Two days later, at dawn when the Elemental Fiends were most active, an overpowering scent a.s.saulted the Elemental Fiend Primordial Queen Mother deep inside the labyrinthine nest. She was presiding over the conversion ritual of a group of Warrior Elemental Fiends beside the elemental pools. The sudden appearance of the scent had triggered the Queen Mother"s anger as she stopped maintaining the ritual immediately with a wrathful expression! The smell was so strong as if the whole field of their cultivated spiritual herbs outside had been ripped apart and grounded into smithereens. Only by doing so, such strong smell could be emitted directly to reach the underground nest. Although the Primordial Queen Mother"s intelligence was not highly developed, she could still act on instinct for the preservation of her whole colony. The Queen Mother vibrated her vestigial wings in agitation as she released a strong pheromone alerting the entire nest!Someone was stealing their spiritual herbs yet again!
As the spiritual herbs could only be cultivated once every year, they could face a shortage later if they did not defend their cultivated herb well. The special food source was paramount to their still budding colony!
The premature death of the former Primordial Queen Mother due to tribulation lightning had also reduced the colony population by more than half. This was due to the fact that she had ambitiously faced the heavenly tribulation within their own nest in an attempt to become a n.o.ble-tiered spiritual beast, while at the same time manipulated the tribulation lightning to establish the Lightning Elemental pool. She had bitten more than she could chew and perished. The scorching land above had served as a reminder for the current Queen to be more prudent before making any big moves in the future of the hive.
Naturally, as the current Queen Mother was an aberrant in the colony; born as a true spirit beast as compared to her fellow comrades who were just ferocious beasts, she succeeded the throne as the new Queen Mother. She had finally managed to consolidate her colony around three years ago to focus on producing more General-leveled Elemental Fiends. Right now, only time was needed to let her carefully nurtured colony flourish.
The Elemental Fiends were a unique existence within the tropical rainforest. The Queen Mothers had the secret to artificially create Elemental pools and pseudo-spiritual beasts, the Warrior-cla.s.s Elemental Fiends. Once an alate managed to find the best ground with a hidden spirit vein within, she could transform into the first generation Primordial Queen Mother to establish her own colony on that site. Typically, a new Primordial Queen Mother needed at least two-hundred years to develop a thriving colony with the right conditions. It was in the event that no natural predators like spiritual fowls or Stone-scaled pangolins managed to find the hidden colony before it matured. Besides that, the Elemental Fiends also had their own natural enemies, such as the stronger Earth Demons. Although it seemed like the Elemental Fiends had a huge advantage to breed and spread due to their Primordial Queen Mother"s ability, they too had their own difficulties and natural counters. Hence, they were not too many of the colonies existed in the tropical rainforest.
However, the previous Primordial Queen Mother in her alate form had stumbled into the area around seventy years ago and was elated to realize the absence of predators. Somehow, no other spiritual beasts dared to enter the location even after being goaded multiple times. Her beastly instinct told her that the area seemed to be own by someone, but the added security had tempted her. Hence, she had been cautious and lurked for nearly ten years before she truly started building her colony nest. Her not-so-intelligent self had not yet comprehended that the owner might be in prolonged seclusion at that moment and might decimate her whole colony once it woke up. Kuro was so preoccupied with Hana since he was awakened, he had no time to look through his territory properly. Once he knew the presence of these annoying pests, the aunty had already persuaded him to keep them as she planned to "own" them for various reasons. As such, although he had some spare time once Hana was better, he had not disturbed the nest.
The Primordial Queen Mother devised a simple yet effective plan to surround the thieves and sent them through the colony-wide telepathic channel to the captains of each team of Warrior Elemental Fiends like how she always does to all other thieves. However, she already learned her lesson to station more troops at the same time on each side.
As she observed how her troops efficiently moved towards the source of smell with her mind"s eye, she found that the strong smell was moving towards the west side rapidly after a while. She immediately relayed her next command to pursue the origin of the smell by hook or by crook!
...
Tens of thousands of white, black, and dark red Elemental Fiends poured out of the small obscured opening not too far from the blackened scorched ground in droves. They moved in three large groups like angry hornets, zeroing on the adorable little snake, now, the size of a three-meter python with closed wings. In between his enclosed wings was a sealed bamboo canister with strings attached, fashioned like a double sling bag. The canister was leaking heavy scented mushroom soup from a small puncture!
