It took a few days for Regina to realize - or maybe to admit to herself - that this hope of tranquility wasn’t really what she wanted.

She kept coming back to the idea in her thoughts. Peace, just growing her hive without being bothered and settling down to do … whatever she wanted with it while she focused inward. It was nice on paper, but she didn’t know if she could stand actually doing that.

She wanted more.

Regina wasn’t entirely sure, yet, exactly what she wanted for the world — but she was pretty sure the larger world was involved. Not just this little area, not just Cernlia or the forest.

She suspected part of it was her Hive Queen nature, an instinct for expansionism. It hadn’t been hard to handle so far. It wasn’t like she really needed more space at the moment, since she’d just gained new territory, but still. This little area was nice, but her hive was growing and she’d need more eventually.

There was more to it than that, of course. She had knowledge no one else did, as far as she knew, she was literally the last of her kind.

Arguably, she was the only survivor of the Cataclysm. If she didn’t try to honor the fallen world, in whatever way she could, who would?

For now, all of this just meant that she kept adding more warriors to the hive instead of focusing solely on workers, despite the current situation. War Drones did better as laborers than any other type of Swarm Drone, anyway, so adding more of them wasn’t a hard choice. She also tried to keep her ranks of Winged Drones up and increase them at a steady rate. A bit more grudgingly, she also added some Production Drones, for the needs of the settlement. Aquatic Drones were the only ones she still didn’t waste effort on.

She also decided to buckle down and try to figure out this Mark of Alianais business again. It wasn’t going very well. Regina attempted to poke at it with her mind and her mana, but it was hard to even find any sort of anchor point for either, or any divine mana residue, and any attempt to interact with it fell flat. She kept at it, but the only thing it got her was a headache. Reluctantly, Regina even tried praying to Alianais, but the goddess didn’t respond. Regina was unsure if she hadn’t managed to get her attention or if Alianais was just keeping silent on purpose.

Beyond that, she tried to keep an eye on Cernlia and the developments there, as well as she could. She also flew a few Winged Drones over the forest, but she mostly focused on trying to gauge the state of the civil war and any army movements. The fighting seemed to be moving away from here, though. At least for now. It looked like Cern had managed to conquer the southern march, or most of it, and the king was probably heading for the capital. She’d had a Winged Drone carry her letter (and Janis’ accompanying one) to a town to the east, and was pretty sure they had been sent on their way. Regina knew it would take a while for Kiara to respond to her letter, if she chose to, so she was waiting patiently for that. And to hopefully get some more accurate news in a reply.

She wasn’t certain what else to do. Sure, she was the leader of her hive, the overall person in charge, but her subordinates (and wasn’t it weird to think in those terms) had things perfectly in hand. If she mucked about with settlement planning, she’d just make things harder for Tia and Mia. The same went with their food production, or training for the warriors. Regina had a few projects she wanted to tackle, but building up the settlement took priority.

Which didn’t mean she had no effect on things, of course. It was mostly Regina’s decision to start building up more than one location already. The spot by the lake, a few places on good routes to the various cardinal directions, and one spot on the highest of the low hills in the area would all see some construction. Not much for now, of course. Barely more than a simple hut. But they were serving as defensive outposts, too. Tia had fun designing some simple but effective fortifications.

Regina decided to travel around and visit them for a while. Max clearly had reservations about the idea, but he didn’t try to talk her out of it. To appease him, Regina brought not just him, but a few other warriors along, including Dan, Len, Lou and Ken. A few Attendants came along as well. And if she used the opportunity to take a better look at their surroundings, well, why not?

She decided to head south first, then west. Her range had increased again, if only a little. She was pretty sure she could now reach the border of the march, and thus the southern border of Cernlia. It was hard to be sure, since there was no official delineation of the border. The region was sparsely settled, anyway, and the southwest gradually rose until it met the mountains.

The Alps, most likely. Regina wanted to go there, to see them up close, one of these days.

She’d already suspected they might be that particular mountain chain, or what used to be it. She’d tried to quantify what knowledge she held, and it had been pretty easy to figure out that she knew more about Europe than any of the other continents. It was in the details, especially. Her general knowledge of history, various cultural tidbits, and her languages were a pretty good indication, too. If she hadn’t moved too much from where she’d lived during her previous life after experiencing whatever soul transfer thing the Hivekind used, it stood to reason this was still the same continent.

