Chapter 602: Infinite growth
‘What?!’
It was a good thing that I was an astral projection right now, because otherwise I’d surely be shouting this out loud.
In response, there was a wave of twitching antennae and wings, as if all the bees in front of wanted to jump around excitedly. Instead, they sat still, but I can still feel the hive mind’s energetic mood.
‘Yes, Father! This is it, this is what it was given to us for. The god-creatures that let us develop telepathic genes unknowingly gave us a way to beco one of them. Which we would have never discovered without the samples of the Divinity Sound from the Champion Tree. If a vast enough mind focuses on the Divinity Sound hard enough, its power will change qualitatively… And this mind will wield it, becoming equal to god-creatures.’
A hive mind becoming a new god… This sounded so impossible.
‘How does this even work? Is there an explanation I will be able to understand?’
Precio-Us didn’t reply imdiately. I suspected they were thinking hard—usually this would’ve taken re nanoseconds, but right now 99,9% of their ntal capacity was busy. I waited patiently.
‘We will try to explain in simple terms. The Divinity Sound is a way to twist one’s mind that makes the world react to it. The larger the mind that’s twisted, the more the world will react, so there’s more power. At certain amounts, this power multiplies by itself… And the more of it there is, the more it multiplies. Father, you said that god-creatures are infinitely powerful, or at least, claim to be. Well, at so point, the Divinity Sound’s power will begin multiplying infinitely, we are sure of it. We just can’t tell at which point.’
I wished I could rub my forehead when I heard all this. So of it, Precio-Us has guessed already and told —the part about what the Divinity Sound was, at least.
But becoming a god?.. Hearing about this didn’t bring any excitent that Precio-Us were feeling. This power wasn’t a good thing for us.
‘This will only bring us more trouble… All gods are all-powerful, and they surely will band against any newcor with extre prejudice. Take them out before they can even do anything,’ I told Precio-Us.
The dip in the room’s mood at these words was palpable. Even without my ability to sense emotions, I noticed frowns around . At the sa ti, I felt a shiver going down my spine and slled ozone in the air.
There was no lightning, and the scent disappeared a mont ago, leaving slightly puzzled for a mont. Then I beca thoroughly distracted by the conversation.
‘Maybe with enough bees working with us, we could beco a god, powerful enough to defeat all other gods! Even among the infinites, so infinites are larger than others, Father.’
Inwardly, I shook my head.
‘What are you suggesting, Precio-Us?’
‘More bees must join our hive mind. Enough to reach the infinite growth of the Divinity Sound’s power and destroy the god-creatures that send their servants to attack us!’
A single bee stood up from her seat on the ground and stared at —yet again, the hive mind could locate my astral projection via triangulation without being able to actually see it. With a slow, careful gesture, she raised two hands and spread two others out.
‘Father, we know that you don’t like it when bees join hive minds. But this could be the only way to achieve what you want. To protect the Empire, us, yourself…’
The bee’s hands fell, and now she looked just as carefully calm as the others.
Precio-Us read well, but I could read them just as well.
They never said this, but liked being a large hive mind and believed in the hive minds’ supremacy. They believed that turning the Bee Empire as hive-minded as possible was the most effective way of controlling it, and they found it incredibly puzzling and pointless that I would restrict the creation and expansion of hive minds.
They would never trick into going against my will—they were good girls, perfectly deserving their na—but they were happy that the magic solution they found required creating a massive hive mind first.
I also knew that Precio-Us were so focused on the Divinity Sound that they didn’t consider the motives of creatures that gave us hints for it. The Usnea God surely didn’t give us these directions because they wanted Precio-Us to beco a god and kill them.
‘Alright, for a start—how many extra people do you need to just function normally, Precio-Us?’ I asked, gesturing at the bees sitting around.
‘Another thousand should be enough,’ they replied after another long pause. ‘We can hold the Divinity Sound as it is for now.’
‘Good. And can you keep it under control enough for the guard patrols to be safe while they guard this work camp?’
‘Yes, Father. At most, there might be small disturbances like the one you felt. But they should disappear after we have more people.’
‘Good,’ I said again.
Precio-Us didn’t say anything, but I felt them waiting for to ntion their latest discovery and what I planned to do about it.
The truth was—I didn’t know.
Expanding the Divinity Sound felt dangerous in itself. And what if the disturbances that happened already or will happen beco noticed by any of the gods besides the Usnea God and Dalmanrach?
I shuddered to think about it.
Suddenly, the bees around all jolted and jumped to their feet. At the sa ti, I was hit with a reverberation of the Divinity Sound through my mind; thankfully, it was weak and lasted less than a second.
‘Father, beware! We hear sothing around here!’ Precio-Us exclaid in my head. ‘The presence of a sound…’
“Should not have been noticed by you, swarm of gnats!”
A voice that I didn’t hear for years, but one that still turned my blood into ice.
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