∼ Day 146 ∼

"My Lord, we already discussed this at the council yesterday," A large bugbear said, walking alongside me.

"No matter how impatient I myself am to get operations up and working with this veritable treasure trove, Build Master Mar'v has his hands filled with tearing down and reshaping the main settlement for future construction, he has no time to oversee the raising of a miner's quarry or the like. Besides, most of the workforce will be used for the things that take precedence, and setting up a mine is long down the list of those things."

Glancing towards the much taller and broader monster who was the chief of mining and ore extraction that I had hired, Fortuuk, I shook my head gently.

"Just follow," I said simply as we crested a small incline by the base of the mountain range of the basin.

Confusion briefly flickering across his face, he was about to say something but shut himself off as he laid eyes and the small encampment before him.

Manned by barely more than half a dozen orcs, there were a couple of large bulbous creatures in shoddy pens that captivated the miner's attention.

"Mineral Beetles?" He asked with a hint of surprise tinging his voice.

Smiling, I just nodded.

"They're not supposed to be so far into the wastelands, let alone the lowlands," He stated before pausing awkwardly. "Also, aren't they a bit... big?"

"We've brought them in from the outskirts of the wastelands, on the border of the enlightened territories. We had initially used them for transporting our migrating caravan to the basin, but now we've lacked any proper use for them other than just mere beasts of burden." I said. "And yeah, we've been generous with feeding and taking care of those we have left from the journey here."

"Are these all the ones you have?" He asked. "I'm counting eight."

"Not all, we have another two that should be elsewhere,"

"Shame, if you had a queen, they could've become valuable additions to my work, even though they're a bit hard to handle from what I remember," Fortuuk said with a bit of disappointment.

"I don't have one... for now," I said simply, giving the bugbear a grin.

"What do you-?" He managed to get out before I continued into the pen where the eight alumn beetles were being taken care of.

Gesturing the workers aside, I called upon the Sanguine Plague within each of the beetles, making them line up along each other.

"They're about to evolve," I said as Fortuuk caught up.

"How did you- how do you know?" He asked apprehensively as he pointed at the obedient beetles.

"As I said, they've been well-taken care of, and now all of them are at the threshold, excluding the two others not here," I answered.

I didn't want to waste time as this process would take a little bit, so I activated their evolutions manually. Even with non-sapient creatures, I could do this, but only just setting the process in motion, not actually giving me the ability to select.

Shocked as each beetle began taking on the familiar white hue of evolution, Fortuuk stared in wide-eyed awe.

"You're able to control their evolutions - but how?" He asked.

I looked towards him, meeting his excited gaze.

"That's not something for you to know just yet," I answered simply, not quite ready to disclose that piece of information with someone I do not know nor trust.

Taken slightly aback, Fortuuk nodded hastily, quickly forgetting himself in the light of the white hue again.

"Do you think one of them can become a queen?" Fortuuk asked after a while.

"That's what I'm hoping for," I paused before pointing to one of the beetles. "The biggest one there has gotten most of the care, we'll see if it mattered any."

The first to complete its evolution was one of the smaller ones, and the creature that came out was distinctly different from anything we had expected.

Instead of the bear-sized insect with its blue armored carapace and mix between a stag beetle and rhinoceros beetle, it had not only become much bigger, but it also was much more like that of some kind of rhinoceros beetle - and funnily enough, the size of a rhino.

However, the biggest change was definitely the fact that the creature now, and very eerily so, stood on four spiky legs with a torso more so than a thorax of which now sprouted an addition of a pair of massive and thick bulky arms that looked made for digging and the sort.

Lastly was its color, a light crimson that shaded differently on its carapace under the sun's glare.

From its massive horn made of crushing and digging, to its now much more dexterous figure and size, I felt like it could carve out a mountain if I gave it enough time.

