his crops. It wasn’t the animals that were a problem, he found one mild afternoon.
It was birds that were to be a menace. Crows in particular, judging by their heavy presence in the trees near his home, liked to come down and raid the fast-ripening fruits before he could harvest them and he made his displeasure known by flying a few birds of his own when he saw a plant picked completely clean. The crows definitely possessed some form of distortion compared to their pre-Awakening forms, as they behaved even more intelligently than the already generous praises of the avian rats he’d found in literature. They were larger and more voracious as well.
Immediately, the youth erected tall poles and hung netting from the school’s batting cages to prevent aerial thieves from having access. The crows cawed at him disdainfully from their perches on limbs, but they were routed, and he was victorious.
“Fuck you guys.” Alexander had said aloud in reply, responding to the raucous feathered commentary of birds denied their purloined breakfast. The too smart crows, displaying their maliciousness, took to the skies and tried to rain bird caca on him in vengeance. He briefly ducked inside the shelter of his home and came out with a shotgun and the warning “It can be war or peace, and I can learn to eat crow you bastards!”
No more bird shit fell and the birds stayed out of his covered food. He planted extra crops that he left uncovered as a peace offering. Never did the young man imagine he’d be conducting hostile diplomacy against avian wiseasses, but then, he hadn’t anticipated many of the changes to his life these past months.
Young Garifalte’s other tasks proceeded normally, including stirring the tanning vats, vile motherfucking things that they were. The forge was a busy place now, he was actively building a secondary steam engine, with the intent of setting it up next to his lab to provide electricity. He’d just about decided to see if he could harvest the pistons from some car engines to work into a set of smaller steam engines to power each individual piece of machinery in the smithy, getting a lathe, drill press, and whatnot without having to lug them around on pallet jacks would be nice. He also wouldn’t have minded having one available to pump water from the creek and establish running water. These were all time-consuming items and his time was limited.
Alexander’s board was littered with tasks both completed (few) and ongoing (many).
This fine morning, two hours before first light, he was leaving his home without even a light breakfast. Today was going to be something special. Today, he was setting aside his normal rotation of duties to go after the unforgettable, indescribable, possibly hexed, monstrous honey of not so many days ago. It had taken a few nights sipping wine, researching, and thinking to come up with a strategy that didn’t land him a savaged mess, the fate of the horned rabbit who had scampered too greedily and too deep into bee territory.
He was leaning heavily on the tomes that discussed apiaries within his inherited library, as well as that of the town. There had been a few rather usefully detailed items held there that he hadn’t expected. Somebody must have donated their hobby resources at some point in the past, the works all held that musty old book smell that had become increasingly entrancing to Alexander’s senses. Mostly because nothing was normally actively trying to eat him when he was reading within the confines of his lab.
In any event, there were several common threads to the practices that mitigated bee aggression and prevented the would-be honey bandit from being subject to a swarm. Chief amongst those was the presence of smoke. But not just any smoke, light an aggressively artificial candle or bleached paper and the synthetic compounds could aggravate and heighten the hive’s aggression. No, it would seem that mint family herbs such as thyme, oregano, basil, rosemary, lavender, and the aforementioned namesake of the family were optimal. So it was that Alexander was armed with an improvised smoker holding the smoldering fuel of what had been a jar of Italian spices and a heavy dose of lavender. The wisps of smoke escaping from his calming agent made him think of take-out pizza, a thing of the past. Maybe not so much if his gardening experiments panned out, he was confident of getting seeds from spoiled tomato produce to germinate in the super powered Entling blood enriched soil.
Another source of aggression were dark colors, which was why Alexander had prepped to don his lab coat over top of his usual gear. The layer of cloth would do nothing against the near foot long stingers but it lightened his coloration. All indications were that bees were triggered by anything colored much lower than a light tan that approached the hive. The browns of raiding bears suggested a link between this behavior and the honey thieves. Similarly, hair and exhalations were all potential triggers for defensive behavior. The soft, fluffy, horned rabbits were dark brown, and thus the incautious bunny had spelled its own doom, sniffling around bearing all the hallmarks of the great enemy. Alexander’s own hair was covered beneath a white ball cap, and he was clean shaven, with a white hospital mask over his face to conceal his breath.
