"So, Lena. What did you get?" Blue asked when they left the dungeon.
"A notification letting me know I was invited to the royal ball. I think that is the hard mode," Helena said.
"...And?" Blue pressed, excited by whatever the teaching was.
"I got a skill. It looks a lot like a spell, and I'm trying to understand how it works," Helena replied while she still was staring at nothing, obviously reading the notification, "Ah fuck it. Be ready if this gets weird," Helena raised one hand horizontally and spread her fingers. Her shadow started to grow and then bubble up. Everyone stepped back, unsure of what to expect from that skill.
The bubbles became stronger and stronger, reaching the point that it looked like a fish was trashing right beneath the surface. Suddenly, the shadow became still, and a large claw-like hand emerged. It twisted and reached down to the ground before it started to pull the rest of the body from behind. After a few moments, an oddly shaped head emerged. It was horned and had no apparent eyes, but it was hard to tell. Whatever was coming out was made out of shadows, and its features were lacking. When the creature finally came into full view, everyone pulled their weapons, unsure what would happen.
This shadow monster had broad shoulders with a spike going outward. Six legs, two very much like that of a person but another four behind it, creating an odd mixture of a centaur with a bee with a large abdomen with the stinger in the end. Its hands, if they could be called that, seemed to be melded into weapons. A massive tower shield and a lance that was pointing to the side. The creature's head moved as if it was looking around before it turned to face Helena. The lance retracted, and the shield melded into its back just as the shadow wasp kneeled in front of the mage.
"Oh, this is fun," Helena smiled.
"That's yours?" Shane asked.
"Yeah, it's the skill I got. It's called Wasp Guard. It makes a construct with my mana to protect me. The way it's worded makes it seem like I can get more of them in the future," Helena explained.
"How long does it last?" Bonnie asked.
"Half an hour. Then it has a 5-hour cooldown, but I can spend 20% of my mana to call it again. That doesn't interfere with the cooldown."
"What if you use mana to call it again? Another will show up, or that one is gone?" Adrimel asked.
"I don't know. Let's see," Helena used the skill again, but before her shadow even grew, the shadow wasp in front of her vanished. There was another disturbing moment when the Wasp Guard came out of her shadow one more time. It had the same shape as the one she summoned before.
"Can they talk?" Hera looked at the Wasp Guard.
"No… it can't. It's not like your court. It's more like a robot that I can command. At most, it can defend me when I'm being attacked. I mean, that's the limit of its automation, not that it can only do that. I think the idea is that I'm like the Queen Bee, well, Queen Wasp, and they are the royal guards," Helena explained.
"Oh, for fuck's sake. We already have the Empress over here. Now we have a Queen too?" Alex gasped in a joking tone.
"Don't complain. You are surrounded by royalty. Not everyone can say the same," Helena chuckled.
"Can they run fast?" Nimbus asked.
"I don't know. The skill doesn't mention the speed, only that their power is increased based on my maximum mana," Helena replied.
"I see.." Nimbus squinted at the shadow wasp.
"Jealous?" Daskka teased.
"I'm not jealous. That is just a piece of armor, and it can't stay out for a long time," Nimbus huffed.
"Yeah, he's jealous," Hera said with a chuckle.
"Empress!" Nimbus gasped.
"Ok, ok. Let's move back to the doorway. We can hunt monsters on the way to gather supplies. Adriel, can we use one of your drones as our bag?" Alex turned to the elf.
"Sure, I was already thinking about that," Adriel nodded and changed the lights of one of his drones to blue, "We can use this one. It can carry up to 50 kg, and I can set up a barrier to protect things from any sneak attacks. I want to keep my main drone free this time."
Everyone nodded, and they started walking back while talking about the items they got. Hera got the armor, Alex got a belt that could create a stinger out of any part of her body to deal one big hit, and Mylo got a pair of glasses that looked a lot like the compound eyes that bugs had. When wearing those, it would be much harder for anything to hide from him. It also worked as binoculars, but that was it. Those were the only pieces of equipment they got. The rest of the rewards were materials, from honeycomb meshes to wasp parts. Thankfully nothing that was too big. The royal honey that a few of them received wasn't that different from the honey gems. The only difference was that they had a number of uses. Ten each, and they would keep the temperature of whatever was placed inside them. So they could have one with ice or cold drinks if they wanted to. Keeping something warm didn't sound like a good idea, even if, in theory, it should also keep it from spoiling.
It didn't take long for them to find a group of those same odd Frog donkeys. Since Helena's guard was still around, she asked the group to let her test the new spell. The mage wasn't going to do anything and just let it fight, and she asked the rest of the party to do the same. Then she turned to the construct and ordered it to kill the pack of Frogranires. The shadow wasp just nodded and moved towards the monsters bringing out its shield and lance. With the weapons in hand, the construct rushed towards the first of the monsters. It moved quickly, not as fast as Alex with her new skills or as Nimbus in his griffon form, but the shadow wasp was still very nimble.
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In a quick movement, it bisected one of the monsters, splitting it with the lance. Then the construct turned to the side and used the stinger to kill another Frogranire. The monsters noticed the attack and started to defend themselves. Two of them jumped on top of the shadow wasp and kicked down with their back legs. Those creatures had tremendous leg strength, and just a single attack was enough to break some of the construct's form. Still, even after losing part of its torso and one of its legs, the shadow wasp continued its attack with reckless abandon, trampling one of the Frogranires to death. Helena's command was to kill the pack, and the construct would follow that order, no matter the cost. Using the shield to bash one of the monster's head in. Another of the Frogranire used its tongue to pull the shield back, forcing a tug of war with the shadow guard.
