In the last 4 days many things happened, the dorm was finished, and now the oficial kitchen and the new super honey tanks were in construction, the new collectors had emerged and were helping Matt and Miles at full steam, the new cooks also hatched, soon as the cooks were born and Ken finished cleaning the nursery i made a another big wave of workers and they had already hatched for now, now we had a great team of builders, transporters, pollinators, gatherers and cooks. Everything was going very fast and well, and now I was just waiting for the new have of soldiers that i had layed to be born and I had created a small number of [Bards] and [Weavers] as well, to test their skills, and in the rest of the production combs I created more soldiers, it was somewhere between 10 bards, 10 Weavers, and 40 soldiers.

The dormitories that the worker made was very nice, it was connected to a large hall that the boys could use to socialize, and the large hall was connected to the communal refectory.

The new kitchen was being made near the lunchroom, and the workers were connecting everything with large corridors, unlike the narrow corridors that Levi initially planned, these corridors were large and easy to walk, capable of withstanding a large flow of bees.

Another thing the workers were doing was to put wax between the spans of the branches of the tree, they closed all the holes and then asphalted everything with wax bricks to create a smooth surface, even if they didn't need to do it since the only ones who needed to walk were the cooks, but when I asked why they did it, they told me that it was not just a matter of aesthetics, leaving these holes all over the base was dangerous, since enemies could attack from below.

In the meantime I also got a lot of Xp, and several worker reached Lv 3. Some others like Levi, Carl, Ken, Miles, and Steve were upset that they couldn't level up because they were doing jobs that didn't grant Xp. While Matt had already reached Level 4, and was super excited about the possibility of evolving.

Some workers were assigned just for me, to build my laboratory, it was a small group, around 5, but still managed to carry out all my demands.

They made wax pots, dishes and grinded ingredients that the scouts founded.

Trevis succeeded in his journey, and the soldiers managed to pluck a whole flower with roots and everything, and brought it to me a few days ago.

The poison forest was dangerous, but Trevis hiding abilities were good, and because he was so 'weak' the creatures that could find him didn't wasted they time eating him.

The flower was planted on the roots of the tree by the workers, and soon I asked the cooks to try to create a royal jelly capable of curing anyone who ate it.

[Description]

[Bee's Royal jelly]

A royal jelly created by cooking bees, this jelly can cause the [Regeneration] effect for 15 minutes if eaten.

* [Regeneration] - heals 1 [health] point per minute

Quality: Excellent

The effect of the jelly was not very good, perhaps because it took away the limitation of [species], so bees were very good at making medicines for other bees, but they could not do much for other species.

I tried asking them to use MP to create a powerful effect and I finally got something that could be useful for the Beastmen

[Description]

[Jelly of Vital Renewal]

This jelly can accelerates the natural healing processes, mending wounds and revitalizing the essence. The jelly has an immediate and potent impact, restoring 30% of the drinker's maximum health over a short duration.

* Gain the effect [Disabled] after consuming the jelly.

* Greatly increases the natural regeneration of the body for several days.

* Earn a permanent small immunity bonus.

Quality: Excellent

'That's fucking Jelly is strong as hell! That could help the Beastmen!'

"Boys how much of this you-"

When I looked up to the Cook who had made this single drop, he was passed out on the floor, and the other cooks were trying to carry him to a safe place.

"What had happened with him?!?"

"Mom! It's just Mental exhaustion.. He pushed himself too hard to create what you wanted and it ended up that way... After a rest he can return to work."

"What do you mean?! I-I didn't know it was going to happen, if he knew it was going to happen, why did he let him have a mental breakdown??!"

"He just wanted to fulfill your mother's request..."

'Fanatical mentality fuckers! These guys are willing to die while working for me!'

[Efects]

[Mental exhaustion] - 24:58 Hours

This individual mind has been totally overloaded, the damage is real.

"..Ask the soldiers to take him to the dormitory! Give him a full weak off!"

"There is no nescessity mother! When he wakes up he can-"

"Give him the recess! Nobody here is going to work till they drop dead!"

"A-all right..."

'This is bad, I can't ask the cooks to faint to create this jam, I only have one drop, I would need a much larger amount if I wanted to help the werewolves, and even if the cooks volunteer themselves for the work, we don't have [Tears of the saint] enough to produce the nessecary amount of nectar!

'Damn it! If I had chosen the [Farmers] back them they could have helped me out really good now!'

"Boys, I'm sorry to ask, but how much more of this jam do you think you can produce?"