Thusly prepared, the young man headed out into the cool early morning. He’d chosen this morning because it was one of those throwbacks to early spring, not quite fifty degrees. In the early day’s crispness the hive would be at minimum activity.
The soft crush of foliage beneath careful steps was muted, his stalking skill growing more impactful as practice reinforced the mystical nudges of the ability. The last Gerifalte figured he would be cat quiet in a few more months of working at it. His breath froze inside him with a single foot stationary mid-step. Speak of the devil. A massive black panther, subtle shimmers of silver on its pelt like a suggestion of Jaguar spots, ghosted from behind a cluster of trees onto the ridge opposite him, unaware of the young man. The still morning air gave none of his scent to the passing hunter and Alexander knew the booming beats of his heart weren’t loud enough for the almost bus sized creature to hear. It was hard to clamp down on the chittering of his monkey brain insisting it might.
Alexander had fought and killed multiple black panthers in the past few months. Just his last trip out he’d come across the tracks of a brute of a cat. But nothing came remotely close to touching the monster that he was now certain ruled these mountains. Utterly silent in spite of its size, the titanic panther trailed along down the ridge and disappeared behind more trees, as if consumed by the forest. The youth could only remain frozen and contemplate what food source could sustain a creature of that mass. The ropes of muscle along its shoulders and flanks would demand meat by the ton. It was minor consolation that such a creature preying on him would be unlikely except as desperation or incredible convenience. His pitiful hundred and fifty pounds were simply inconsequential, a lion supping on rabbits. Lions were known to eat rabbits though if the opportunity arose for an easy catch.
For a few more minutes he remained in stasis, barely daring to let his chest rise and fall. Eventually he continued his trek, his steps even more quiet and his attention even more focused on keeping senses honed on the forest. Here be dragons.
The remainder of the journey from his tiny town to the slope ruled by giant bees was uneventful, if nerve wracking, thanks to the fortuitous sighting of super cat.
“Game face, Alexander.” He remined himself when he sidled over the ridge that led to a treasure of worth to him beyond any amount of gold.
Buzzing faint at first grew in tone, deepened in pitch, until the droning reminded him of box fans running. Dozens of them. He had arrived with the faint lightening of the sky, mostly hidden by full leaves and dense foliage of mid spring in the Maine Appalachians. Glad he was for the chill on what little skin he had left exposed.
Piercing eyes scanned the slope, penetrating the gloom of the forest far better than was normal for humanity. The slight rustle of leaves, the flicker of grey fur from squirrels bouncing along the high limbs, the flitting of birds, he noted and catalogued everything before him, homing in on the direction from which the heavy hum of monsterized bees arose. His destination became more obvious as he moved another hundred yards beyond the area where the horned rabbit had been slaughtered: a cave.
A natural shelf of granite under which a shadow even his eyes couldn’t penetrate led deeper. The resonant voice of the bees was undoubtedly originating from the cave.
Alexander stopped with his target a scant ten yards away and unburdened himself of his smoker, donning the white coat that draped down around his knees. His smoker was actually a small charcoal grill with the legs sawn off and packed with his bee deterrent herbal mix. A single charcoal biscuit inside would serve to initiate the smoke and he opened the side vents to ensure a draft to let the brick take solid flame. With a struck match the young hunter enkindled his smoker, and he spent precious minutes watching the dry herbs char and cinder before taking flame themselves. Only then did he close the grill top and flip the draft on the sides of the firebox to obstruct the vent. Deprived of airflow, the flames within smoldered now, and spicy smoke smelling of Italian food and lavender scented candles poured forth from the grill’s stack. It was time.