The black python started to attack the incoming Elemental Fiends in a frenzy with its fangs and sharp erected scales. It moved to the left, and to the right, and slithered around the spiritual mushroom grounds, vandalizing them to its heart"s content. Behind him, a trail of very angry Elemental Fiends doggedly chased him while snapping their pincers, making metallic noises, and throwing elemental energy b.a.l.l.s in synchronization. Once they swarmed over the black python, it would retaliate by rolling its body or slapping them away with its serpentine tail. Sometimes, the black python swallowed whole tens of them before crushing the rest. Time and time again, the pseudo-spiritual beasts were scattered, but they doggedly regrouped, re-consolidated, and re-attacked the black python without reservation.
Slowly, the number of Elemental Fiends burgeoned to more than a hundred thousand. Although the black python could still maneuver in between the attacks and clashes, the opening had become narrower. It suddenly turned around and slithered fast towards the west. As the thick layers of encirclement were nearing completion, a group of black Elemental Fiends shot orange-colored flames, in an attempt to inundate this brazen enemy into oblivion. To their dismay, both electric-based attacks and poison flame attacks weren"t showing any effects at all.
A pair of glossy dark red wings spread wide, as the large python suddenly lunged into the sky and flew in a hurry. Behind it, droplets of concentrated mushroom soup dripped while leaving a long trail as the Elemental Fiends followed with a frenzied fervor.
...
[Okay. Ku-chan, move to the next phase.]
[Mommy, please be careful. No more Elemental Fiends are coming out. However, there is still around 50% of the colony present. The purple-colored ones didn"t show themselves yet. Most probably, they"re looking down on me.]
[Noted, Sweetie. You must be careful too. Double back after your part is done. Do wash first to avoid these termites from noticing the soup"s odor during the operation once you reach the place.]
[Alright.]
A kilometer away, inside a shallow man-made cave, Hana was sitting cross-legged on the floor while observing blankly in front of her with ruby red irises; she was soul-linking with Kuro at the moment. A white fox with antler was surveying the surrounding cautiously beside her while a little yellow chubby bird was perching on the aunty"s head.
Surprisingly, at the aunty"s back, a trembling snakehead fish was obediently floating as his gaze darted back and forth, not comprehending what was they doing over there. It was obviously little Chomper, Ara"s lucky attendant. Little Chomper was here, following Hana"s agreement with Grand Elder Watershade, where all experts nurtured by Hana could be used by her at will. He had just finished consolidating his own powers as it hovered solidly at the initial high-level spirit beast.
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"Alright, Markisah, tell your friend to start. Remind her not to destroy the nest, only incite them enough to pull out their General-cla.s.s Elemental Fiends. Act like a weak bird, okay? If she"s too strong, they"ll be too afraid and might go into hiding. Try to spare some of the red-colored Warrior cla.s.s ones. The rest, she can eat as she likes."
General-cla.s.s Elemental Fiends were the purple-colored Elemental Fiends. Different from the single-element white, black, and dark red Elemental Fiends. The purple Elemental Fiends were ten times much stronger than the rest while harboring double elements, making them extremely dangerous. Hana knew the external helper she asked for help wouldn"t be able to pull the King out, but at least, if all General-cla.s.s were engaged with Markisah"s friend, they"ll have an easier time.
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In the cave-dwelling decorated with thousands of glimmering pearls, the slight crack on the largest egg placed on Hana"s handmade shelf widened. The large egg trembled slightly as it suddenly moved by itself and rolled down from the shelf!
Once it fell, two tiny feet with pink talons protruded from the large crack on the egg. The tiny feet struggled hard and had finally found themselves balanced on the large egg. Slowly the two tiny feet worked together and waddled clumsily like a drunken monk performing the Drunken Fists; sometimes to the front, while at other times to the back or to the sides. On multiple occasions, both feet didn"t cooperate well as the egg tumbled down and roll again.
Where was it going?
At the deepest part of the cave where the sealed tunnel was, a large number of pearls had been gathered into a mini-mountain. Hana and co. had gathered large rocks to make a makeshift barrier for holding all the leftover pearls; that was after they had finished embedding the whole cave floor. The mountainous amount of pearls emitted the brightest natural light within the cave, giving it a romantic atmosphere. After the egg with the feet struggled hard for a long time with multiple detours, it finally rolled itself to the stone barrier. The naughty feet propped the egg up and struggled to climb the final stretch of obstacle!
"Piko! Piko!"
A delighted chirp resounded from within the egg before it burrowed itself into the spirit pearl mountain.
...