IMPERIUM INSECTUM

<I’m surprised you took them alive> penn said.

I glared at her as I placed the girl's body on the ground. <I am not that much of a brute. >

*Snap*

My head snapped down toward the girl whose arm could now move in 7 different places.

<You were saying…> I rolled my eyes as green mana erupted from my hands. In no time, her body was healed.

<Are thease specimens good for you to work with Penn?> Penn moved away from the nearby tree and inspected their bodies.

< Couldn’t ask for anything better 4, healthy human subjects for me to experiment with.>

<5 actually>

“AGHHHAAAAA LET ME GO!” We glanced up just in time for a worker to drop another human in front of us.

The human screamed as my eyes met his and he tried to scramble away, but I caught him in no time and swiftly put him in a sleeper hold. In less than 30 seconds, he was out cold.

<And this one is?> penn asked

<He is probably the driver. He is useless except as food for me. But I can't leave him. Once he notices his passengers are gone, he may turn tail and run back to the town.>

Pen nodded as I laid his body along with the rest.

<too think they only sent 4 mid-grade adventures. Well, that’s Good news for you, diva; they aren't aware of our true scale yet. If they are sending mid-grades, they are assuming it's just a bunch of goblins going out of control.>

<That’s great. That’s one last thing to worry about. Ive already been invaded once; a second time is not in my cards.*Sigh* I'm going to have to come up with a defence strategy.>

<that you will However, now is not the time. If you don’t mind, Penn stared eagerly at the 4 human bodies in front of her. I took a step to the side as Penn jabbed her genetic siphon pincer into the tank. Soon, red fluid filled the clear cylinder on her pincers. Once full, she pulled it away as her eyes flickered rapidly as the contents of the cylinders were sucked up and into her body.

Penn swiped the screen away, walked up to the next human, and did it again. In quick succession, she grabbed her genetic material, completing the entry.

I read over the listed traits; they were quite interesting. The first one would allow certain members of the hive to move more independently without my guiding hand, maybe as field commanders, maybe as deep infiltration. The second one is kind of redundant, as I can just fuck somebody to get their magical power; however, maybe I can skip the fucking part with that trait, or maybe I can imbue a different magic into a unit. Yes, if that’s possible, then….. Maybe I've written that one off too quickly.

<Im done> She said, stepping away from their bodies. Penn had a very content expression on her face, if I had to describe it. It looked like she had just eaten a delicious meal.

<whilst I do love growing my trait collection, diva. It iis very much a shame I have nothing I can use them on.>

I sighed <Youre right.>

Penn’s head snapped towards me in disbelief. <R…r..really?>

I nodded and stared deep into the forest. <Thease 4 wont be the last. Man, more will come, and I wont be able to fight them as I did. Correction: I shouldn’t be fighting them as I did. The hive exists for me, and thus my children should do the fighting; anything that helps and gives them an advantage should be taken. Just promise me this. Don’t let them suffer. If they are in pain or they must die, at least make it quick.

Penn gave a deep bow. <I promise.> She raised her head and turned away from me and back towards the 4 unconscious humans.

<Whats the plan with them now? Do you plan to make them breeding stock?> She asked

I shook my head <Feels like a waste with these 4 doing that to them.>

<That’s surprising to hear from you. I'm honestly shocked you haven't buried your ovipositor to the hilt in the female, at least.>

<I would be lying if I said the idea wasn’t tempting. But why should I use her when I have you.>

Penn laughed for a moment before she realised what I meant, but at that point it was too late. I had already been pinned against a tree.

<Wait Diva.> she begged

I shook my head <I’ve just realised. You are the only one for whom I haven't buried my eggs. Maybe I should fix that.> I gently caressed her cheek. I could feel her body tremble beneath my touch was it fear or was it excitement I couldn’t tell. I leaned in close to her ear and bit it, causing a small amount of sweet green blood to trickle down my throat.

<Delicious. That will do for now.>

I pulled away from her, and she crumpled like a sack of bricks.

<W…why> She asked as she held her bleeding ear.

<Because I can penn. Don’t worry, I wont get you today, but be warned: one of these days I will impregnate that body of yours. Like I did to Sally and Penn and most of the females ive met in my life. You are not free from that fate. Now get up penn.>

<Y…yes…Mother: I did not react; however, she did call me mother. If that’s all it takes, then what's gonna happen the day I reshape her insides to fit me? That’s a fun thought for later; however, now I have something more pressing to take care of.