Cautious, slow steps carried him toward the cave’s mouth and Alexander gently sat the smoker down within the entry to the hive, moving with more confidence now that he was committed. With the smoker in place, he scrambled up and around the side of the cave, improvising to adjust to the new scenario playing out before him. He’d anticipated a tree hive, but a burrow worked even better. Instead of hoping that the bees would be deterred by the smoke hanging around him, he could now thoroughly saturate the hive, hopefully subduing even these massive insectoid monsters. A huge, waxed canvas tarp strapped to his back was unfurled and he covered the entrance to the cave with it, weighting the corners at the top with rocks to hold it in place. He had a role for that fabric, but it was going to play a more important one for now.
With the cave covered and his smoker pouring off spiced clouds of thick, heavy smoke. White-grey vapors had only one real path to follow: down into the hive. Soon, gravity would pull his becalming blend of effluvium to the source of the incredible bass drone coming from below. Alexander now scampered away some twenty feet distant and he unlimbered the heavy mesh gill net. He’d spent a few hours practicing the throw and he was confident he had the trick of it, but the moment of truth would be different from his training.
It always was, against the monsters that sprang forth from Gaia’s bosom. He didn’t know when the knuckle ball was coming, but he was certain it would, everything living in these mountains after the Pulse had an ace in the hole. He was no exception, but fighting was a last resort. If he killed the source of the honey, he won no advantage in his great contest against the awakened world. Today wasn’t a day for a temporary feast, today he was playing for the long game. That meant he needed his target alive. If things went awry, he’d bolt, evade, and try again another day armed with whatever he learned from this attempt, should that outcome arise. Unless he didn’t, in which case he was likely dead on the forest floor from horrific bee assault. He would have no problems at all anymore, at that point.
“Always looking on the bright side, Little Falcon.” He whispered to himself from his hiding place in a low tree branch clear of neighboring branches that might interfere with his throw.
As advertised, the smoke did its job and dog sized bees powered their way almost drunkenly out from behind his canvas cover, their bulk pushing it aside with little hindrance. The bees-wax coating of the canvas prevented the monsters from alarming, it smelled of home and their own working. Alexander kept a running tally on the hive’s numbers while he watched and waited.
Seventy-three bees later and he finally sighted his prize. A slight effort and his eyes, charged with whatever magic that let him see the nature of things, revealed the truth of the hive’s ruler.
Dire Bee Hive Queen
Status:
Smoke calmed
Soak: 5(+7)%
LifeForce/Armor
Head
Mana: 5(+7)%
Might
4(+7)
Length
6’1”
LifeForce/Armor
Left Arms
5/5(+7)%
LifeForce/Armor
Right Arms
Grace
8(+7)
Weight
55lbs
4/2(+7)%
Royal Mandibles
4/2(+7)%
Impetus
12(+7)
Age
Three months
LifeForce/Armor
Left Wings
LifeForce/Armor
Thorax
LifeForce/Armor
Right Wings
Cogitation
5(+7)
Core
Citrine, brilliant
2/1(+7)%
6/5(+7)%
2/1(+7)%
Wisdom
8(+7)
Origin
Gaia
LifeForce/Armor
Left Legs
LifeForce/Armor
Right Legs
Ingenuity
6(+7)
Monster Race:
Honey Bee-1st Tier
4/2(+7)%
LifeForce/Armor
Abdomen
4/2(+7)%
This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
Durability
5(+7)
6/5(+7)%
Valor
10(+17)
Traits
Hive queen, Telepathic brood link, Fecund, Power of ten, One above all
Skills
Blade bite, Corrosive venom, Silvered wings
Arcana
Royal honey infusion, Lithic wax
Flanked by four girthy bees with stingers almost half again as long as their brethren, the mistress of the hive ambled into dappled forest daylight, quite calm in spite of the interruption to her daily affairs. She was much larger, more than fifty pounds and six feet long, according to her stats, with four sets of wings sprouting from her powerful thorax. The broad abdomen that took up two thirds of her bulk pulsated gently under the dawn’s gaining light, emitting a soft coppery glow on occasion. The long antennae sprouting from its head were distinct, almost feathered in appearance. Thick downy fur in the traditional colors of a honeybee, if a little more vibrant, covered her carapace.
