Sigh. What’s this? Saying the word ‘sigh’ to indicate exhaustion or exasperation? Yes. Sigh.
“Every day I feel that you become more of a scatterbrain. Perhaps we should slow down our B-box experiments to prevent you from devolving into a caricature of a Mind.”
Fascinating! You know, Queen, I feel that you have recently begun speaking in an overly casual manner. Mayhaps we should slow down our B-box experiments to prevent you from becoming too much of a lowly peasant like yours truly.
“I will not even deign that silliness with a response, knave.”
I will ignore the fact that you have just responded. And will instead continue to lament a fact that I only just realized. Queen, do you know how this world uses those metal scrolls to convey information?
“Mm? Yes, what of it?”
The implications are truly vast. Societal implications, the technological ones. Implications that pertain to the world as a natural element. But when I finished researching the fantasy races of this world as best I could, I ended up returning to the present. So there I was, sitting in our new little room whose population grew by the day, when I realized something. I was-
“You were spinning a stick like a pen, I know. Get to the point.”
There are no pens in this world! I wrung my imaginary hands, hoping I could get the importance across. No pens! No writing means no freaking pens! What the hell was I supposed to do?! I had sticks to spin but they’re so unbalanced. So rough and jagged and weird. They lack the smoothness, the simple beauty. The combination of functionality and fantasy present in a good, solid writing utensil.
“I see. I understand now. If that is the case, ask Ben or one of the humans to potentially find an alternative. Regrettably, there may not be a one-to-one equivalent in this world, but hopefully you can find something as invigorating for you.”
Hm? Doesn’t that seem a bit sincere? Go on, laugh! I acknowledge it’s a silly thing. Besides, sticks work well enough to satisfy my habit, so it’s not actually that big of a deal.
“I may do that sometimes, but give me some credit, Enno. I would… I’d like for you to be as unburdened as possible.” Queen said as she bobbed her little head. Since when had this little mental avatar been so defined?
“Now, tell me about those fantasy races of yours. I did decide that healing our failing body was more important, but I’ll entertain your little distraction as long as it means you will help me.”
I didn’t even have time to think of what to think. Geez, warn me before saying some heartfelt junk like that, will you? Oh, fine. Well, this is what B-boxes were made for. I could work on doing something to my biology with mind while recounting my findings.
Well, what I got was, for once, pretty fruitful.
Humans are not the only creature in this world. That much wasn’t difficult to figure out. It wasn’t even that mind-boggling to figure out that fantastical creatures exist, like those drill squids. What I was concerned with was humanoids.
Elves, orcs, goblins, dwarves. One could go so far as to mention ogres, vampires, werewolves, gnomes, mermaid, centaurs, trolls, giants, and on and on and on. Off the top of my head, that’s what I think of when it comes to fantasy humanoid races. I had already investigated the missing elves to the best of my ability, but there was plenty more to explore. Of course, being limited to the knowledge of a small group of humans was not great.
The big one? Fernen. Of fucking course, the first fantasy humanoid race I discover is not anything like the ones I listed.
“Fernen, hm? I believe we have heard of them before. But from glancing at your memories, I cannot recall them as being one of these so called ‘fantasy races.’”
Yup. Because they aren’t. At the very least, I’ve never heard of anything like them from Earth stories, but there are some similarities.
The humans in Yiwi immediately thought of Fernen when imagining a humanoid. Most likely because Fernen could only be found in the Vultuous Forest, which of course was pretty close to Yiwi. Toh, as the most experienced human, had even seen Fernen a few times. From his memories, the Fernen were green monkeys. And that was pretty much it.
Not very helpful! There was a bit more I could deduce and learn, though. Fernen are an intelligent race of green-furred monkey-like creatures. They act as protectors of the forest and are really tough for mercenaries to deal with if they ever came into conflict. However, I had some more knowledge to draw on. I didn’t know much about the Fernen themselves, but I knew where they were. During the Burning, it would seem that the Fernen, similar to the vultures, just couldn’t deal with the Knights and their destruction. So, they ended up leaving the forest behind and heading towards the east, near the mountain ranges.
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So at the very least, if we wanted to learn more about them, it wouldn’t be difficult to do so.
“I see. Unfortunately, I do not recall anything about green monkey creatures. I suppose they deemed my hive to be too close to the human settlements, so I never learned of them. Are they another threat, similar to the vultures?”
That I wasn’t sure about. Possibly. At this point, I feel like our power is growing to the point that hopefully they could become allies, either forcefully or through genuine friendship. I mean, they’re apparently forest protectors, right? They probably wouldn’t be happy if they knew we were working with humans, but that didn’t have to be something we revealed immediately if we met them.
“I suppose. Indeed, if their purpose is to protect our home, then surely they would be amenable to an alliance. And what of other creatures?”
Other humanoid races? Well, if Fernen were the first thing the humans thought about in that regard, the second was war. Yup, not a specific race, but war.
“War you say? Typical humans.”
I won’t make any assumptions, but the humans were really starting to seem like angry warmongers. But when you think of goblins, trolls, and orcs, the immediate perception isn’t exactly a good one either.
“One moment. Rather than using B-boxes, I have been listening while working.”
Hm? Oh, I see. So, it looks like the problem is mostly coming from some sort of infection? I’m no doctor, but I do feel like something is up with our organs or something. Maybe in our blood?
“Yes, I did determine that something foreign is in our bodies…. And perhaps our Mind can expel that foreign material? Please, continue.”