"Huh? Well, now that we know that we shouldn't overdo it, we can create a smaller amount without fainting, but with the lack of raw material, the most we could create is a small wax jar filled with this jam every day, If we focus only in that!"

'That's very little, a small jug is the size of a golf ball, there's no way that can heal a group of 30 people...'

"Now all of you guys help me think! We have a group of 30 people, most of them injured, they are at least 20x bigger than us, and all we have to help them is this small dose of jelly! How can we help even more?!"

Everyone in the room seemed to be looking at me with a face like, 'you're asking too much of me, aren't you?' but Ray and Jay still seemed to be thinking about an solution

"Well... We can try to create jelly with minor healing effects!"

"Y-Yes! And then we could put it all together and create a medium-quality jelly, which isn't going to heal all of their injuries,but is going to help a lot already."

"Yeah, and we could just make each of them drink only a minimal dose! Leaving the most injured with the priority and those who can recover, without jelly."

'These guys were able to think of these solutions like if were the most natural thing in the world...'

"All right! You can move forward with this plan! Try to create at least one medium tank!"

"A-a medium tank? That would be a lot of jam... It would take us days to fill it"

"It doesn't matter!! It can take a while, just try not to take too long!"

"Understood!"

Soon as I left the temporary kitchen I thought about trying to create a healing potion, a potion could help more those people than that little amount of honey, but to create a potion it is not enough to have good intentions, creating a potion requires many ingredients and knowledge, things that I don't have right now.

Trevis kept searching for new healing flowers, we knew there were more of these flowers somewhere on the poison forest, they were just very rare and hard to find, but with enough time we could monopolize all the healing flowers in the region.

One thing about the flowers was that the [Tears of the saint] seemed to grow very well on the roots of this tree, the only flower we found until now, had take roots very quickly and started producing more flowers bulbs and leaves. For now we couldn't use anything, but in some time we would have a [Tears of the Saint] full of flowers and healing nectar!

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Another thing about roses and flowers, was that the [Burning Blooms] now were... 'Dying'.

The fire Rose seemed to survive by absorbing some kind of energy that came from the crystal, but in these last few days the glowing rock began to lose its luster and became darker and darker, and the Rose that once emitted a red glow and heat from its core was now dull and the heat was so weak that we could touch the core without hurting ourselves. One of the things is that this Rose seemed to be prepared for this situation, a few days it began to lose all the petals and the nucle that was previously the source of heat began to turn into a kind of 'fruit', it looked a lot like what fruit flowers did in my word, but it was a rose, so it was very strange, currently the 'fruit' was still growing and the Crystal seemed to be about to runs off.

"Now I need to send soldiers after another of these burning roses."

After giving Hans a mental tug and waiting for his arrival, a large bee of dangerous appearance, who carried a metal harpoon much larger tham himself in 2 of his hands appeared to greet me.

"Mom! How can I help you?"

"Hello Hans, I need you and some soldiers to go to that cave you had found some time ago and bring more one of these fire roses."

"Sure. Immediately?"

"Oh, no, you can wait until I give the orders~"

"All right! While I'm here, I'd like to make a request!"

"Of course! What is it Hans?"

"I would like you to give the permision for us the soldiers to start training again! So we can level up and evolve!"

"Hmm, can't you guys wait just a few more days? The cooks are very busy for now, and overloading them with a high food demand is not a wise idea."

Hans seemed surprised by my statement, the oficial kitchen was almost complet and the new stocks soon would be made, there's no reason to stop the growth of the soldiers.

At least that's what Hans thought.

"Why are the cooks overwhelmed? What happened?"

"Haven't you heard from Steve? I plan to help the werewolves in the north."

"Them? Steve told me... But why do you care so much about them? They not even members of our family, they are only potential enemies, very dangerous enemies, if we leave them as they are now, soon all of them would probaly die and we will no longer have to worry about the threat they pose."

'That's... Hans always been this cold? He always cared so much about the good of everyone and was always kind anf soft to everyone except the soldiers, but I didn't think Hans could just ignore someone dying like it was the most normal thing in the world.'

"Th.. .That's cruel Hans... Would we let a group of workers die if they were too far away or if it was too expensive to save them?"

"Yes, of course, sacrificing a small piece is a small price to pay for the good of the whole colony."

"H-Hans?!"

"It's just what I think Mom.. Of course i would feel bad for letting my brothers die, but I would feel even worse if an even greater number of my brother died because of my bad choices."

"Hans... Ah.. The story of cutting off an arm to save the body..."