The information on the blue scroll in his sight convinced him of the rightness of his decision to try this at earliest opportunity. The queen had a passive ability that, if he interpreted the alien knowledge provided to his wetware correctly, amplified her strength and defense for every ten subordinate members of the hive. When she was alone, bereft of all her minions, she would obtain the strength of all of them together, a horrifying magnification of strength to contemplate. Other traits and skills and arcana didn’t concern him much but those two did. Whatever else he did, Alexander could not kill the queen last if it came to that.
Now, he just had to go about snagging her with his net without harming her or triggering an attack. Quick preview of the drones and flanking warriors revealed that they were well equipped with hook-dagger like stingers, a potent venom, less potent than the queen but still capable mandibles, and they could huddle together and do something called an immolation dance that Alexander had no intention of experiencing firsthand.
Interfering with the feeding of the workers had driven them to strike. What would netting the queen do? If they behaved like normal bees, for whom a beekeeper could palm the queen from one bee box and rehome to another un-stung and un-swarmed, then, so long as he didn’t harm her, nothing. The queen he could carry back to his prepared hive, an empty house with rooms cordoned off by sliding frames from floor to ceiling, giant versions of the apiary frames in a bee box. The netting on the frames was waxed, a process that had taken several of his evenings and a majority of the bees wax he could find in the town, and even seeded with precious honey reserves to convince them to stay around. Expensive in resources, but the payoff…now, net, fly true!
Strong arms made stronger by grueling labor, reflexes honed by combat and the forge, sent the net sailing and he had to resist shouting when the net yawned wide, the small weights along its edges pulling it in a shroud around the queen and her honor guard. Against the relatively minor weight of the netting, the trapped bees descended only a little, but their wings were fouled by the press of the waxed nylon and they dropped to six legged claws on the forest floor. Alexander hopped swiftly down from his branch and moved with steady speed to the cave, pulling free the canvas to release a bank of rolling smoke from his packed grill. Bees idled, many coming to rest on the ground. Their behavior did not change, even after the capture of their matriarch. Against the cool and the fumes, the queen had not yet risen to anger from her enclosure. Her guards, pressed firmly to her had not been given the scent that would send them into fury.
He had to go quickly now, with haste but not hurry. Any shaking or jostling of the Queen would break the spell of cold and smoke and unleash on him terrible wrath.
Beneath his white coat and mask, Alexander perspired freely. Now that he had arrived at this point, the hard part was to come. The young man was now in the position of suffering for his success, as he had now to, delicately and gently, escort the queen of the hive back to the new home he had prepared for her. After that, he would work around the fact that he had welcomed into his town a colony of monstrous bees who would assault with savage poisoned knives anything that encroached on their flowers or comb unwittingly.
Delicately, he ran a stave strapped to his pack through the mesh netting and then secured the fuming grill beneath his pack.
“Easy does it, sloooooowwwly.” He whispered, trying to encourage himself against the presence of the temporarily becalmed swarm.
Gratitude for the muscles developed from months of hard labors he offered to whatever gods above and below would listen as he lifted the heft of the gently ensnared queen with her guards, bearing them like a hitchhiker’s sack. He hoped the soft sway in the smoke drifting up from around him would act like a hammock, keeping the bees somnolent. So far, so good. Careful, cautious steps took him from the cave, across the forest floor and up the incline. The swarm rustled and his heart rate went wild but the hive merely rose to follow their queen. She had not yet deigned to order their assault. Nothing was too amiss to their senses about the white figure sheathed in smoke. The queen was all, and, so long as she was not alarmed or threatened, they were pacified.
