Chapter 180 The day that changed Pangera (1/2)

Tentatively, I bring my antennae into contact with the Queen's and then activate the skill.

Core Surgery!

With what I learned during the skill upgrade I know that all I need is to be touching a part of the body on the monster I'll be 'operating' on but with an ant it feels like the antennae are the most appropriate place.

As soon as the skill is activated I feel a ma.s.sive burst of information as the details of the Queen's core explode in my mind.

Yikes!

The Queen has by far the most complicated and powerful monster core I've seen with the exception of Formo's worm! Frantically I put my sub brains to work processing all of this information before the onslaught of data just straight knocks me out. With my backup dancers doing their part the pressure eases off instantly and I look in awe at the elegance of the Queen's core.

She's actually a very powerful and rare creature isn't she?

I got the impression that ants weren't common in the Dungeon, based on what the Queen told me, usually appearing randomly at the bottom of the first strata or sometimes even lower than that. After all, they have the extremely rare ability to produce their own offspring, rather than waiting for the Dungeon to sp.a.w.n more of their kind. We ants aren't the only ones in the Dungeon with this ability but we are among the most feared.

Looking at the Queen's core I can finally see how this function works. The Queen actually has a network of glands and organs that work together to perform this job. I had thought I'd just find an 'Egg-laying organ +10' or something in here but it isn't the case. The Queen has three total organs that contribute to producing her offspring.

The way the offspring are produced is also not what I expected. Rather than being made from nothing, as eggs that then need to mature, the Queen actually converts Bioma.s.s that she eats into eggs that can then be born. THIS is the reason that the workers bring her almost all of the Bioma.s.s that they catch. Bioma.s.s points are directly converted into new workers inside the Queen!

In a flash I make another realisation. This is why the Queen's egg producing rate has gone down ever since we came up to the surface! Like me, she has a powerful core and is a higher tier monster. She doesn't get much Bioma.s.s from eating surface monsters or weak, lower level creatures. She was born at the lowest reaches of the first Strata, her natural prey are down there! With so little Bioma.s.s points being produced, her rate of laying has plummeted.

This also explains the connected organs for egg producing.

Firstly she has an organ attached to her stomach that is designed to drain off Bioma.s.s and covert it to some kind of liquid sludge. This is the Bioma.s.s Conversion Organ and it looks as if the Queen hasn't upgraded it at all…

I bet she spent almost every bit of Bioma.s.s on eggs and healing upgrades…

Sure enough, when I check through all of her organ data she's upgraded her antennae to +5 for healing channelling and upgraded her healing mana gland to +5 to take burst heal upgrade that lets her wave out the energy over an area, perfect for healing a huge army of ants.

She's really too unselfish. This also shows a little lack of wisdom due to her being a young monster. Upgrading the egg production organs is by far the fastest way to grow the colony's power. I'll have to convince her to upgrade all the organs related to producing eggs as quickly as possible, all the way to +10 if we can, but at least to +5.

The second organ in the process is the lifeform recoding organ. If the job of the Conversion Organ is to strip the Bioma.s.s of its properties, turning it into a multipurpose goo, then this organ is for reshaping that stuff into the necessary material for ant egg making.

Finally there was the egg production gland itself. This was responsible for taking the reformed goop and making it into ant eggs, essentially encoding ant DNA on the sludge.

This process is going to be more complicated than I thought. I figured I could just go to the 'baby ant' section and whip up some magic but apparently not! I may have to make changes to multiple organs here and rework them slightly.