Cornered Rat (2/4)

For the first time since this little war has started the Ant Queen is visibly angry. "AAAARG!!!" she shrieks as she throws her tray of venison across the room.

Her spy plan failed spectacularly mere days after it started for reasons she still can't understand. "I thought the Rehkin care about their own people!? There's no way they wouldn't report back to us, knowing that we have their children captive!"

Why are these dragons so hard to deal with?!

After a moment to think, the Queen says, The clans will be more vulnerable while they're moving, so prepare to attack while they're on the road.

Sadly, her new command is immediately shot down by one of her daughters, "But Queen Mother! The meats are all travelling under the dragon's protection! We'll get slaughtered!"

"Hmm...," the Queen mumbles, "The dragons are being careful in moving everyone together, and they're right to assume that we can't take them all on at the same time... How about starving them out?"

After all, if all the Rehkin and Drakin Clans move together into one location, then it'll become exponentially harder to provide food for so many hungry mouths. They'll HAVE to leave their safe strongholds eventually!

"No," the Queen shakes her head in disappointment, "that wouldn't work. My enemy has many flyers that can cover distances far faster than we can. We can never hope to keep them penned up and starving if their hunters can fly hundreds of miles away and carry back food."

"Besides," she concludes her thought, "in order to hold a siege, we'd have to get on the surface and physically block the way. That would be a waste of mana, with all the dragons lurking about...."

Wait.... what about the humans?

Normally, the Queen would've preferred to steer clear of the humans. It's not because she's scared of them, but primarily because they're low on mana, making them less valuable to eat.

What's discouraging the Queen from attacking the Threshold even more is the information she tortured out of the captured Clans, who are still being held prisoner deep in their nest.

What the Queen has learned about the humans' defenses is that most of their firepower is stored away in the huge arsenal of mana cannons. Unfortunately, the clever humans have altered the mana in their enchantments to make it too volatile to directly consume.

This makes humans tough to kill in their shells, yet not even worth the meal afterwards. Obviously, the Queen knows that she'd lose more than she gains from such a fight....

… Though a battle at the Threshold MIGHT all be worth it if they manage to break through to the Otherwordly gate... and pray that the Otherworld isn't any more dangerous than this one....

Despite the risks, the Queen knows this is a gamble they are going to have to take at this rate.

Sensing the Queen's thoughts, one of the Ants protests, "But my queen.... wouldn't the dragons suspect we'll go to the humans?"

The Queen frowns and digs her sharp nails into her palms. "What choice do we have? That cunning dragon will be the death of us all at this rate. Hmm... Give me time to think.

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Once all her children are gone, the Queen rests in the sweet darkness, where she's at her most comfortable; she'd like some time to think in relative solitude.

She looks down at herself with complicated emotions as she sees the new clothes she's wearing.

"My first memories were growing up alone, deep underground. My only companions were the other Ants I could create out of my powers."

Indeed, for thousands of years, the Queen had survived by creating clones of herself with her mana, then feasting on their flesh. It was bitter, dark, and purposeless. She had run about – naked like a savage as she ate her meat raw.

Now that she'd discovered that there's an entire world up here, she can't help but yearn to possess it all for herself – not just the meat, but EVERYTHING.

She fiddles with her pants and giggles. "Even these 'clothes' make me feel warm and comfortable. Maybe I should make the meats teach my children how to make clothes before I eat them all."

She shakes her head and groans, "No, no. I shouldn't get ahead of myself. The dragons are still a very big problem for me."

She looks up and thinks of Kalkor. "I'll have to give it to that old monster. He's left me next to nowhere to get food…

The Queen and her Swarm are on a relatively small continent right now, and while she does consider sailing to another continent, she knows they'd be completely vulnerable to annihilation while on the waters.

They COULD sustain their bellies on the local wildlife, but their arsenal of mana would stagnate at best. They'd forever be in a passive position. Eventually, they'd lose.

So, that dragon is able to completely predict her every move simply because she has no other choice now. If those dragons continue to be as frustratingly cunning as they are now, then they'll likely figure out that she'll be going for the human fortress next.

"Hmm…," she thinks, "how can I attack the humans in a way that the dragons can't predict? Do we have anything on hand they don't know about? Think THINK!"

"It'll also be hard to infiltrate the place stealthily, since all my children are clones of me, and my face is very recognizable by now. However we do it, we'll have to storm the human Fortress, and we'll have to be very fast, just in case the dragons set a trap for us there."

In the end, the Queen decides to grow another queen ant. "All these Ants are my clones," the Ant Queen realizes, "so I can just teach one of my clones how to use my powers and donate a portion of my horde to her. Hmm… to minimize risk of rebellion, I'll just give my subordinate Queen 25% of my forces."

This is one of the only cards up her sleeve that the Drakin don't know about, so if she wants to act outside of their plans, then she'll have to use it somehow.

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With her next plan in mind, the Queen uses the power in her May Name to implant memories into the newborn queen, along with a single directive in her mind; "Lay siege to the dragons, and hide your numbers so that the dragons don't know what's happening. Then, make sure to devour as much of the countryside as possible.

Even if her subordinate queen stays true to her instructions, she won't be able to do much to the Drakin other than trick them into thinking that the main Ant swarm ISN'T moving on the Threshold. This way, they won't be able to move out of their strongholds to chase them down without putting their families at risk.

Hopefully this sacrificial decoy queen will fool the Drakin, though this completely depends on how well her subordinate queen does her job.

Now... How to attack the human stronghold in the quickest manner and with the least loss of mana? Should she go underground?

No, wait... The Threshold has defended against the Rehkin clans for thousands of years. There are plenty of burrowing type of Rehkin, so the fortress probably has some sort of assurance against this kind of assault...

The Queen's headache only gets bigger as she realizes more and more just how little prepared she is to attack this human fortress. She knows next to nothing about the place – how it's laid out, and what kind of defenses it has; she was lucky to get that information about the mana stones in the cannons being uneatable!

So… what's the most efficient way to learn everything she needs to know about the Threshold? The easy answer would be to just send her endlessly reviving horde at the walls. With so many of her children, she should at least be able to have a few take a peek and explore a little before they die, right? Because of their perfect spiritual link, the Queen shares all the things her swarm sees anyway, so it's not like her children have to report back before they die.

However, this method is very loud and might take significant time away from her. Even though she can keep the loss of mana to a minimum when she revives her army, she can technically throw her army at the walls endlessly until the walls break.

However, if she takes too long in breaching the Threshold, then this would give the humans enough time to get one of the dragon kings to come alone and cut down her forces even more and drain of her precious mana.

Hmm.... What to do...