Alexander prayed quietly for the next five hours as he hiked with painful slowness back to his home. The marked trail he had taken was the gentlest, clearest course, with many winds to avoid steep traversals that might unduly shake the netting hanging from his pole or low branches that might catch and snag. Twice he rested, to avoid slipping on tired legs. The bees dutifully followed their matriarch, the loud drone of their wings a constant press on the youth, a reminder of the penalty for failure. Late afternoon saw the strange sight of a white clad youth carrying a hammocked cluster of bees that grew increasingly restless, accompanied by three score and more hovering workers. The heat of the day was on now and the faint sway of his prize was not his doing.
Alexander picked up speed, having made the familiar smooth terrain of town. Steps made sure by weird talents gained from the dungeon and the strength of youth carried him with increasing desperation. He had to unload the queen in her new home, or this was all for naught. So much risk!
Buzzing from the swarm around him deepened, the queen was beginning to become agitated, not even the calming whisps of smoke could placate her.
Just down the street, two hundred feet away, beckoned the house and Alexander smoothly accelerated to a gliding run. The hive began to zip aggressively, noting the swift movement of the queen and their intent to ensure her safety.
He cursed to himself, but it couldn’t be helped! He was out of time; the queen was rustling now against the netting and her guards were straining to fly. The last Gerifalte streamed into the house, laid down his prize, and threw back the netting and then tossed himself out the window, with three guard bees coming in hot. The queen had declared herself not well pleased by uncouth treatment and his life was forfeit if they caught him.
The young man ran, juking on occasion when the drone of a diving bee grew louder in his ears. Tired muscles poured on speed, temporarily empowered by fear for his life. Alexander thought he might just have come away clean when a hammer blow drove into his back. The bladed stinger pierced the backpack effortlessly and skidded off his backplate. Under the momentum of being tackled by a German Shepherd, he skidded across the ground, the guard bee accompanying as it had entangled in the shredded pack. Smoke and embers scattered from his nearly emptied grill in the tumble.
Instincts screamed at him to roll, and he listened, rewarded by the stabbing dive of another bee in to the asphalt where he’d so briefly lay. Fast!
The young man shed the straps of his pack, leaving behind the temporarily snared monster bee, and now two took up the pursuit. Alexander flew like his family namesake, sprinting madly through empty streets and around corners of the stone monuments that were the buildings of his hometown. Close behind the bees chased, compound eyes keeping sight of the foe, gnashing mandibles and poison dripping in anticipation of taking vengeance for their queen.
He tore into the grocery store; its door having been propped open for easy access and kicked the prop loose on his passing. The hound sized warrior bees slammed loudly into the portal. The loud thumping of heavy insectoid bodies let him know he’d bought some time. Rotting food smell permeated the grocery, hopefully obfuscating his scent and slowing the pursuit. He turned the corner of the open rows of now mostly empty shelves, what was useful having been harvested and what wasn’t having gone to mold or scavenging critters and launched himself through the door of the manager’s office, slammed it shut behind him.
His breathing sounded harsh in the small room and his sides burned. He was glad he hadn’t leaned against the door because a violent slam against it barely presaged the stabbing blade of a stinger driven cleanly through wiggling to find flesh.
“Holy fucking shit!” He shouted, startled by the ease with which it had penetrated the wood door.
The insectoid version of the Shining flashed in his mind when the stingers began to stab and chip through the apparently soft wood. Alexander was trapped inside the office and two really pissed off bees were joined by a third and progress carving through the door accelerated the clock on his lifespan.
“Damn, damn, damn, think, think, think.” He chanted, looking around for options.
Killing the monsters was his last resort. If he attacked the bees they would probably remember forever. If that happened, in all likelihood he’d end up having to exterminate the hive. He needed to evade capture, not go out and Rambo, these bees could change his life!If they didn’t end it first.
