Chapter 224: Chapter 208: Growth

With Nerlia in full retreat, as much as they could retreat in their own country, and Cernlia hopefully sorted or at least handed off to Marquis Lyns, Regina turned her attention to Esemen.

The country was the only one of those involved that had not been directly affected or suffered under the war at all. Even her own territory belonging to the hive had seen intruders, although they hadn’t done much damage. The Esemen were still just parking their army in other countries without having to worry about their own borders. Regina knew that if she wanted to actually invade them, she’d have to move closer. It would be an escalation she didn’t really want, though. Definitely not yet.

Instead, she focused on the forces the Esemen had sent. So far, they’d pushed forward aggressively and then settled into a holding pattern in the territory they had gained. They still controlled the upper edge of Earl Whitor’s domain, along with some neighboring land. Whitor hadn’t made a concerted effort to drive them out. There had been skirmishes, but neither side seemed eager to actually fight.

Regina wondered if the Esemen thought they could just strike a deal. The balance had shifted from when they first came. And people had died, blood that was clearly on their hands.

Then again, maybe it wasn’t supposed to matter that much. She still didn’t have a great understanding of what cultural limits or imperatives the locals had in matters like this. War happened, though, and people died. It seemed to be a fact of life. Usually it was much less destructive than this one, though, from what she’d heard.

Regina wasn’t about to go and crusade against them without mercy for getting people killed in an invasion — the hypocrisy would be a bit much — even if she didn’t like it. If Earl Whitor was fine with how things turned out, she’d have to be satisfied with that. But she still wanted them to leave their pound of flesh for fighting her and her hive.

It would need careful preparation, of course. Regina stayed in the village and inspected their burgeoning industrial and crafting infrastructure, while Ben and the others made preparations. Ben still focused on the army deeper in Nerlia, but Janis and others turned their attention to the Esemen and gathered drones. They debated pretty stridently over whether they should send in an army or rely on more distributed troops.

For her part, Regina just made sure they’d have the equipment they needed. Now that the cat was, potentially, out of the bag regarding their guns, she authorized further use of them. She wasn’t sure how much good it would do, since it would probably be a very different kind of battle — if it came to a battle at all — but it couldn’t hurt to be ready. She still kept their most advanced weapons under wraps, but had the hive start distributing some simpler rifles and even field artillery to the forces gathered against the Esemen. And, of course, she thoroughly reviewed their setup for making explosives and tried to improve their output further.

Their entire supply chain was still too reliant on magic for her taste, and the crucial role Conjuration played in getting their tools and weapons concerned Regina a little. Partly because, if someone else were to use it as much as they did, they could gain the same results. And it made her uneasy to depend on something with a single point of failure. But it was just too useful not to use Conjuration magic.

Besides, I suppose reintroducing more advanced tech is kind of its own reward, she reflected. Isn’t that why I’m doing all this, at least in part? That train of thought led her to the gods, but she quickly turned her focus away again. She was under no illusion regarding her chances, and she knew Deirianon would probably cause more issues for her down the line. The fact that she hadn’t heard anything, especially if the psychic suppression field wasn’t his, was already concerning. It made her feel like another shoe was about to drop. But she wasn’t going to let that stop her or descend into paranoia. That would just be letting him win.

Regina hadn’t really explored her power being marked by Alianais might bring any further, and given what she’d learned, she wasn’t going to. She suspected it was a two-way street, and trying to draw on Alianais’ magic, especially if she didn’t have a suitable Class or knowledge on how to handle it, would probably give the goddess an undue hold on her at best. She might also risk blowing herself up, for all she knew.

It did mean she was pretty much blind regarding any schemes of the gods, though. Galatea had told her what she knew, although Regina was aware she was protecting a few secrets of Leian’s, but it still left a lot of questions. There was nothing for it, though.

One reason Regina worried about it more, right now, was because people were finally starting to immigrate into her territory. It was only a trickle at first, but she could already see it growing stronger. Cernlia had suffered under the war, and now the army was no longer blocking any route into her demesne, at least from the east. The treaty she’d agreed to with Marquis Lyns allowed anyone who wanted to go into her territory, and it seemed word had finally spread, at least a little. They primarily came to Forest’s Haunt and the surrounding area.

The hive welcomed them. Regina needed more workers, especially ones with practical skills from the current world. Even just more farmers would be useful. It might also help them to deal with territory they occupied in Nerlia, in the longer term. The lack of humans to talk to people there was a constant problem. In the short term, at least, it did place a larger strain on their capabilities, since someone needed to greet and organize them.

On the other hand, the hive’s numbers were growing quickly. Regina had pushed herself a little with adding more eggs, since she’d recently been unable to do it while she was traveling, handling a crisis or talking with the Delvers or their allies. Their numbers of Swarm Drones were still outpacing the sapient drones easily, even with the losses they’d suffered in the recent battles.

Regina had the feeling she had started to hit the limits of Drone Breeders, or rather their effectiveness for the hive. The leveling of the oldest had slowed drastically, and it would probably take time for them to reach the third Tier, assuming they would. The increase in the numbers of eggs they added to the hive also leveled off. She was not adding as many of them to the hive anymore, either, mostly for practical reasons. The rate at which new drones joined the hive would probably not increase too much in the foreseeable future, but since she was dealing with exponential growth, it would still be significant. The hive had to scramble to make sure their logistical arrangements were up to the task, but Regina was confident they had it handled. Hopefully. At least they were building a lot of new bases.

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