Chapter 128 Core farming (1/2)
I need cores.
Like, super badly.
I need cores for me, I need cores for Tiny, I need cores for experimenting, I need cores to raise my skills, I need cores to fuse into more powerful cores for myself and for Tiny AND I need cores for my other side project!
CORES!
The number of monster cores we had extracted so far from the farm was a grand total of one! When Tiny and I went in there to cripple the creatures this morning we found a monstrous toad had already slaughtered most of the creatures inside. Tiny had excitedly rushed to engage it, charging up his lightning fist and exploded the foe with one punch.
Luckily he hadn't destroyed the core!
Still, one core every three days is not nearly enough to meet my needs! I refuse!
I just don't have a solution to this problem currently.
Tiny and I are currently resting in the nest. A contented bustle has come over the colony recently as the workers have been busy doing the things that workers love to do. Tending to the brood, expanding the nest, foraging for food. Our new anthill has become impressively large now, the top reaching towards the peak of the trees. I had to ask them not to make it any higher or we'll end up too easy to spot. Our main objective is to hide and ride out the wave after all.
I want no trouble, be it human or otherwise.
To my delight, the pupae have started to hatch over the last few hours, hundreds of new workers emerging to swell the ranks of the colony. When this generation finally emerges we will have reached the one thousand worker mark! A milestone in the life of a young colony to be sure.
This is nothing though. If we expand the farm a little and keep the supply of Bioma.s.s coming it won't be long until we reach two thousand, five thousand, one hundred thousand!
That was the other exciting thing to happen this morning, the Queen finally awoke from her rest. After a ma.s.sive feed provided to her by the workers she got busy producing the next generation. Even as I rest I can hear the workers scurrying about madly with fresh clutches of eggs, stas.h.i.+ng them into the egg chambers, fastidiously cleaning them and ensuring they are the right temperature.
This means I means I need to advance the schedule of my project even faster. For that though… I have to have cores!
As I clack my mandibles in irritation I'm suddenly distracted by a noise. Turning around I see that it isn't Tiny snoring for once, though he is asleep, thick meaty arms flung over his face like a hairy teenager. The noise instead came from the pupa stashed with us in our private chamber.
The coc.o.o.n has already begun to take on a distinct thin shade as the young larva inside has gone through its remarkable metamorphosis, transforming from a grub and into an ant. Still ghostly white and translucent as its carapace has yet to harden the almost complete worker has started to slowly move, twitching it limbs and stretching out for the first time.
I guess I'll help the little thing out. It is normal for other workers to a.s.sist newborns break free of their coc.o.o.n, cutting away at the threads with their mandibles. The very first workers in the colony will have this task performed for them by the Queen herself.
I think I can vaguely recall having to bite my own way out, but I don't really have any memory of my pupal stage, I really only became aware of myself after I had emerged.
At any rate, I cheerfully help out the new member of our colony, my sibling no less, break out of the casing by chomping away at the outside carefully, removing sections of threads at a time and clearing the way for the hatchling to emerge.
Gradually I see a little ant face poking out of the gaps and after a few minutes the brand new worker stands proudly before atop its own casing!
…
Small!
Why the heck is this worker so small!? She looks smaller than a normal hatchling by about a third, which makes her very tiny indeed! There is something else odd about her as well. I'm not sure exactly what it is, as a worker she seems a little, energetic? She is practically bouncing around already and she only just hatched!
I remember as a grub this one had a lot of pep but this seems ridiculous.
Before I'm even finished internally complaining about this high energy hatchling she starts waggling her antennae around before locking onto me and rus.h.i.+ng in my direction! In a few short moments she has raced across the ground and scrambled up onto my back before triumphantly positioning herself between my antennae and thwacking them insistently with her own.
….