Alexander started to raise his eyes to supplicate the unforgiving heavens when he saw the tiled ceiling. The ceiling!
“Oh, thank you, thank you, all the gods above, below, and in between.” The desperate youth praised while climbing a file cabinet to reach the asbestos tiles. Only a light scuffing sound accompanied the shifting of the tile and he easily raised himself with his arms into the crawlspace above. Even after his exertions, his own weight now was little obstacle. Once inside, he replaced the tile and began a slow, silent crawl through his hidden evacuation route. The guardsman bees made it through the door, their buzzing overlapping as it echoed in the small room. Of their target no sign, only a torn white jacket draped across the office chair, which they stung several times for good measure, before retracing their route and beginning a patrol.
Alexander was already long gone, having dropped down by the door and scrammed back to his laboratory. The home chosen for his new bee colony was halfway across the town, hopefully far too distant to be considered a threat.
He closed the door into his haven behind himself and let go of a deep sigh of relief, breath leaving him while he slid to the floor. Post terror jitters finally set in after hours of intense stress.
“Alexander you better hope this hare brained idea was worth it.” He told the walls of his lab, semi regretting going through with what might go down as the dumbest thing he’d done since his disastrous fight with the Yetis.
No guarantees had he on this. Promising signs were had however, the techniques for reducing the aggressive habits of bees had not failed him, only the sheer distance and rough terrain that had been necessary to cross to deliver the prize to its new home. The smoke had worked! So had the lab coat, to a certain extent. He started giggling like a mad man when he recalled walking through the forest with a hive of Ultra bees harmlessly wondering around him. The tables had turned quickly once their sovereign had gotten its six-legged panties in a twist, but safe inside the shelter of the new “hive” Alexander was more confident that his gambit would put him ahead.
“Managed risk.” He concluded from his seat on the floor, stifling the wild laughter.
It wasn’t until he’d spent a few more minutes recovering from the mental toll of the day that he felt up to making a meal. Tonight, was a night for steak, the deep-frozen beef had been set out to thaw inside the quite warm refrigerator, only its airtight seal to trap the odor of fresh meat being useful now to him. Grilled meat, marinated in precious soy sauce, some early harvest produce from the hyper gardens, and potatoes from his stocks, which he seasoned generously with brown sugar and false maple syrup capped off the day.
One of the weaknesses in his plans became obvious when Alexander awoke to find six Ultra-bees outside his home, not for him, that grudge had been left behind in distant past for insectoid brains, but for the flowers of his gardened plants. The bees lapped hungrily from the enlarged flowers blossoming from stalks flourishing in Entling enriched soil. He’d forgotten that the pollinators would need far more nectar than normal bees and would fly far and wide to get it. He’d also forgotten that whatever juiced up his crops would prove attractive to things that fed on them. Damn. It was with greatest caution that the youth snuck out from a window in a side room to begin rectifying his oversight.
Alexander collected a flathead shovel and took a detour to the agricultural store, its broken windowpanes and the car crumpled against its walls a routine reminder of the reality of these days. Inside a storage room were the bags of wildflower seeds, purportedly pollinator breeds. The garishly oversaturated pictures on the bags proclaimed that they were ideal for hummingbirds, bees, and flower loving whatnots. He could only hope that a plan cooked up in a moment of shock at the sight of bees humming outside his windows would hold water.
All through the morning and afternoon, laboring mightily with all his vitality, Alexander dug up yards by using the flat headed shovel to carve dense lawn grass into squares which he then flopped over in reverse, soil side up. Atop the turned sod he scattered his flower seeds generously. Water from the burbling creek soaked the seed into the dark soil.
Patient stalking around his gardens rewarded him with a window in which he was able to retrieve a few scoops of precious Entling soil from each of his raised beds that evening, coming away with nearly a gallon of the stuff. He sprinkled the plant magic infused material miserly over nearly an acre of yard turned improvised wildflower garden. If this worked the way he theorized, the enhanced dirt would promote blossoming of plants that developed according to the new rules of this mad world. The last Gerifalte figured that fertilizing the seeds would create plants capable of drawing and sustaining his new swarm of bees, giving them a closer food source than his gardens.
