After the situation has calmed down again and the kids were in bed, Elise decided to talk about her tutoring plans with her husband. In the end, they decided that the gains outweigh the drawbacks. They don’t have high running costs, so they could manage with Marks's income. Elise will complete her current assignments from the adventurer guild and then start her lessons. This should take about a week if she focuses on them.
The next morning Elise informs the rest of the family about the changes, including Sylvia. This means that she is busy for about a week while focusing on her assignments. This alarms Sylvia, who thinks about the implications. If her adoptive mother stops her outside activity in about a week, she will not be able to hunt for any new food. The Hive Queen didn’t understand the concept of money yet and that with this money Mark would be able to buy enough food for the family. In her mind, she ate a lot and was therefore a burden on the food supply of the family. Sylvia didn’t believe that Mark alone would be enough to feed them all if she starts her next growth phase.
After some thought the Sylv queen decides on a plan to solve this new problem. She just had to compensate for the food loss caused by Elise's break in hunting. As a Hive Queen, she can’t effectively go hunting by herself. In addition, her absence would be noticed and she couldn’t continue learning if she is away from her new lair. Fortunately, there is a simple solution. She just has to start her own hive a little bit earlier. She doesn’t need anything big for now, just the basics to create some Sylv hunters. They would be able to go hunting, while she could continue learning new knowledge.
Sylvia plans to feed herself the extra amount of biomass she needs for her next growth phase through the prey, that her hunters get in the forest. With this setup, she is no big burden on the food supply of the family and she may be able to get more interesting genetic information. Her explanation for the rest of the family would be, that her appetite is only increased in her first growth phase. Of course, she must keep her hive a secret. The Hive Queen knows that Mark is not very fond of her producing more Sylv creatures and she doesn’t want to agitate him.
Sylvia's plan has a weak cover-up and still some smaller unsolved problems. She knows that herself, but she really wants to start her first hive and this is a good opportunity. If suspicions arrive regarding her lower appetite during meals with the family, she could adjust the amount of biomass she eats from her hunters and use the carryover to further develop the hive.
It will take about a week to produce the living structures she needs to create Sylv hunters if she shortens the process as much as she can. The Hive Queen can command not fully matured drones to morph into a living structure. This also decreases the morphing time of the structures. The drawback is, that the size of the structures is much smaller. As a result, their functions are strongly limited. In the case of the Spawning Grounds structure she wants to create, it will have a significantly reduced rate of production and in addition, will only be able to produce one kind of Sylv creature like the hunter. She needs to finish as soon as possible because the pause she needs to take between her first and second growth phases will end in about a week. This necessary pause to recuperate will double for each following growth phase.
The Hive Queen starts her preparations immediately. She commands her first drone Spinny to explore the forest ground surrounding the house to find a suitable place to start her underground Hive Complex. While her drone is busy, she starts to search for a hidden corner to lay her next egg. Spinny checks the ground in various places by digging into it a bit. The hive drone searches for just the right composition of the soil to provide optimal structural integrity, while still being located near the house. After some hours the drone finds a suitable place and starts to dig deeper. The Hive Complex is the only Sylv structure that is built and not morphed into by a drone. Therefore, it’s the only non-living structure the Sylv naturally build. It’s an underground cave system to house the rest of the hive and protect it from the elements.
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Sylvia's Hive Complex will start small with just enough space to host her humble beginnings and will be expanded later when the need arises. Her hive drone will be busy for at least three days building the structure all by himself. The queen gives a second order to store a little biomass in the new Hive Complex each day, which her drone usually finds in the stable. This biomass is necessary to get her hunter production started after the two necessary structures for producing them are ready.
While thinking about where she should lay her next drone egg, she considered that Mark found her last egg pretty fast. She suspects that he may find her next egg if she tries to hide it inside the house. She decides to smuggle it outside and let her hive drone carry it to the Hive Complex, which is in construction. The Sylv queen waits until she is alone and then proceeds to a dark corner to lay her egg. Right after she picks it up and sneaks to the door leading outside the house. She calls Spinny over to receive her egg. When Sylvia arrived at the door, she puts the egg down for a moment and is then able to grab the door handle. The transaction is done quickly and the door is closed again.
The young queen breathes a sigh of relief and makes her way back to the sofa in the living room. Once there, she curls up in the blanket and takes a little nap. She still prefers to sleep around lunchtime a bit and be longer active at night. Soon it is time for lunch and Erik comes over to wake Sylvia up. This time the meal doesn’t include any meat. After lunch, the Hive Queen starts to interact with Erik, learning and playing a bit. She manages to improve her language skills a bit more until dinner arrives. The dinner contains some boar meat, but she didn’t manage to gain a new trait immediately. After she extracts one trait of a species, she needs even more biomass from the same species to extract another trait.
On the next day, Sylvia lays another egg and transports it outside the same way. Next to her language skills she also learns some general knowledge from Erik and Mark. This includes the use of common tools like a cup, clothing and so on. This enables Sylvia to use such things without the help of others in the future. Until now she got still dressed by Elise or didn’t know how to get herself something to drink. This changed and she wants to further improve her knowledge. The Sylv queen also managed to extract one new trait from the boar at dinner, called ‘Reinforced hide’. This Strain thickens the skin, making it harder to penetrate. Sylv creatures already have chitinous armor in some places, but not everywhere.
The third day was special because Mark made this day a break from his work. He spends some time with the children and answers the many questions Sylvia has about her surroundings, human society and the kingdom they are in. Mark also does some chores like cleaning some rooms or watering the plants surrounding the house. Elise has planted some special flowers around the house, which have a repellent effect on most predators in the forest. Surrounding this garden is an additional waist-high fence to keep out smaller animals. This setup works most of the time and if it fails then there are still Mark and Elise who both have combat experience. Before Mark became a blacksmith, he served one year in the military of the kingdom. He still has his equipment stored inside the house and could also use most of the weapons he produces in his smithy.
Elise’s past is a bit darker. The elven longbow she is using once belonged to someone else. Someone who no longer exists. This event is one of the main reasons, why Elise has such a huge dislike for the xenophobia of the kingdom. She keeps using the bow as a sort of memento and to honor the dead. It is very important for her and has always served her well.
On the fourth day, Sylvia didn’t lay an egg. She only needs two drones for now. The first one is for the Spawning Grounds to produce the hunter and the second one is for the Digestion Pool to feed biomass to the Spawning Grounds. The next day her first drone should hatch and could immediately start to morph into the Digestion Pool. The following day the second drone would hatch and become the Spawning Grounds.