In response to my question Jeremy held up his hand which had a ring with a small box on it and explained, "Ring of seeking, add a hair to the box and it subtly tugs towards the nearest or biggest match." Then he countered my question with one of his own,"why are you standing there with your hands spread and holding a string?"

I went with a simple answer, "it's a kind of magic training. I think we should go back home before getting into details, but first, all soldiers step forward." With that command all the soldiers appeared from hiding, and the guys were clearly worried about being surrounded by so many ants all at once so I reassured them, "don't worry, they wont bite unless ordered to."

It worked a little, the hard edge of their tension ebbed away but they were still a bit wary as we walked back home. I can't really blame them for that, they probably trusted me while not really trusting the kids, but they were willing to extend their trust towards me to them. In just a few minutes we were there, I had the soldiers go to 'at ease', and I led them over to my smithing area and sat on the anvil before taking a moment to think of what to say.

I asked, "just to be sure the thing with the ring can't be repeated by someone else looking for me or either of you, right?"

Jeremy replied, "Correct, I did a pass through the town and made sure neither of us left any traces that could be used. Now I have to ask again since it is so hard to ignore, what is the deal with the string? I cannot think of any reason to hold that pose for so long."

Well since it was really bugging him I guess I could explain in a bit more detail, "I got a mission from the blue box that said to hold this pose for a certain amount of time and something good will happen. Now back to you, what exactly did you come out here for?"

They both looked a little uncomfortable but eventually the guard psyched himself up enough to say, "we need a place to hide, the duke sent his personal guard because he took it as a slight against the crown that I and the others who spared the helpless ants did not change our ways. The other three are already dead, I was out getting some food when I heard yelling right before I walked into the guard post so I avoided being seen and saw what happened. I went to the only person I knew didn't outright hate the idea of ant sympathizers, Jeremy, because he didn't freak out when you told us our mercy towards the ants was not a bad thing."

Huh, so mercy to the other races was considered heresy to the point that those who granted it were killed, that was fucked up. But, "I am not against letting you stay here but I need some kind of assurance that neither of you are actually a double agent who will run off, get an army, and kill everyone here."

Jeremy sighed and said, "I knew you would say that, so I brought two Bands of Allegiance that will show our sincerity." He must have noticed the questioning look on my face because he answered before I could ask for clarification, "it is like a simultaneously more and less focused slave band. It does not force obedience, instead it simply prevents you from betraying whoever you have sworn yourself to."

"In that case, I am not the one you should be swearing loyalty to, Queen Victoria is the one who is actually in charge here, I just run the place." Then I proceeded to explain how the ant hierarchy worked, like how me and Victoria were at the top but she was slightly more at the top than me.

Shortly after that, while they were discussing what to do with that new information, my quest finally ticked over and I was free to bend my arms again. Well, I say that but my elbows had locked up from keeping them perfectly straight the whole time so I had to have Christina grab my arm and pop them, it was a weird simultaneously painful and pleasant feeling to release the stiffness. I held off on exploring the new power until later, I needed to figure out what was going to be done with these guys. As if they sensed I was waiting for an answer they turned towards me and agreed to being placed under Victoria's control so long as they weren't going to be treated like some kind of third class citizen.

I assured them that would not be the case, before asking details on how the bands work, which was simple, they just needed to wear the bands on their necks and pledge themselves to someone and if they accept a notification of successful binding will pop up for the binder. Next was getting them in to actually talk face to face with Victoria, the soldiers were uncomfortable with them even being here so I needed a way for them to be safe while going down there. Simplest was just restraint, I explained to them that they will need to be physically restrained so that the other soldiers wont be jumpy about them meeting the queen, just simply have their hands being held behind their backs.

This sparked another round of whispered arguing but eventually they agreed to the terms and put the bands on their necks and I could sense them partially activate, saying the oath was probably required for them to fully activate. Once they were in place I called over an escort force of soldiers, and had them firmly restrain the men before all of us headed down to get this all sorted. Once we were just outside the chamber I had our small convoy stop and I went in ahead of them to explain things.

I opened with, "Honey, we have some... guests, and they want to work for us."

Victoria raised a brow and asked "what kind of guests? Were they the reported intruders?"