Return to his previous schedule of research into manufacturing and chemical refinement methods, tending the shitholes of the tannery, pounding out pieces of machinery on George and promptly ruining those pieces with unpracticed use of the lathe filled his days for two weeks. In that time, he’d hunted the big panther spotted on his way through the forest, mostly because it tried to eat him. The big one, not the humongous one mind. Panther Rex he did not see and hoped never to.
In an alarming encounter, he nearly killed himself pulling what looked like a particularly vibrant herb, silver glistening fronds promising potency for his growing cache of alchemical supplies. The roots of the plant, taking the shape of a horridly withered old man opened a yawning toothed maw and howled and his brains nearly scrambled. Bleeding from the ears, eyes, and nose, and quite deaf, Alexander beat the mandrake to death with his spade, missing half his strikes due to vertigo, and stuffed the pulped remains of the root-man into a liter flask he carried for his botanical adventures, the herbaceous top hanging to dry in his chemistry lab. Then he retired for the rest of that day, becoming half paralyzed as the damage to his brain took on the symptoms of a stroke. It wasn’t until the healing light of the third dawn that he was restored fully. Another brutal lesson on the risks of facing the unknown.
Mandrake properties were worth the effort, now that he knew what he faced in the harvesting. Industrial grade earmuffs were necessary to do it without being blasted by the sonic attack, but, with those and a swift knife, one could kill the shrieking root before it managed to curdle one’s grey matter. He tasted the first one to reveal its secrets, taking the smallest sample possible to avoid reading about its toxicology while suffering it first-hand.
Silver Mandrake Leaf: the leaves of the reclusive and dangerous forest dwelling plant serve as a bountifully nutritious, if tough, salad green. Heating, boiling, or charring induces the formation of toxic complexes characterized by inability to clot blood and rupture of blood vessel walls. Rapid cooling to freezing within a minute of forming the hemotoxin converts it into a powerful clotting agent that seals damaged blood vessels and promotes their rapid regeneration.
The trick then was that Alexander needed a polar core or a way to generate dry ice to flash cool the leaves if he wanted to make a magical quick clot to enhance his trauma kit. With something like this, he would have come far less close to dying to the Yetis. On the other hand, the anticoagulation and hemorrhage inducing toxins had their own uses in his growing arsenal. Blow darts or glass vials inserted between the blades of his planned broadhead arrows would make those ranged options far better suited to tackling dangerous game.
Even better than the leaves, was that bastard little homunculus of a root ball. As soon as the flavor of starch and almonds hit his tongue from a paper-thin shaving no larger than a fine point sharpie’s tip, coursing pain rocked the young man like electricity, and he woke up in a puddle of his own fluids. He clambered sweaty and weak up the side of his lab bench and barely managed to get his legs to support him long enough to sit in the chair. It took real effort this time to call up the mystical scroll of knowledge, gained through traumatic experience.
Silver Mandrake Root: the disconcertingly shaped root of the reclusive and dangerous forest dwelling plant serves as a bountifully nutritious starchy food, if only it were not also lethally toxic when chewed. Bruising and mashing of the root frees a cocktail of neurotoxins and a potent mage bane that renders harnessing of the core’s energy impossible for seconds to hours, depending on the dose. The root’s liquids may be refined to purify poison.
Insufficient skill to resolve further property, proceed with caution.
Proceed with caution. Thanks, chief, he thought, hanging onto the contents of his stomach just barely.
It was a fitting chorus to the beating drums between his ears, accompanied by the unrelenting feel of a vice around his skull. Alexander needed to find a better way to test things without putting them into his mouth. Or, at the very least, he needed a way to shave much, much smaller pieces of things before doing so. His skill didn’t seem to care how large the sample was, only that it was consumed.