"Yes, but that's not the point here, the point is that we shouldn't mix with these 'Beastmen', they aren't our brothers or our responsibility, if they survive by themselves that's fine, but I am against offering a helping hand, we must first take care of ourselves, in fact, we must only take care of ourselves!"

'Is Hans right? I'm so worried about feeling bad for letting them die, that I'm forcing cooks into an abusive work routine, if I were powerful or rich it would be easy to help some misereable people, but I'm not powerful or rich, I'm a bee.'

'I can't offer them what they need, with a lot of effort I can get them some jelly that helped them take care of their injuries, but that's it, I can't do anything more for them...

We are responsible for those we care.

'If I can't take responsibility for taking care of these guys, then it would just be cruelty trying to take care of them, I couldn't do anything but extend their suffering...'

"No! It's not right Hans! Yes, we should think more about ourselves than we think about others, but if we don't open up a little space to think about the others, then when are we going to think about them!??"

"Mom.. Helping them is a mistake, if we offer a jelly capable of healing the wounded, do you think they would thank us and leave us alone? They probably gona come after us! They would try to extract more 'medicine' from us no matter the methods!"

"We are far away! We can deliver the jelly through Trevis, he'd have the skills to come back untraced!"

"That's counting with luck! The power of those creatures is unknown! Trevis could easily be tracked down by one of their high-level members!"

"How can they be high-level?! You didn't hear Trevis report, they were all bruised and denitrified, if in the 2 of us who are only insects managed to get through the poisonous forest without majory problems, then think about the power of these guys who arrived here all tattered!"

"This is naivety mom! Exactly, we are insects, we are not a worthy meal for powerful creatures, and we can fly! That group had to walk all the way here, and they are big enough to attract the appetites of many monsters, and guess what?! They passed through the forest! Despite all the dangers of the place they still pass through there! Do you really think we could fight them if they were in their best state?! Do you think we can fight them in the current state?!"

"I... Ugh.. I can't just let them die Hans. I-I can't leave someone abandoned to die... let them suffer and hope for help, let them hope that someone will help them only to die alone..."

Like when I died begging for help, and no one ever came.

"Mom!... We need help too. Us! Your children! Not a bunch of strangers! I.. I don't know how much longer I can guarantee everyone's safety, the enemies will increase in numbers every day, and we continue the same way, even with the large number of soldiers on the way, if we can't guarantee sovereignty over this region, then we can only fight to the death against our competitors!"

"H-Hans... I didn't know this place was so dangerous... We've never had any 'accidents'..."

"And what do you think the reason is, mother? We soldiers protect everyone 24 hours a day, every day! We need to keep the colony always protected, and that's why we can hardly sleep due to our low numbers to maintain rotation. And when we don't sleep, we can't perform our duty with mastery! The only exception is me! I can stay awake longer because I'm from a superior class! But if we can't increase our numbers quickly, and individual strength, the creatures living in the valley will come after us, trying to get an easy meal!"

"That... But with the new 40 soldiers that will be born in a few days, can't we guarantee our safety?"

"Honestly? No! Just as we soldiers are not intimidated by numerous low-level enemies, a powerful being will not care about several low-level soldiers."

What should I do? The weremen might end up dying, but if I dedicate all our resources to helping them, we will be the ones to sufer. Hans is right, I shouldn't care about someone who has nothing to do with me... I could help them, but before helping others, I need to help myself. My children are at risk here, until now, no one had died, but that was only due to a combination of a hard work done by the soldiers and incredible luck. The scouts were at the greatest risk going so far from home, and the soldiers had so few members that they couldn't maintain the security of more than the 100 bees we have. We have so many workers now and several other troops that it would give about 8 bees for each soldier to protect; it's simply ridiculous.

With the new 40 soldiers on the way, everyone's job would be easier, but if I didn't allow them to level up, then it would turn into a numbers game against a powerful enemy, and probably a large part of my children would die in a fight to defend the nest, all because I didn't allow them to develop and gain combat experience.

"...I understand Hans... The weremen will have to... Help themselves. I allow you and the soldiers to level up much as you guys can. So please continue with the good work, and I'm sorry for not thinking of us as a whole before making an important decision..."

"Thank you very much mother! I understand it might be difficult for you to give up helping the beasts, but how about this? If we level up higher, we can send some soldiers to try to protect them!"

"That would take forever... Until one of you evolves enough to be able to help the beasts..."

"Then we'll just have to wait until we're stable enough to help others! I won't give in, mother! I won't help anyone other than my own brothers!"