The wasp was still fighting against five monsters, even after killing two of them. Another of the creatures went in for a headbutt, pushing the shadow wasp to the side, almost making it fall, but the guard endured. It used the lance as a blunt weapon, slamming it against the Frogranire that was about to headbutt it. That wasn't enough to kill it, but it was knocked out by the impact. Another monster ran to the side of the shadow wasp, spinning around and kicking two of the construct's legs, making them bend backward. It wasn't enough to break them, but the damage was clear. The shadow wasp pierced one of the smaller monsters, who seemed to be still in its growing stages. The attack wasn't enough to kill it right away, but it opened a large gash on its stomach, a small part of its intestines spilling out. The foal tried to get up and fight back, but it was too weak. Another of the Frogranire got closer to its child and rubbed his head against it. In just a couple of seconds, the smaller creature closed its eyes as the amount of blood it lost was too much, and it finally perished.
The Frogranire that was helping the foal croaked loudly and jumped to the shadow wasp, who now had pierced the tongue of the monster holding its shield. The parent who just lost its child jumped again, getting extremely close to the construct's head, and in a flash, kicked it with both legs, decapitating the shadow wasp in a single move and finally destroying the construct. Just as that Frogranire landed, a jade blade of wind came flying and bisected it as it turned to look at the foal on the ground. The monster, which had its tongue pierced by the lance, looked around as a pair of bladed tonfas appeared on its neck, decapitating it. Just as the last creature realized the danger wasn't over, it turned around to see a staff flying in its direction. It tried to jump away, but the flowers around the staff were too mesmerizing. Mylo's weapon pierced the monster's skull in a single move and became embedded in the wall behind it.
"Ok… can we not do that again?" Bonnie asked, looking at the group of dead monsters.
"Yeah… Watching that is not something I want to happen again," Blue shivered.
"You don't have to ask twice. I didn't expect them to act out a traumatizing kids' movie," Helena shook her head, "Either way, now we know. The wasp guard I summon can do some damage."
"You also need to check if it keeps knowledge. Like if you ask it to fight while trying to defend against attacks, would it remember that order the next time you call it?" Hera suggested.
"That's a good point. Maybe you can teach it a dance and tell it to do that every time you say 'Macarena,'" Blue suggested.
"That is a very convoluted way to do that. It's easier to just ask them to spin when she says a word or something," Alex frowned.
"Yeah, but then we won't see it doing the macarena," Blue replied.
"That is a very good point. Seeing them doing that dance would be amazing," Hera chuckled.
"Ok, ok. Let's get going, shall we? If we are using these as supplies, we will need to butcher them," Shane had a smile on her face. It seemed like she was really excited about butchering the bodies, but in reality, it was because she was picturing the shadow wasp doing the macarena.
They worked quickly. Aside from Helena and Bonnie, everyone in the party had various degrees of expertise in butchering the animals. There were seven bodies on the ground, and a couple were in really bad shape. Since Hera and Blue were the most proficient ones, they played rock paper scissors to decide who would work with the one that was mostly splatter on the floor. Unfortunately, the Empress lost, so she had to deal with that mess. She looked it over and called Edge. Since he was a skinning knife, it would be a great tool for this kind of thing. It didn't take long for her to understand what each piece of the monster was and even less time to understand what she would need to do to gather as much meat as possible with them.
In just two minutes, she cut everything, and she was even able to make some portion sized cuts that were ready to be cooked. Somehow, she even knew where to cut to allow the meat to bleed faster. And using some of her water spells, she had the idea of controlling the water inside the blood to speed up that process, managing to create a new spell out of it.
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Exsanguination
Intermediate spell
By using mana, you can help push out the blood inside a dead body. This spell only works in bodies that have a type of blood that is known to the user.
Mana cost: 200 mana/s
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After finishing up with her body, she placed everything on Adriel's drone and went for the next one. It was the parent and child pair who died in the combat. It seemed like no one wanted to butcher them since they showed such a tragic sight. In the end, the party was responsible for their pain, even if it was short-lived. Hera wasn't immune to that guilt, but she would feel even worse if they did all that for nothing. Since they killed the animals, the bare minimum would be to use every part of their bodies. It took her less than five minutes to finish butchering both of them. It was almost as if she saw the lines where she had to cut, and Edge was surfing through the meat.
When she was in the last part of the process, about to start cutting the meat into portions, Edge's voice stopped her, "Hera… are you seeing this?"
"What?"
"This," Edge left her hand and tapped the meat. There was a small black line where she was about to cut.
"You mean the line?"
"Yeah… I don't think that's supposed to be here."
"What? How so?"
"I don't know… It's just a feeling. Daskka, can you see it?"
Daskka floated over and inspected the meat, "Nope. I don't see any line."
Hera stopped to think for a moment, this was going surprisingly well, and she wasn't that skilled in butchering to do such a good jog with such speed. It could have something to do with her title, but this effect didn't happen when they first got the meat. Then again, now that she looked at the line, she realized that she saw it a few times during the dungeon, always in places where she should hit to deal a lot of damage, and when she was using the Pool of Styx, there was something helping her locate the right connections with her mana.
"Ah shit," Hera groaned.
Edge turned to the Empress, reaching the same conclusion that she did, "Does that mean…."
Hera let out a long sigh, "Yeah… I think the curse finally caught us."