Adon turned his head and saw dozens of Red Slayer Spider Wasps falling from the sky all around him.

The ones closest to him seemed to be the worst affected. Those that had gripped his limbs released their holds, and their bodies began to tumble limply through the air, lifeless. Adon did not know precisely how he knew those wasps were dead, but he knew.

Perhaps he had simply seen enough death, done so much killing, that he knew it at a first glance.

He managed to turn his head back before he started losing altitude, so he could see what had happened to Regina. The Queen was dropping as she moved her wings more erratically, and she was holding her forelimbs to the sides of her head as if she was in intense pain, but she was unfortunately very much alive. She was also much further away from Adon, all the way on the palace rooftop.

Then he began to fall, and the Queen quickly receded from view.

I wonder how I killed the ones that died, he thought. I know the mind is powerful and can have drastic effects on the body. But, just what did I do?

Ideas flashed through his mind for the mechanism of death. Perhaps he had overtaxed their brains and caused them to fail. Brain death was what scientists considered the definitive form of death, wasn’t it? If the brain died, even if the rest of the body was theoretically fine, then eventually the person would simply die of natural causes.

But it didn’t matter. He was grateful that whatever the mechanism of the attack, it had been supremely effective. He suspected that the handful of wasps who had been holding onto him were not the only ones he had killed.

Too bad I couldn’t do more for the voles. If I had only known I could apply mental magic that way… But there was no point in hypotheticals. He had needed to be desperate to recognize the offensive capability inherent in mental magic.

Adon struck the ground, bounced once, and rolled to a stop by a thornbush. As usual, the fall did him no significant harm. He darted his head from side to side to make certain that nothing was flying toward him, and he found that he seemed to be all right for now. Then he rushed forward into the thornbush.

The wasp colony wouldn’t all be dead. His movements were still clumsy, his body not completely recovered to its normal power and speed after the countless wasp stings.

He activated Color Change to blend in with the thorny branches. Then he reached out to find healing magic, and he jump started his recovery.

How do I protect myself and my friends now? he considered. Regina will still go after Goldie and Red, I know that. What do I do here? Rush back to them? Or do I try to get Regina? Will that stop the rest of her colony from pursuing us?

He thought the latter strategy might be his best shot. The Queen didn’t seem like the type to give up easily, but without her, the red slayers would lack leadership. They wouldn’t have any particular reason to continue after him or his friends, or so he hoped. At the least, they would have no reason to connect him and the spiders in their minds.

This is the best I can do, he decided.

He leaped down from the branch where he was resting. He had only spent a few seconds healing himself, but given that he had decided to climb up to the palace roof, he needed to move fast. Fortunately, his non-magical regeneration seemed to be working with the healing magic to restore his strength.

Hopefully I make it up there in time, before Regina tries to go for Goldie or just flies away to recover from whatever damage I did…

Adon raced across the garden path, his Color Change struggling to keep up with his movements as he crossed ground more quickly than he ever had before. He didn’t mind so much if the wasps spotted him and attacked him again—with Mana still flowing through his exoskeleton, he felt nearly invulnerable—but he was afraid that the workers might see him coming and warn the Queen. If she escaped, he, Goldie, and Red would never be safe again.

He reached the palace wall after what felt like forever but was probably less than a minute of faster-than-ever-before movement. Adon began scampering up the side of the building. He still maintained Color Change, easier in this position because the palace was a well maintained building with the entire wall in a similar color and texture.

With his simple eyes, Adon made out that there was movement from behind him now. It didn’t appear to be rapidly approaching him, but the sight confirmed that there were still airborne creatures floating around somewhere, probably somewhere far from him. Some of them were almost certainly Regina’s subjects. By Adon’s estimation, at least a dozen wasps still fluttered gracefully through the air.

And those are just the ones I can see, he thought.

Their buzzing was still audible from where he was positioned now, but it was a distant droning noise.

Adon recalled the royal bodyguard wasps beside Regina, and he imagined that if she had survived his mental attack with only a mild headache, most of her bodyguards were probably fine too.

As he made it to the edge of the rooftop, Adon was acutely aware that this could be a bad idea. Even a suicidal idea.

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If I don’t do this, we’ll be looking over our shoulders for the rest of our lives, he reminded himself. This fight has to happen. If it happens now, at least I have a little bit of an advantage. The magic took her by surprise. She won’t be expecting me to have partially healed up.

The Queen also seemed to have deactivated Telepathy—or, more likely, she had simply kicked Adon out of her network to try and limit the amount of damage he could do.

But I have Telepathy too. I might be able to pull off the same kind of attack again using just my Telepathy. If I have to.