Selfish boy, maybe I'm the problem, as the mother of this colony, I should only think of what's best for them, but I still bother to think about helping unknown and potentially dangerous people. There's no problem in helping them if I could ensure that I would really help them and that they wouldn't be a threat for us in the future, but helping them now is simply unattainable.

"Awnn I understand, Hans, you certainly are a knight with an iron fist, it's not a bad thing, and I understand your point of view, please take good care of the soldiers."

"I will, mother! I'll make you proud of all of us!"

I am already, you idiot.

After Hans left, I was alone, thinking about my choices. As the mother and queen, I made the right decision not to help unknown people, but as a 'human being', I failed to help someone in a time of need.

Maybe this karma will come back to me someday, there's not much to do with this for now. I can forgive myself someday for letting a bunch of strangers die, but I don't think I would ever forgive myself if my family died because of my mistakes in priority choices.

----------------------------------------

"And now I declare the kitchen officially open!"

"YES!"

"Finally! Now we can focus on the super silos!"

The workers were doing an 'inauguration' of the new kitchen, they were even drinking small bubbles of honey as if it were 'champagne', to celebrate the event, the soldiers had gone to get the cookers and the whole kitchen was super well equipped, had stairs made of wax, ramps, benches and tables, everything adapted for those who didn't have wings, the cooks could move everywhere without problems, and the ceiling of the kitchen was very high, enough for workers to fly between the place without disturbing the cooks, the whole room was connected by a large entrance to another room still under construction, which had a bunch of large honey tanks.

The workers began to 'innovate' in the creation of Tanks, formerly they used only bricks and made a kind type of pool for the honey and resourses, but now they created real silos of Hard Wax, some workers inherited knowledge of silos, engineering, and architecture, and different from a workplace where the boss's words were law, the bees argued freely about the best design and shape to maximize their efficiency.

This new tank had the cylindrical shape of a silo, with funnel-shaped parts on top and bottom, the whole silo was made of a thick layer of hard wax, and coated with ordinary wax, the funnel shape allowed the workers to place a 'tap' on the bottom, which allowed a fast emptying, the tap was unconventional, it was a system with a hollow wax tuple, and a wax cylinder that the bees used as a 'stopper', the whole tap ended in a kind of bowl, since bees didn't need to fill buckets to carry honey, just fill their breasts, and the top of the cilum had a large sliding wax lid.

It would be hard for Cooks to get up there, considering each silo was about 4x the size of a cooker. But the job of the Cooks was to make food, the one who transported it to the silos were the bees of Miles's group.

Carl still continued with his work, as incredible it may sounds, cooks cannot make honey, only jam, they can turn nectar directly into jam, but they cannot turn nectar into honey, so this work continued with Carl. And speaking of him, Carl was at Level 8 of [Create honey] and I asked him if he had gained a sub-skill at Level 5, and he actually really did! But it wasn't the sub-skill [Flakes creation], but a skill called [Condensing honey], which allowed him to create the [Concentrated honey], he said he didn't use the skill because he would have to mix the honey with regular honey and was afraid of 'compromising' the food reserves, and Carl didn't want to have to empty all the honey he made into a separate tank, so he chose to use just the main skill.

This showed me that the sub-skills weren't fixes, they depended on who gained them.

After this event I called all the workers who work with Carl, and are at least Level 5 of creat honey for an 'interview'.

"Ok guys, please each one of you tell me what sub-skill of [Create honey] you have, and give me a brief description of what it can do!"

"I have [Honey infusion], I can infuse the taste of nectar into the Honey I create more easily!

"I-I have [Honey Presenvation], the honey I create takes longer to rot...

"Yes! I have [Create candy]! I can make small candies using honey!"

"I.. I have [Senses for honey], when I look at honey, I can tell its quality, how long it takes until rots, and its nutritional value."

"My sub-skill is [Right measure], I can make more honey with less nectar!

"I-i h-have [Syrup Production ,I-I can turn honey into a super sweet and nutritious syrup, but the a-amount is quite small.

"Humm, I understand, thank you very much for the personal information! They helped a lot, you all can continue your work!"

"Okay~!

"Goodbye"

"T-thank you"

The boys helped me see that certain [skills] granted sub-skills, it wasn't all the skills that gave these sub-skills, it seemed that it was something unique to the [production] area, is it a way of the system to create professionals in a varied areas? I haven't found any bees with [Create flakes] or repeated sub-skills, but that doesn't mean they are unique skills, it may just be that there are a large number of sub-skills to gain. So when the boys got level 10 in [Create honey] would the skill still become [Create food] or something else? Because even though they are all different sub-skills they all have the commom fact of food production.