So I explained, "They are two of the people I met in Merriat, one is a guard who was deeply affected by your mother's surrendering army and the other is the man who taught me the basics of enchanting. I don't know a lot about them, but from what interaction I did have I think they don't hate ants."

She was interested but told me, "interesting, but we cannot have people just wandering around without them proving themselves somehow. I mean, mother made sure Fighter was always watching you despite already being half dead and I agree with that level of caution."

I knew she would ask that which is why I asked them about that, so I said what they did, "They are wearing magic collars that, supposedly, will make them incapable of betrayal, and blue box will confirm their sincerity. The box may be a little obtuse and have weird rules but it has never outright lied, so if it says they are under control I would believe it."

She nodded and said, "I see, I have no reason not to at least try it and see if it is as they say, bring them in," Before crossing her lower arms over her chest.

I poked my head into the hall and had them come into the chamber, they gaped slightly at how big Victoria was before they both went down on one knee and Jeremy said first, "I, Jeremy Hale, pledge my loyalty to Queen Victoria for as long as she will have me."

As soon as Victoria said, "I accept your pledge" there was a slight sizzling sound and the band fell away to reveal a tattoo around Jeremy's neck and Victoria received a notification confirming the subordination. The process repeated for the guard, whose name turned out to be Frank with no last name, and once he was confirmed to be bound they were let go.

After a little wrist rubbing Victoria gave them some rules, "Rule one, do not enter my chamber without announcing your presence, any number of things could be happening that I don't want non-family to see. Rule two, unless I say otherwise, Kadi has authority to issue commands in my stead. Rule three, please do not attempt to flirt with my daughters, they may be beautiful but they are literally incapable of feeling the way you would want them to feel about flirting, being friends with them is okay though. Other than those just try to be good so I don't have to add more rules, it would really annoy me. For now, I suggest you first go back to the surface and get something to eat, and stay away from the bushes inside the walls until Kadi can explain them to you."

Then she wiggled something to the soldiers that were previously holding them and they all headed back to the surface, after they left I scooped up the collars, I thought they would lock on to them but I guess anyone with enchanting skill could then break the enchantment. Next I turned to Victoria and asked her how the whole binding thing worked, she described a new screen that listed various contracts, and bindings seemed to be limited to one per level because said she had two out of seven taken. With some poking and prodding she was able to get a little more information that appeared to indicate that those bound cannot bind others. Meaning that even the human king couldn't just bind everyone, which is probably why they are not often used.

The other thing the page listed was it provided a better description of exactly how the binding restricted those under it. It maximized the bound person's loyalty and locked it there, so they cannot be convinced to do something that would be considered a disloyal action. Like, they could be convinced that fighting with the workers would help somehow, like saying it would train them, but hurting Victoria was impossible because that couldn't be justified even if she was ill and suffering they would try to find a magic solution instead of something drastic like "put her out of their misery" unless Victoria herself asked them to. This was all conjecture based on the vague description of loyalty in the stat block, but I felt it was probably accurate, it made sense at the very least.

It was a little too mind-altery for me to be entirely comfortable with, but at the very least it required consent on the part of the one being bound. On the other hand, it was mentioned these were a specialized alternate to slave collars that had absolute obedience protocols as part of them. Nothing I could do about it right now but I added 'rescue slaves' to my list of personal quests to be done once I can spend a long time away from Victoria physically, but still connected with some magic shenanigans. For now I told Victoria I finished my quest and now had "mana weaving" skill, hopefully it would work how I wanted it to, but since the system agreed with my idea in order to give me the quest in the first place I had high hopes.

I hung out with Victoria for a bit longer before I headed back up to the surface with Christina to handle stuff, and grabbed a celestial again since this time I could make a storage medium. Once outside I started explaining more in depth about the various classes of ant to Jeremy and Frank, including how Christina was special compared to her sisters which is why she can talk more naturally than they could. I did not introduce them to the alraune yet, I decided to let them settle in a bit before I spring that extra bit of weirdness on them. With all that handled I finally kicked on the 'mana weaving' skill and I could feel my mana alter into different form that was easily able to be made into a woven sphere, it took only a minute instead of near an hour to make it now that I had the proper skill. Once done I placed my Celestial against my chest right over the spot and using negative mana pressure I slowly started drawing light energy into the weave.