After Mar had motivated the rest of the Swarm to see things their way, it had become time for them to return their attention to the ongoing construction efforts. Workers and human Subjects alike were working diligently to tear down the walls so that the wood could be processed into Biomass. So Mar accessed the new part of the Interface and began to explore it.

* Available Settlements: 1(Hor)

* Settlements being settled: 1(Heraclius Fortress)

* Note: The Hor Settlement has no active Buildings within it and can have a new type assigned to it.

* Settlement: Hor

* Type: Agricultural Town(Favored Resource: Biomass, Manpower)

* Buildings: None(All existing structures are defunct due to the Swarm ownership)

* Resources:

* Biomass: Depleted

* Currencies: Poor

* Dross: Barren

* Energy: Barren

* Faith: Poor

* Manpower: Average

* Minerals: Barren

* Ores: Poor(Noted Subtype: Bog Iron)

Mar was surprised by the findings as the initial information appeared before them and it took a bit of mental prodding to make sense of it. Unlike the strategy games that they had played in their previous existence, the resources section here did not rely on hard numbers nor did it purely reflect the current haul of resources available to the Settlement. They reflected a combination of the current access to Resources and the general ability to produce said resources.

It was also strange that none of the buildings in the town counted as Buildings in the system sense, but Mar had planned to...redecorate anyway. So they dove further into exploring this new addition to their interface and this was where the first real deviation from the established system appeared.

Blueprint Cost Function Notes Civilian Subject Cubicle Space Biomass(Notable/Varied Amount) Houses up to 500 people, can be expanded to massively increase housing. Nutirent Valve Biomass, Minerals(Insignificant Amount) A valve connected to the Fungal-Floral Network, it serves as both a well and a food distribution center. Biomass Refinery Biomass(Varied Amount) A Building designed to process and refine sources of Biomass. Can be incredibly varied in size and scope. Ore Refinery Biomass, Minerals, Ores(Varied Amount) A Building designed to process and refine Ores. Can be incredibly varied in size and scope. Resource Gathering Station Biomass(Varied Amount) A Building meant to gather physical Resources(Biomass, Currencies, Dross, Minerals, Ores) Energy Pylon Biomass(Small Amount) Energy Pylons serve as stations to gather and channel Energy, either to power the use of Buildings or going directly to the Swarm. Requires at least 1 million available insectile lifeforms to function. Blueprint Research Station Biomass(Medium Amount) A Building dedicated to researching new Blueprints for the Swarm.

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The lack of a "red text" and the sudden table format threw Mar off as they were both annoyed with the new format and annoyed with the fact that it wasn't used for other aspects of their Interface. Speaking from an organizational perspective it would have been useful for certain sections of the system, but it was more important to consider the buildings. The lack of hard numbers made it harder to...visualize the costs involved but Mar saw the potential use for all of these buildings.

As Mar saw it the most important steps were to stabilize and fully convert Hor. Agriculture would continue to be valuable for Biomass production so the focus was no issue, what mattered was getting the Settlement stable. Food, shelter, and the beginnings of industry.

In other words, it was time to step up the production of Workers and begin to create Spiderling Engineers as they would be vital in what was to come. Then the first steps would be creating Nutrient Valves, a Resource Gathering Station, and a Biomass Refinery. Without the Fungal Honey Bees, the production of Biomass had become far less efficient as the Workers were less adept at that task, and they would need significant amounts of Biomass to create proper housing.

So, Mar redirected the focus away from dismantling living spaces within Hor itself and began sending people out to scavenge and dismantle the Farms around Hor. The fields would be important later but the buildings weren't and it was time to urbanize the area anyway.

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Helena was along with the other Acolytes and Priests within Hor set to lead prayer groups with the children and the less physically able members of the community. Faith would keep the Swarm happy and fed which was important, they felt that their own needs to eat were far more reduced than usual. It was almost like a trickle of divine essence flowed from their prayers and into the Swarm and then back out to the various extremities of it.

It was confusing to do something so familiar as praying when the entire framework had been flipped around. Old Yoss walked among them but as a far different creature, zie had become a taller and androgynous thing with strange multi-colored eyes and sickly grey skin. It was almost like someone had merged a farmer with a scribe and put them in a pickling jar for decades, and all of the former Acolytes of Old Yoss found it deeply uncomfortable.

The Vizier was busy with leading Farmers out to begin planning out new fields that would aid in feeding the town. All of the Non-Farmers who weren't busy praying were sent out with those strange "Workers" to all of the farms and hamlets that supported Hor before the conquest. It was like a caravan considering all the carts that had been commandeered to go out with them.

What truly distracted Helena from her task was when Workers and a strange new breed of Units suddenly came into being as if shaped out of the very air itself. First, pools of... slime? Sploshed down on the ground from a slight tear in the air and the semi-liquid began shaping itself and hardening into living beings.

Large dog-sized spiders came with their much larger workers, unlike the workers these spiders had notable bee-wings sticking out from their top carapace and unlike spiders, these beings had *hands*. The entire congregation stared at these spider-bees as they began leading teams of workers away. One such team began digging near the prayer group until they reached a strange...mass in the earth. Two workers dug down while two more went of to carry turf and stone over to the spider. The former digging workers crushed some of the uneven stone into powder while the even rocks were kept whole.

The Spideringling Engineer then began to work with gusto as it produced webbing and honeycomb, while also removing the roots from the turf and using the two former to mix the earth and stone together. It was a truly eerie process to watch as the "little" creature used its hands and other appendages to great effect as it connected the strange tube-like construct it had to the mass in the earth.

Next, the creature connected the bits of root and the even stones to make some sort of...pedal that stuck slightly up and remained parallel with the ground itself. It then stepped back and the 4 workers began "shoveling" all of the excess earth back and packing it hard around the construction so it stood stably and without giving any indication that there had ever been digging done in the area.

Helena and the others watched with their mouths wide open as the team of Units casually moved away from what they had created and began moving further into the city as if nothing of note had been done there. The Collective of Hor pushed against their minds as they were given a vital piece of information.

"You are meant to derive sustenance from these valves."

The thought was deposited and then the Collective turned to its other management duties without allowing the assembled humans to even react. How were they supposed...to eat from that?