Chapter 457: A step ahead

Direct fighting was an unacceptable option. But even though the fire was useless, there was still something hornets weren’t immune to…

‘Malevolence, you must bring this cave down on the hornets and their nests. Gunpowder is the most primitive explosive I can think of, but enough of it will cause a ceiling collapse either way.’

Malevolence’s eyes lit up. Of course she liked the idea of explosions, and her almost innocent (and a bit bloodthirsty) smile made me smile myself.

“What a wonderful idea, Father! It really sounds like the best option. It still won’t be easy from what you told me, but it’s real. If you bring us the gunpowder for the operation, since the hornets are pretty deep in this cave, we could place the explosives closer to the exit quietly and stealthily… at night, when they are asleep…”

I nodded several times as I listened to Malevolence, then realized that she couldn’t see it. And I that wasn’t actually nodding—I had no head and no neck!—but simply imagining nodding.

‘You have all the right thoughts, Malevolence,’ I said. ‘I will give orders to bring you the gunpowder as soon as possible, by the human horse riders. I will also send engineers who could calculate the optimal way of bringing down this cave—and extra soldiers, just in case. The latter will take the longest to arrive, though.’

Malevolence nodded.

“Thank you, Father! I will start on the preparations, but we won’t approach the hornets’ cave until we have all the equipment, Father. As much as I’d like to crush the hornets immediately, I know we must not trigger them before the time. Instead, my forces will gather at a safe distance, but near.”

‘Yes, you had a plan for a defensive line of outposts—a blockade. It’s a good plan. I’d even say that we could besiege the hornets in this cave, if there weren’t so many of them that they could break any siege we place. As it is, even if the cavern collapse won’t crush all the hornets outright, perhaps they will just starve inside!’

“Then the plan is final?” Malevolence asked, looking ready to send out orders.

‘No. There’s one major problem we must consider, and which might throw a wrench in our plans. But… we will deal with this, too.’

***

The next day, the scouts sent to watch after hornets with their astral projections proved my guess correct.

They reported that although the cave was deep, it ended with a dead end—a stream of water several kilometers wide through which you had to swim for a long, long time before you could find air again.

Astral projections didn’t need air, but hornets did. I doubted that even with divine help they could evolve from the need to breathe fast enough to save themselves.

The scouts also reported sighting a lot of various beasts down there—in the water too. They described the fungi that grew in abundance, the strange local creatures that ate it and their vicious fights, countless insects that bred wildly even there, and also how hornets would prey on everything that moved. They clearly adapted well to the caverns.

None of the scouts saw the Goddess of Hornets, which was not surprising, but still a little relieved.

So with all this, the plan to blow the hornets up became even more final. I arranged the transportation of several dozen barrels of gunpowder—enough to arm a human fort’s worth of cannons for a while—to Malevolence’s positions.

The barrels would travel on water first, then on carts pulled by lots of horses. It was the fastest means of transportation possible with current technologies, but it would still take at least a week and a half if the weather was good.

The Oracles promised only small rains in the next week, thankfully.

The scouts also reported that the evolved murder hornets had a mostly ordinary day cycle of hornets, which meant that they went to sleep at night despite seeing the sun only when they flew out to hunt.

There were hornet guards who woke if some beast approached the mega-hive and attacked it, but they were relatively few and only noticed threats that were right next to them.

They also didn’t seem in a hurry to fly out and attack anyone outside of their hunting territory. It was a relief, but also highly suspicious.

The fewer obstructions to the Operation Explosives there were, the more concerned I felt. Surely the Goddess of Hornets won’t just let this slide? Surely she won’t just let the bees prepare for as long as we want before striking? Surely she will counterattack us first?

My suspicions were confirmed a couple of days later, when Oracle Undecided brought me another prediction.

This time, although she looked glum, she almost didn’t stutter when she delivered her report.

“Father, in seven days the hornets sleeping underground will wake up again. There will be more than the last time, and they all will wake up near the cave nest you’ve found. Their numbers will be colossal, and this is all I can tell right now.”

Although a part of me wanted to pull my hair in frustration, the larger part of me wanted to grin. Which I did.

“Ah. So the Goddess of Hornets showed her hand. And in a way that was… pretty expected, actually.” My grin widened even more. “It’s a good thing that I and Malevolence prepared for it beforehand.”

Undecided tilted her head in confusion.

“Father, what do you—ah…” She nodded in realization. “Yes. I remember this dream now. It’s… brilliant. I’m so glad! This means I don’t have to worry so much about the future.”

“Things might still get awry, Undecided. You and the other Oracles must keep me apprised of anything you see in your prophecies. But… Yeah, he-he. The Goddess of Hornets clearly didn’t think everything through!”

Unlike me.

She had prepared a trap for the bee forces who would try to attack her mega-nest of hornets, but I was already a step ahead of her!