-Appraisal!-

Appraisal - Hemaite Worker Information Attributes Traits. Titles. and Skills -Name- "???" STR 42 ⇒ 70 Skills ??? -Race- Hemaite Worker VIT 47 ⇒ 69 Traits ??? -Sex- Male AGI 16 ⇒ 25 Titles ??? -Rank- E+ DEX 18 ⇒ 32 Resistances -Level- 1/50 INT 6 ⇒ 10 Health 640/640 CHR 2 ⇒ 4 Physical Resistance 24 ⇒ 35 Stamina 399/399 WILL 5 ⇒ 12 Magical Resistance 8 ⇒ 15 Mana 0/0 MAG 1 ⇒ 5 Mental Resistance 4 ⇒ 8 [Sanguine Worker]

Nodding with a broad smile on my face in appreciation, I looked over at Fortuuk who looked to be positively shaking in his boots. At first, I thought it to be fear, but soon realize it was actually excitement that had the large miner rattled.

Not long after the first, the next three worker beetles finished their evolutions, but the fifth beetle to finish was something different.

Unlike its rhino-sized and looking brethren, this monster of a beast was even larger, almost two-fold. Instead of the arms and horns made for digging, excavating, and crushing, these appendages were undoubtedly made for the purpose of mutilating and destroying.

With an even deeper shade of crimson, the behemoth beetle towered over both me and Fortuuk.

-Appraisal!-

Appraisal - Hemaite Warrior Information Attributes Traits. Titles. and Skills -Name- "???" STR 48 ⇒ 91 Skills ??? -Race- Hemaite Warrior VIT 51 ⇒ 80 Traits ??? -Sex- Male AGI 17 ⇒ 25 Titles ??? -Rank- D- DEX 17 ⇒ 24 Resistances -Level- 1/50 INT 8 ⇒ 13 Health 833/833 CHR 2 ⇒ 4 Physical Resistance 29 ⇒ 44 Stamina 451/451 WILL 8 ⇒ 17 Magical Resistance 10 ⇒ 25 Mana 0/0 MAG 1 ⇒ 5 Mental Resistance 5 ⇒11 [Sanguine Warrior]

Gawking at its stats, especially that insane physical resistance, I admired the massive insect.

With it patiently waiting and still abating by my commands, the other beetles also finished evolving, resulting in another two worker beetles.

However, there was still one left. The largest, and the one I had been putting my money on.

It took some more time than the others, but that just promised well for the end outcome, and when the white hue of evolution faded, we weren't disappointed in the slightest.

Dwarfing the worker hemiates, and even the one warrior, the queen was an absolute leviathan in comparison.

-Appraisal!-

Appraisal - Hemaite Queen Information Attributes Traits. Titles. and Skills -Name- "???" STR 35 ⇒ 52 Skills ??? -Race- Hemaite Queen VIT 62 ⇒ 93 Traits ??? -Sex- Female AGI 19 ⇒ 24 Titles ??? -Rank- D- DEX 13 ⇒ 18 Resistances -Level- 1/50 INT 18 ⇒ 30 Health 1011/1011 CHR 15 ⇒ 28 Physical Resistance 28 ⇒ 45 Stamina 395/395 WILL 15 ⇒ 26 Magical Resistance 22 ⇒ 46 Mana 0/0 MAG 3 ⇒ 14 Mental Resistance 8 ⇒ 16 [Sanguine Hive Breeder]

Sporting the same glossy crimson and spikey carapace that ran down like segmented plates of armor across its massive form, the queen looked like a living fortress. Almost like a centipede, its otherwise similar frontal body to that of its kin, was attached to a much longer and elongated body that stretched out to clearly be the breeding factory that was common with queens of hive creatures.

But instead of the horns like the others, it was almost formed like a majestic crown that fanned out atop its head, and longer down the front of its body were multiple sets of arms or appendages that all sported serrated and scythe-like claws.

Nodding to myself in satisfaction, I gave the stunned bugbear a toothy grin.

"So, you said something about needing a workforce?"