I turned my attention back to the humans; that little distraction still hasn’t made it clear what to do with these 5 humans. Using them as food and sex slaves is easy, but it feels a bit liike a waste. Then again, the female’s power is desirable. But let's not think with my ovipositor for once. If not sex slaves, then how about… Spies? Yeah, spies, I like the sound of that. 4 spies feeding me info on what the humans are doing and giving me a heads up would be nice, and thanks to my new psychic powers, that might be quite possible. I mean if I can disrupt their minds with the weave, why can't I shape it?

<Ive decided Penn. They will become my unwilling spies!>

She shakily saddled up to my side.

<A.a…and j..j…just how will you do that?> she said stutering over and over. Damn, seeing her like this. It's so tempting to bend her over and rail her from dawn till dusk. But alas, the time for that will be later. I walked over to the swordsman and held his head in my palms. < I’m not entirely sure how, but we're both gonna find out>

I closed my eyes and directed my psychic weave into his mind. Immediately, I hit what felt like a literal wall, stopping my very invasive thoughts, but as I piled on more and more power into the attack, I felt the wall crumble. Slowly, I started to get something back from his mind. Blurry, hazy images and unintelligible sounds. I kept going and going until I gave and gave until there was a bright eruption of light followed immediately by darkness. I found myself swimming in an empty void, and in the centre of the void, right in front of me, was a brain, a large, hulking mass of grey matter. Pulsing in front of me

<So this is where it all happens.> I swam around the brain inspecting it for any clues or guides, but there was nothing, just a brain that you would see out of a textbook. I gently held the right side of his brain. As I did, flashes of images streamed into my mind, a lot of it incoherent garbage, but some of it useful. I filtered through the images, discarding the childhood memories and 1st kisses and focusing on the ones that looked more recent.

<I see, so this one is called Joshua, and so they were brought together by the guild master called Ristran, but just who is this man? I must find out more.>

I focused more on the images. And before I knew it, the images started moving, turning into watchable memories.

<Now that is something.>

I watched the memory play out like a Netflix documentary: the private meeting with Ristran, the journey here, everything. It was a gold mine. It turns out Penn was right; they are here because of the goblins, which is a big sigh of relief. Now let's find out more about this guild master.

He and Joshua seem close, so let's dig deep for something I can use. I searched into his mind and found Movies of both of them on the battlefield. Ristran was his commanding officer, and Joshua was a regular rank-and-file soldier; however, they were close, sharing stories with each other, etc., etc., all boring stuff. Any information I can use could be useful, annoyingly, however, a lot of it was useless crasp raniging from him eating breakfast to him taking a shit and quite a few of him jerking off.

<Quite the impressive member he has; maybe taking him as a sex slave wouldn’t be a bad idea?> I kept going and going. Combing through all these memories made me feel like I was back in the evidence room, way back when I was a detective. Those were simpler times.

I scrolled for what felt like hours until finally there was a memory that stood out to me. It was one of them, drinking beer on the roof of the guild hall in Doonvatel. It was quite recent, around a month or so old.

“So when is she due?” Joshua asked, taking a sip from his beer and looking over the city.

“Next month, I'll tell ya I'm so scared, man,” Ristran replied

“Scared!? you!? Ive seen you charge headfirst into a basilisk's attack without a single care in the world, but this scares you?”

“It's different, Josh … fighting monsters is easy, but this… this is different. What if I raise him wrong or-“

Yes, yes, yes. I get it. The fears of fatherhood and all, let’s move on.

“So is it true the ristran?” Joshua asked.

“What's true?”

“That the Ashdowns are stepping down as leaders of this place.”

“You shouldn’t believe rumours joshua. They might get you killed-“

“I know what I heard! Ristran. Is it true?”

Joshua stared at Ristran, who turned away.

“Yeah. After the explosion and the loss of their son. The sudden influx of those god-forsaken mushrooms. The orphanage fire that is now being treated as a possible massacre. It's just too much. I also hear that their daughter is in bad shape as well.”

“Damn. And do we still not know who is responsible?”

“No clue, but my bet is that it’s the underground those homeless basterds and I have in good reason to think it’s them. The person set to replace them is someone quite close to one of the families down there.”