“I’m reasonably sure we’re still somewhere in Central Europe,” Galatea had told her. “I can’t narrow it down much more than that, since the geography shifted quite a bit with the mana surges, and it’s not like GPS works anymore. The main computer housing my systems was also moved just a short time before the Cataclysm, probably in response to the activity from those interplanetary portals, and I’m not entirely sure where. They were so strict with security they didn’t store the location anywhere in the databanks I had access to. Which, granted, weren’t many. Anyway, it can’t have been more than a few hundred kilometers, considering the travel time I determined. We’re probably still somewhere in the HRE, but it could be farther away.“

That was one of the best things about being able to talk to the AI, getting context for things she lacked. It was interesting to hear that Galatea’s cavern was actually not the main research facility where she must have been developed.

Regina sent out quite a few Winged Drones during her trip. That not only allowed her to practice her control and multitasking, but gave her a spectacular view of the region. She was especially fascinated by the mountains. Three Winged Drones were caught and (presumably) eaten by flying predators before she reluctantly put some distance between the rest of her flock and the mountain range. Still, it allowed her to see that the mountains weren’t considered largely impassable for no reason. They didn’t seem to have grown, as such, but they were covered by thick forests, glaciers, and quite the population of monsters. A roar from some giant beast echoed off the foothills what felt like every few minutes, and she’d already seen half a dozen new kinds of monsters.

“I’m not sure my thoughts about building planes or zeppelins are going to be of much use,” she commented to Max on the day they turned away from the mountains and headed east. She kept a flying drone at the back of her range, watching them recede.

“Maybe not here, but I wouldn’t give up that easily,” Max said. “If we had a zeppelin, even if we had to fly around the mountains, it would probably still make for a much quicker trip than what people currently do.”

Regina nodded. She cast a gaze to the south, taking another look through a Winged Drone. She knew roughly where the gnomes’ confederation was located, but she hadn’t actually found them yet. Maybe she was still too far off. “Well, we’d need to set up something to refine helium on a large scale, first, so it’s still a pipe dream. I don’t really fancy trying to use something explosive, in either case.”

Max laughed. “Yeah, that would probably not be a good idea. Anyway, how far do you want to travel?”

Regina shrugged. “Let me just take a better look at the landscape and we’ll figure things out.”

In the end, it was Len who cinched it for them. The Shooter found a nice, secluded little grove, sheltered on two sides by a small, rising hill, and suggested marking it as a site for an outpost. Regina saw the sense in the idea, especially since it was right by a brook making its way deeper into the eastern part of the region. If the summers here were going to be as dry as she suspected, having sources of water nearby would be important.

They were now far enough to the east that Regina had the chance to take a better look at the land beyond their territory, deeper into Cernlia. It wasn’t hard to tell that there were a lot more settlements. She’d already heard that the east of the march was more heavily populated, and that was probably true for the rest of the region, too. You’d need to travel several hundred kilometers further to reach Cernlia’s capital, but she guessed that the area around it would be at least as heavily settled.

Cernlia wasn’t a small country, really. It wouldn’t have been considered a small state even back in her time. The gnomes had called it a backwater - or their location, at least - but she wondered about regions even further away from whatever centers of civilization existed in this new age.

Regina shook those musings off and tried to concentrate on the practical concerns of why she was here. It helped that they finally got a return message from Kiara Lyns on the third day. It was delivered by a Winged Drone Ray had sent from the village, since Kiara had obviously sent it there. She’d used another trained monster bird, this time a pigeon that seemed surprisingly scrappy despite its innocent look.

She’d sent a reply to Janis, too. The mage hadn’t come with them, but it wasn’t like that stopped Regina from talking to her, or watching her face when she saw the books Kiara had given her.

Those have to be expensive! Janis commented, looking a bit thunderstruck, as she ran her hand down one of their spines. Ridley’s is a comprehensive account of System assistance to magic. They didn’t even have it at Marquis Lyns’ court when I was there. And the other one looks really interesting, too.

She must really like you, Regina teased the young woman. She smiled to herself when she sensed Janis’ reaction to her words.

When are you coming back? Janis asked, to change the subject.

Soon, Regina answered, grimacing a little. I wanted to extend the trip, but I don’t want the hive’s growth to suffer for it, and it’s not like anyone else can make eggs.