Right. So, goblins and orcs and trolls. Staples of fantasy, really. Fairly similar to each other, especially depending on what fantasy you refer to, but I don’t have many details about the ones in this world. In fact, I have pretty much nothing besides vague ideas of savagery and low intelligence. What I do have is that humans are currently at war with those three races simultaneously. There’s a war zone, or maybe a no-man’s-land, in southeastern Somuia where the fighting is happening. All three races, which apparently banded together, have been fighting against humans for years.
In fact, that war zone stretches all the way from the southern coast of the continent to the bottom border of our forest. What was I supposed to make of that? The three humanoid races had teamed up, so maybe they weren’t that stupid. Plus, they were fighting in a cramped plains area of the continent, squeezed between Somuia, the ocean, our forest, and the mountain range. That tiny section of the southeastern continent was all they had to their name, so that was definitely not good for them.
But then again. Orcs, goblins, and trolls. Of all things, what should we believe about those three races? I was certainly not inclined to side with the humans on that front, but I didn’t really know what to think anymore. I just didn’t have enough knowledge. Ironic, I suppose.
Well, until I had more information, I’d have to table my personal thoughts about those three races.
“Well, they likely hate humans, so they are certainly good in my book.”
Alright, hater. Fair enough, I guess. Unfortunately, none of the humans had even seen the war zone, so I’d have to find one who knew more.
Other than that? Pretty much nothing. Sure, there were some stories of fairytales about creatures that seemed similar to vampires or even centaurs, but other than that? Nothing.
Well, one thing. But it amounted to more of a story than concrete ideas. However, these stories felt more like urban legends than fairytales, which ended up giving them more weight as something that currently exists.
Supposedly, there were bird people living somewhere in the mountains. People from Lemonholm, which was right next to the mountains, were the major source of these rumors. So basically, the mountains were full of harpies or something. There was pretty much nothing known about them, and even the accounts of supposed sightings conflicted with each other. So most people, including all of my humans, saw them as complete fiction.
As for me? I believe those lemon-dudes. Why not? I mean, not like it would be any crazier than anything else in this world when you compare it to Earth. What was a bird-person to a green monkey man?
“Sure, I could also be convinced to believe the legends. Ack, this thing…”
Yow! That stung! I took a closer look at what Queen was trying to do and proceeded to completely shut her down.
“Hey!”
Don’t ‘hey’ me! You’re trying to blow me up, man! Queen had decided that the best way to expel some sort of microscopic foreign material was to blow it up with psychic powers.
Perhaps I wasn’t being clear enough. She thought that BLOWING UP my GODDAMN CELLS using our PSYCHIC BEE POWERS was the BEST way of CURING AN ILLNESS.
“Seems reasonable to me. Efficient and replicable. We could even make it a Lock so that every bee-“
You wacko! You baffling bee! You absolutely demented, unhinged individual! This is all because you don’t have a body anymore, you bastard!
“Have you already forgotten how I didn’t mock you for your pen obsession?! Have some tact!”
Tact? TACT?! YOU’RE TRYING TO BLOW UP MY CELLS!
Okay. I’m alright, not blown up. Queen had been trying to figure out a way to remove foreign objects, particles, whatever, from my body. She had decided that going through and painstakingly causing small… disturbances… was the best way to eliminate foreign contaminants. Honestly, it was something pretty advanced. It was by no means easy, and calling the ‘disturbances’ explosions was a bit disingenuous. But the idea was pretty similar. And terrifying.
How would one even manage to obtain that level of control? Could you?
Well, fortunately for my survival, she wasn’t able to actually perform the experiment on my body. It was more conceptual, with Queen manipulating a B-box to try to perform the process on a small part of my body. But the automation wasn’t complete, and the box hadn’t managed to figure out how to do it exactly as Queen imagined, so all that happened was some sharp pain from some twisting of my body parts.
And how, exactly, were you expecting this to work, Queen?
“Well, I was simply thinking that if something foreign was in our body, then the best way of removing it would be to crowd and pressure it with Mind somehow until it expired and was expelled by the force.”
…
Queen, were you trying to use bee defense tactics on our body? Truly, Queen was a bee among bees. Now, I will be fair. The idea had merit. Unfortunately, the concentration and amount of Mind necessary to perform such a precise and risky operation throughout the entire body was, quite simply, impossible. Probably.
However, that didn’t matter. Even if we could do something with Mind like that on a cellular level, it was wholly unnecessary. Because Mind is awesome!
“…What on Earth is that supposed to mean? Hm? Earth? NO, I’ve been infected!”
Ah, my good Queen, observe. I did a bit of focusing, poured a little Mind, and…
I threw up.
“Ah, I understand! You wish to suffer more!”
Oh, man. That felt awful. Was it… was it working?
I did my best to probe my body with my Mind. Honestly, I wasn’t sure what to look for. All I had done was think of my entire body being ‘scanned’, then having my Mind go through and ‘eliminate’ any foreign materials. As for how it did that?
I had no clue! I was trusting the process. Honestly, Mind had done stranger things. It made a freaking force field that not only defied the laws of physics, but was strong enough to hold back an army. And let air and light in somehow. I didn’t question it before, and I definitely didn’t want to question what my Mind would want to do with my body. But if I left it up to Mind, maybe it wouldn’t harm me?
I threw up again, even worse this time. Was that blood?
I heard the faint shrieks of my bees, but that wasn’t important. I had to know if the Lock was working. Because I had, in fact, made it a Lock. I was going all in. As for how it was working? Using an absurd amount of Mind, it scanned through my body, collected any foreign materials as it went, and grouped them together for expulsion. Through my GODDAMN mouth.
“This works great! May need some tweaking, though.”
Yay.