Chapter 51:

The ants had spread much farther out since the last time Alice and Titus encountered them. Whether they had simply stripped the area nearby bare or if it was more about time and exploration, she wasn't sure. It took nearly half an hour of marching before they got in range of the mana drain and influence again. Alice couldn't feel it at all from her mana; she could only see it.

The amulet she'd made was designed to act like a Faraday cage. However, that wasn't exactly how it was functioning. It protected her by keeping an equalized pocket of mana around her. It felt like she was walking along the bottom of a seabed with a bubble of air surrounding her. It was weird, and required mixing metaphors a lot, but her [Mana Sight] showed the ambient mana being drawn toward some central source.

Alice wondered if it was something like an ant queen using it for egg production. She didn't even know if there was a proper queen in this nest. They seemed to follow some ant rules and not others, making it hard to predict their actions.

However, her mana wasn't being ripped away from her and forcing her to concentrate on holding it. She found she might even be able to recover some of her mana from the bubble around her. It wouldn't be ideal, but it was certainly better than the alternative. Maybe it would even help fill her up one more time.

They rounded another bend, and the nest lay in front of them. It had grown even higher—at least a dozen stories tall, covering several blocks. Alice nervously poked Titus, who wordlessly handed her a vial of pheromones. She liberally applied some more and put the remaining bit in her pocket, not wanting to run out anywhere near the nest. They were nearly half an hour's jog away from the edge of ant territory. Previously, they had only managed a few minutes in without being attacked. Still, now they would be in serious trouble if the ants figured out they were enemies. It didn't matter how many they could kill or how fast they could run; the ants would swarm them.

Alice gulped nervously, and Titus patted her shoulder comfortingly. Tony was still, still at his feet, but seemed to be radiating comfort in some undetectable way. The corners of Alice's lips quirked up in a small smile before they continued moving.

The ants, for the most part, moved around them. Luckily, they hadn't bothered trying to climb over Alice, though a few stepped on her feet. It wasn't exactly painful, but uncomfortable, like a little dog not realizing it had claws. As they rejoined the stream, Alice followed along, her focus turning inward. She felt at her mana to comfort herself.

She had been sort of neglecting it over the past few days, focusing on enchanting and working with her inscribing tool. But her mana and the little ball of stored, condensed mana inside her were still growing. Her reservoir was coming along nicely, but it hadn't had any qualitative change—just a slightly larger volume. She'd been hoping for some sort of evolution, something like the luminary statue at Montserrat had suggested.

Maybe that would come with reaching D grade. She hadn't talked to Titus about it because their ways of reaching E grade were so different that she hadn't thought any insight would carry over. But perhaps she should fix that.

Her mind wandered, trying to distract her from the task at hand, but she pulled it back into focus. They could talk about this later if it even mattered after they finished their task. Her hands were shaking with nervousness as they started up the side of the nest.

Large soldier ants, many times the size of the workers, stood guard. Instead of dog-sized, they were more like ponies. Their abdomens reached nearly up to her chest, and they were several times longer than she was tall. These ants were terrifying, and instead of level ten like the rest of the nest, they were a solid level twenty-five. Each ant was tapped with one of their massive antennae before being let in.

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When Tony stepped up, Alice held her breath, wondering if they would notice anything different about their pet. The orange stripes didn't seem to raise any alarms, and the simple antenna pat was received stoically. Tony entered the nest, and then Titus was up. Alice gripped her wand with white knuckles where it was in her belt, but Titus only received two taps, and then he, too, stepped into the tunnel entrance. He and Tony stepped aside, letting the ants flow past them.

Alice stepped up. The cold indifference in the many-faceted eyes of the guard in front of her made her tremble, but she forced her knees straight as it inspected her. The antenna that bopped her on the forehead was slightly fuzzy, which was strange. She wasn't exactly sure of the ants' detailed facial features, but it didn't raise any alarm, so she stepped past it and joined Titus.

"You good?" he whispered.

Alice nodded, not trusting herself to talk.

"Fucking creepy, aren't they?" Titus said.

"Yeah, I see why you don't like ants," Alice replied.

The darkness around her was less of an issue as the paths the mana took toward the center of the nest flowed through the tunnels, illuminating them through her [Mana Sight]. She still trusted Titus's night vision better as they went deeper. Luckily, the massive ants made the tunnels larger than she expected. If the tunnels had only fit the small workers, she and Titus would never have made it.

Titus only had to duck a little, tilting his head to the side and crouching. It looked awkward, but he didn't complain, and Alice was able to walk with relative impunity. Only a few times did she have to do anything besides stride normally. Some inclines were steep enough that she had to use her hands to help climb. Still, those were when Titus seemed the most comfortable, able to lean forward more and not worry about brushing dirt from the tunnel ceiling.

In general, they didn't know where they were going. Alice simply pointed them in the direction the mana was flowing. It seemed to be in the center when the nest was much smaller a couple of days ago, so that was probably their best bet. Sadly, they had no service or GPS connection inside. The layers of dirt above them were too dense for a signal to get through, so they couldn't just navigate to the supercomputer center. They had some idea of where it was, but it was easy to get twisted around in the tunnels. The flow of mana was hopefully leading them in the right direction. At least, Alice hadn't, recognized any landmarks yet, so they weren't going in circles.

The first interesting thing that happened during their indeterminate period of climbing through dark tunnels was encountering another set of guards stationed in a hallway with many branching paths. Alice looked for alternative routes, but unless they wanted to backtrack several minutes, there was no other good path. Even then, it had been more of an equilibrium point rather than a way forward.

"What do you think that is?" Alice asked.

Titus looked at the guards. "I can only think of a few options. It's either larvae or egg storage or the brood chamber."

Alice nodded. "That makes sense. Should we try to go around or go through? It seems more like the brood chamber is off to the side rather than directly in our path."

"We should try to go through the tunnel, but hopefully not through any of the important chambers," Titus said.

Alice nodded in agreement, and they walked forward, pacing the rest of the ants. The guards posted weren't doing any active screening, luckily, and they managed to get past the first pair unnoticed.

When Alice looked over, she noticed thousands of little pricks of mana gathered throughout the cage.

"Larvae," Titus said, explaining the large ants moving gently through the sea of little mana stars, carefully inspecting each one.

They passed several more chambers of varying uses before reaching the middle of the guarded section. Inside the chamber was the largest being Alice had ever seen. It made even the T-Rex she had seen so long ago seem small. At least the size of a three-story building, the massive queen ant was awe-inspiring. As they watched, it popped out another egg and handed it off to a caretaker.

"Well, fuck," Titus whispered next to her.