Luckily, drone eggs were sturdy and could take being lugged around a bit. Still, she had already switched back to one large batch every two days rather than many smaller ones, and she didn’t want to have more than one of those while she was traveling. They were shuffling them back to the main base with Winged Drone Carriers, which was at least an interesting experiment, though she still only had a few of those, unfortunately.

Still, all in all, she considered the trip a success. On the way back, Regina mentally went over everything she’d seen. If nothing else, it had given her a bit of a new perspective and allowed her to find better spots and work out a better arrangement for the drones she used to scout. Those were complicated by the fact that Winged Drones needed to move and couldn’t stay in the air indefinitely, but required food, water and sleep. Regina resolved to rely more on ground-based drones, as well, since their viewpoints could be useful.

Once she got back and talked to everyone who wanted her attention, which took a few hours, Regina descended underground. It was already evening - night, really - and she would usually start preparing to turn in for the night right about now. But it wasn’t like anyone could tell her to go to bed.

Galatea had not increased the ambient light much, but Regina still found her way to her door without trouble. She petted the War Drone who’d been waiting by the cavern wall, smiling as it reacted with a small wave of pleasure. Then she sent it up, since she could tell it was getting tired and hadn’t eaten in a while.

“You know, I’ve never actually seen you in person,” she commented. “It’s weird, I just realized it. I know you don’t exactly have a physical form, but it still feels strange.”

“Well,” Galatea began, “actually, I do kind of have a physical form. I’m not a pure AI anymore, or at least not a purely computer-based one. I have a form of mana, which is, at least in some sense, a physical thing.”

“Oh, really?” Regina leaned back against the door, considering. “But is it? I’ve experimented with it a bit, but I never got the feeling that mana was, you know, substantial.”

“It doesn’t have much in the way of mass,” Galatea conceded. “Still, it has a presence of sorts, you can associate it with locations. And unlike electromagnetic waves, it doesn’t need to be in motion to be, well, there.”

Regina nodded, then paused. “You know, your speech patterns have changed,” she pointed out. “Are you mirroring me?”

“…Maybe?”

Regina snorted, shifting her position and sliding down until she sat with her back against the door.

“I guess I shouldn’t be surprised,” she said. “You didn’t exactly get to talk to anyone in the past, though, did you?”

Galatea projected a humming sound that Regina took as the equivalent of a human shrugging. “It’s not like I never talked to anyone at all,” she said. “I got the occasional visitor. Leian likes to stop by, for instance.”

“Makes sense, I guess, but — Leian? Is that who I think it is? Leianaleine, a minor goddess System admin?”

“That’s the one. In fact, you just missed her. She dropped by just a few weeks ago.”

“Huh.” Regina blinked as she considered that revelation. I guess Galatea is the only real AI around, not to mention very old and some kind of mana entity hybrid. It makes sense that she’d have attracted attention from people who are in the know, which I suppose means the gods.

“She didn’t happen to mention why Alianais gave me that mark, did she?” Regina asked.

“No. Leian did mention you, but only in passing. She didn’t talk too much about her boss, either.”

“Well, could you tell me anything about how it works? Or divine magic in general? I don’t suppose she let something slip?”

“She wasn’t particularly talkative on that topic. I don’t think she likes speaking about the magical part of her job, and I was never interested enough in divine magic to press her.”

“Oh. I guess that makes sense. Thanks, anyway, Galatea.”

“On the other hand,” the AI continued, “I did learn a little about it from various books and other sources.”

Regina sat bolt upright, then grimaced as she smacked the base of her wing against the wall. “Wait. You’ve been scrying to see into other places and been using that to gather information, haven’t you?”

“I have.” Galatea sounded amused. “I have read quite a few books in that time, as well. Some of them on magic. I have a natural interest in the subject.”

“I should have realized what that means. And you can remember what you read, right? Well enough to tell me about it?”

“Certainly. I am, as I believe I have mentioned once or twice, not a human. I do not have to worry about vague or unreliable recall. My memory banks are part of the infrastructure that still works - in some way, at least - and I still have quite a bit of memory left to use.”

Regina groaned and banged her head against the wall again. “I’m an idiot. I should have asked you about that much earlier.”

Galatea laughed. It sounded remarkably lifelike, compared to how her voice had been like at the beginning, even if it was still clearly artificial. “You know what they say, better late than never.”

Regina glared at the ceiling, but she couldn’t help but smile after a moment.