He wasn’t certain if he could establish a telepathic network between multiple bugs, the way Regina seemed to be able to. He had practiced a great deal with Telepathy and repeatedly enhanced the Adaptation, but he had not practiced that specific ability. Goldie had initially been reluctant to try talking to Red. When she changed her mind, Adon discovered that Red could not communicate verbally. Princess Rosslyn had never met Goldie and Red. So all of the conversations he had attempted had been one on one.

We’ll see, I guess. Mental magic wasn’t the only trick he had up his nonexistent sleeves.

Adon poked his head up and saw them immediately.

The Queen and her retinue of bodyguards, plus a dozen more of her workers, hovered at the edge of the roof. The buzzing was very noticeable now. Perhaps a bit louder than usual for their number, but he imagined that was just the bodyguards being larger and noisier than their fellow red slayers.

They seemed to just be standing there, and then Adon realized, They must be waiting for me.

It was the only possibility that made sense. Regina knew she had started something with Adon that could only end in one of their deaths. Perhaps the Queen thought that if she fled back to her nest, he would be able to track her there.

Adon had no such abilities, but considering his success as a hunter, it would be reasonable for her to think he did.

So they waited out in the open for him to walk into their trap. She probably thought that with her bodyguards supplemented by a dozen workers, she had more than enough numbers to take him down.

But she had another thing coming.

Adon ducked back down below the edge of the roof, out of view once again, and he began charging his Mana ball. He skittered along the roof’s edge, maneuvering to place himself so that most of the wasps would have their back to him, and the group as a whole would be too close to react quickly to his attack.

As he drew closer to the corner of the roof, Adon heard the sound of buzzing intensify.

This is really too loud, isn’t it? A few pieces clicked into place in his mind. So that’s the trap.

The force of wasps Adon had seen in front of him when he peeked out over the rooftop had looked formidable, but beatable without too much struggle. Now, as he focused on the sound of buzzing that came not just from the rooftop above him, but also just around the corner below the level of the roof, he realized there were another two dozen wasps lying in wait. The Queen had ordered them to hide on the other side of the wall that Adon was crawling along now.

If he suddenly attacked the mass of the Queen’s defenders that were arrayed on the rooftop, her reinforcements would appear and change the dynamics of the fight.

I don’t think the numbers are that big of a deal, though, he thought after a moment. Fighting them in the tunnel wasn’t great, because it was hard to hit them. My best attacks are long range. Wasps fight up close. I’ve only seen them use their stingers. So they had the advantage. Up here, though, their numbers just mean it’ll be hard to avoid hitting them. Especially if they try attacking me instead of just defending the Queen or even running away.

He tried to consider how he would have handled this situation if he was Regina, but it was difficult to put himself inside of her perspective. He still had trouble grasping what fundamentally motivated her. Was it envy? Insecurity? Fear? Hatred?

Fundamentally, do you want to destroy me because I’m a threat, or are you mainly trying to kill me to get me out of the way of your imagined future friendship with Rosslyn?

He thought the wasp was probably more motivated by fear than anything else. She had lied to him more than once during the conversation, but the one thing she had said that he thought she must genuinely believe was that if they remained in the same space for long, she believed he would come after her.

If that’s the case, her head is in the same space mine is. If she wants to stay here and live in relative peace, she has to kill me now. Otherwise, she’ll be looking over her shoulder for the rest of her life.

If that was the case, everything was as it seemed. The wasps were just positioned for an ambush. This should turn into a straight fight as soon as he showed himself. The numbers might be against him, but there shouldn’t be any more tricks besides the effort to conceal how many there were.

Adon felt that his Mana ball was ready to fire now. He had a good sense for how much power was actually needed to make it a powerful attack that could cut through multiple insects’ bodies at this point, and he imagined he would need to economize on Mana. He had already used multiple ostentatious Mana-burning powers over the course of this encounter, and if he hadn’t increased his total reserves, he would be empty already. So this attack had slightly less power infused in it than his previous Mana balls had consumed.

He leaped over the side of the rooftop and fired his Mana ball into the thickest part of the crowded mass of wasps that hovered in front of the Queen protectively.

The ball tore through the air and then collided with the closest wasps before they had time to react. Adon saw the orb strike and pass through, leaving no impact.

What?

There was a slight ripple in the air where the ball passed through the wasp. That was Adon’s only visual cue.

There was an audible clue as well. As the ball continued in its path of travel, it passed through what looked like a patch of empty air—only for Adon to hear a sizzle as if the orb was tearing through moist flesh.

Then he saw a wasp corpse tumble to the ground. From out of the air where nothing had been visible before.

Adon felt a cold dread begin to creep over him.

The Queen can use illusions.

The sound of buzzing intensified, even as the image of wasps before his eyes remained exactly the same.