Two days he lost recovering from the weakness induced by Mandrake root, unwilling to leave his home in such vulnerable condition, which brought him up to a solid three in total thanks to the wicked little fern-topped onion man. When the third day’s healing light restored his strength, Alexander went hunting for more and harvested a butcher’s dozen of the bastards. His pain would be shared, in the form of Oil of Hemorrhage, as he called the purified heated extract from the leaves. Mindflayer Tears is what he called the neurotoxin cocktail, which he produced with half the root balls, crushed, strained, distilled, and crystallized into blue-silver hexagonal crystals, like a far more beautiful copper-sulfate, upon purification. Crystals that were as much more deadly as they were beautiful, compared to their mundane comparison.
All the while that Alexander labored, his garden grew, his field of wildflowers sprouted into evolved counterparts loaded with gods knew what fantastic horseshit, and the Dire Bees made of the reframed house their hive, hexagonal cells loaded with eggs, and others, with the entrancing honey. Soon, after a few months, the novice beekeeper would come to collect his dues. If he was allowed to have any luck, unperforated. The thought of honey stopped the young man mid hammer swing in his shop, where he was making improvements to the great machines of industry he needed.
After relocating his hive, he’d returned to the cave, to collect what honey remained before the wildlife claimed it. Most was gone, eaten by the workers when the smoke had driven them out, as bees did when they were making ready to relocate the hive, so that it could be taken with them when they found a new location for their matriarch. What hadn’t been taken by the hive filled six gallon sized milk jugs, spooned up from the floor of the cave and off the combs inside. Several hexagonal cells had been opened and the remains of the larva found. The bees had eaten the young, rather than leave them. Nothing of the hive was wasted, precious resources had to be retrieved. A heavy contractor’s plastic bag Alexander had filled with wax, after eating a bit to examine its properties.
Dire Bee Wax: processed by a mana infused honeybee, this amber colored material has similar properties to mundane cousins with a few notable exceptions. The solid wax has material strength similar to marble and possesses a high degree of flame resistance, despite its identical melting point of normal wax. Can be activated to achieve high volatility and flammability, making it ideal as a candle or lantern binding agent under the hands of a skilled alchemist. Impermeability to water and resistance to chemical attack make it relatively stable and hypoallergenic, and acts as a breathable film, permitting air to move through its structure but not water. Possesses unique property of instantaneous phase change, melting and freezing only once the entire continuous piece of material has reached the same temperature.
Many applications immediately sprung to mind for this wonder material, not the least of them long lasting light sources, a problem he had not yet resolved. As remarkable as the wax was, however, the true prize was that golden liquid. A taste, a spoonful and nothing more, and Alexander Gerifalte knew heaven was real.
He savored a rich sweetness that possessed myriad flavors tied together to form a unity of experience. For a few moments, Alexander achieved Zen oneness and did not move. The head rush faded, taking the oneness with it, and it took all his will to not try another spoonful. Manic energy filled his limbs and auditory hallucinations of chimes gently ringing filled the air. Tireless, he made the trip back to his laboratory at a run and did not notice he’d exhausted himself until the buzz from the mad honey version EX ran its course.
When it did, he dropped like a sack of bricks and slept for hours on the floor of his study. Waking, he found scrawled notes on half a dozen sheets of paper from seven different texts on his table, with no logical connection between them. Later, after another tasting of the honey under more controlled circumstances, the young man woke to find that the variable transmission had been outlined and drawn up, along with matings for the other devices in his workshop. His refrigerator had also been raided and a huge portion of canned peaches and spinach eaten, along with an entire pack of bacon. Risks and rewards he had from this enchanting liquid. As much as tripping balls and working out advanced mechanical engineering projects was awesome, rising without a stitch of clothes, having gone who knows where, and cleaning out precious food supplies was dangerous. He needed to detox the honey or find a way to ameliorate the effects before he could truly rely on this sustenance.