“Really! Do you have a name?”

“Nope, and frankly, I don’t want to know.”

“That isn't like you, Ristran. You were always the sort to right wrongs. It's why you became guildmmaster.”

“Times change, buddy. I’m going to be a dad soon. When I think about that, I see Mary and our unborn son. They are precious to me in ways I can't explain. And when I think about them getting hurt because of me, it's… It's too much. Being guild master is too much of a big target on my head. So it's between you and me. I’m stepping down and leaving Dounvatel, and by the sounds of it, you should do the same. This town ain't what it used to be….”

I closed the memories and looked over his brain. Doonvatel Leadership is changing, and this person is linked to the underground. The more I hear about this place, the less I'm fond of it. But this info could be useful to Apollinaris as her investigation has gone cold. I’ll relay this back to her later; however, now let's work on shaping him to be my spy. I placed my hand on his brain. I was immediately assaulted with several libraries' worth of information. Too bad most of it didn’t contain anything useful. Now my goal here is to instil loyalty to me above anything else, but how? Could it be just as simple as saying it?!”

“You obey me now, Human!”I waited for a moment…. Nothing. It was worth a try. Let's see. I have this stream of information entering my head. What if I did the same, but the information this time is orders from me? It's worth a shot, right? What's the worst thing that could happen? I focused on my psychic power and moved it down my arm into his body. As I did, a steady glow of white light erupted around the brain.

<This looks promising> I was about to give verbal orders as before, but suddenly an idea came to mind. A lot of the information coming to me is in the form of images, sounds, and smells. So, how about instead of trying to command loyalty to me, I instead impart the image of loyalty to me? Yes, that actually sounds more feasible.

I focused on the white light as I did; the white light suddenly formed several hundred needles that jabbed into the brain, going to various depths. Through those needles, images of me, my hive, and children flowed into his mind and began occupying key areas, such as memory and consciousness. I went as deep as the centres responsible for dreams and subconsciousness amongst those images, where images of loyalty such as someone bowing, Images of me as god and dozens of images of me being held in reverence. Anything I could think of to do with loyalty, I brute-forced to the core of his brain to the point his brain trembled in my hands. I don’t know how long I did it felt like hours, but eventually I was satisfied. I pulled the needles and my hands away. As I did, a tiny amount of the white light remained and sank into his brain. I watched the brain for a moment when suddenly a green energy seeped from the folds of his brain, as it seeped out, it formed the image of an eerie green crown.

<It looks promising. But I'll hold my expectations. If it doesn’t work, then off to the breading chamber you all go.>

I killed my connection with his mind, and before I knew it, I was back out in the real world, surrounded by Penn and my children

<Done already? That was barely a second.>

I looked back towards Penn in disbelief,

<Really?>

She nodded.<. You just touched him and then immediately let go. Are you sure you did it properly?

<I’m confiident I did so.> I looked back at him in wonder. So time progresses a lot slower in the mindscape than it does here. That is good to know; that means I don’t need to rush when I'm in there.

< So diva, did you learn anything useful from his mind?> Penn asked. I nodded. <There was a lot. I'll feed it all back to you later; however, let me finish off the rest.>

I turned my attention to the others, and one by one, I did the same thing. Scanning their minds for info and instilling loyalty. It felt like days to me, but to Penn it was barely a moment.

<And that should be the last one>>

I threw myself to the ground and took a deep breath. Doing that is very mentally taxing but Im confident it was worth it.

< Penn takes them into the hive and monitors them for any abnormal changes. Once they are awake, alert me. I will test their loyalty personally.>

<Yes diva.> she said with a mad, gleeful smile. Something tells me they are in for a world of pain, oh well, not my problem. I shuffled beckwards and leaned against a tree I think after that I need to give my mind a break to think its been pretty non stop for the last few days. Maybe I should take a few days too. Suddenly, I felt something tug on my mind. It was one of the warriors. Wait, does this mean?

<Mother, she has woken up.>

The words sent a smile as wide as the sun across my face; as it did, my tail-poster finally revealed itself.

<Oh god, I don’t like that look. What's going on? I looked towards Penn, keeping my smile as wide as possible, <Something ive been waiting to happen for the last couple of days. I finally get to break in my tail positor.>