The hive crossed the border into Nerlia in the dark of night.

It would have been easier to travel underground, but even they couldn’t dig tunnels that quickly or comprehensively. Still, the entire force of drones didn’t use a single light, not even a candle. They moved silently, like shadows through the night, with only soft footsteps and the slightest rustle of wings to give away their position.

The border territory between the northern reaches of what had been Cernlian territory, at its edge to the Great Forest, and Nerlia were sparsely inhabited. Even if the forest was arguably a good source of resources, and adventurers or other people hunting monsters often passed through, it also represented danger. The occasional monster wave every five years had been known to break through defensive lines. Even during the time in between, a dangerous monster wandering out of the forest wasn’t unheard of.

Regina’s drones didn’t have to worry about that. Even if they met a monster, they would only see it as a nice snack.

She herself was watching the front line’s advance through the drones’ eyes instead of participating directly. That would have made Max throw a fit. Besides, Regina knew perfectly well that her strengths didn’t lie in this area. She could see in the dark as well as any Hivekind and she could fly, but she wasn’t a shock trooper. Instead, she hung back with a group of bodyguards, watching and helping to coordinate their movement.

Most of her forces were Swarm Drones, obviously. While Winged Drones were more mobile, they wouldn’t be enough for this, so they had a large number of War Drones as well. Ben and the others were counting on their ability to live off the land, so they were not bogged down by trying to bring wagons along, or other traditional arrangements to carry supplies. It made it a lot easier to move on a route that didn’t follow actual roads, and he’d explained to her that this ability to maneuver independently of a road network might be their biggest advantage.

Regina privately thought he was probably underestimating the Winged Drones as a factor, but she wasn’t going to argue this point. The more advantages they had, the better. And she had to admit that watching thousands of drones set out to enforce her will on foreign land was a nice feeling. It didn’t make her wonder about how many or which of them were going to die any less, but it did make her feel powerful and confident.

It helped that she wasn’t the only one to feel that way. Ben had joined her, Max and the others, and she felt the quiet satisfaction practically wafting off him like a tangible scent as he watched their drones, his troops, move according to the plan he had drafted. Hastily, with some adjustments, but that only made it more satisfying. Regina was glad to have him there to handle the operational details. Aong with the other senior Warriors who were acting as his subordinate officers for this - well, she supposed ‘campaign’ was probably the best word.

“It’s going well?” she asked him quietly.

Ben smiled, one of the most unguarded smiles she’d ever seen from him. “It is, my Queen,” he responded. “About as well as I could have expected, and I was entertaining doubts. Our mobility is everything I thought it would be, and if we still haven’t encountered resistance, we can be relatively sure the first part of our march is going to go smoothly. We’re coming up on the first settlements, anyway.”

Regina nodded and focused her attention on the psychic link, looking through some drones’ eyes. “I hope this will go as smoothly when encountering the populace,” she muttered.

“It’s not like we have to worry about our Swarm Drones burning or pillaging the villages,” Max commented, the ghost of a smile on his face.

He had a point there, Regina admitted. She had given the drones strict orders. Even without that factor, however, there were advantages to having what were essentially animals as your fighting force. And not the ‘slavering, bloodthirsty, monstrous beasts’ kind, either. Her Swarm Drones wouldn’t care about the human civilians except possibly as obstacles unless they were directly attacked, and they certainly weren’t going to go looting, raping or burning down homes.

She just hoped that would be enough. So far, it seemed like it, at least.

The first few forward teams had several sapient drones along, mostly to handle the communication as well as acting as commanders and lynchpins of the scouts and vanguard. They addressed inhabitants of the villages her drones took, calling on them to surrender and promising they would be left in peace as long as they didn’t resist.

Most of the villagers appeared more bewildered than anything, from what Regina could see. She supposed being woken in the middle of the night to see strange insect people soldiers swarming over your fields and village streets was going to do that to people.

When they did fight, it was pretty easy to handle. Regina suspected at least some of the villagers choosing that course of action were drunk. Her commanders on the spot managed to take them down without killing anyone, although a few of them were seriously injured and would need medical attention. And it only cost the hive three Swarm Drones. A senseless waste, but at least it’s not quite for nothing. I hope.

She wasn’t out to ruin any of their lives or set up a reign of terror. Well, if she was honest, Regina would admit that she didn’t care too much if some people in another country who she didn’t know happened to get hurt - because of her actions or not. But a soft touch was obviously the best choice here; she didn’t want to drive them to resist her hive’s presence. Or worse, start some kind of guerrilla movement and fight them from behind the front lines.

“I get your reasoning, my Queen, I just hope it won’t be too much of a soft touch,” Ben muttered.

She glanced at him and raised an eyebrow. Had some of her thoughts leaked through? More likely, he’d just thought about the same things, watching what was happening.

“I don’t think so,” she said. “We do have a pretty nice iron fist inside the velvet glove to use, anyway.”

Max smiled slightly, and Regina could sense a hint of amusement from the others around them. She’d been trying to pay more attention to her psychic senses, to hone her abilities. Unfortunately, so far it only really seemed to focus her attention on what was going on inside her psychic link. It’s like it simply defaults to it, automatically or when I think of using psychic power or something. I guess that makes sense for Hive Queens, but still … Regina suppressed a grimace and resolved to keep trying to sense other minds that didn’t belong to her hive and hone her senses on them. Considering the Skills she had, she knew she had to have the ability to use psychic power outside of it. Galatea and Madris had basically confirmed as much, anyway.

At least she had a reasonably good opportunity for that right now. While she still kept back, behind the line of advancement, she was going to move forward as well, and so come closer to the Nerlian settlements and the humans within them her drones were currently mapping out. It would be good practice in trying to see past swarms of her drones, at least. Now I just have to figure out a good way to train my mental defenses.

“They’re mostly civilians so far,” Ben noted, dragging her thoughts back to the situation at hand. “I suppose it makes sense that most of the adventurers have departed, probably to fight in the Cernlian civil war. We did hear it’s apparently more lucrative for high-leveled fighters.”

“The war against the elves is probably a factor, as well,” Max added. “I wouldn’t be surprised if they weren’t too happy to see Nerlian adventurers in the forest right now. Even if they don’t outright attack them, they can probably still make things very inconvenient.”

Regina nodded. “Or they simply don’t stay around in villages like these,” she pointed out mildly. Most likely, all of these reasons played a role.

Of course, it still didn’t take long until their forces ran into the first adventurers. Or what she guessed were some, anyway. They didn’t wear signs with their profession written on them. But they were armed, in an eclectic mix that seemed to fit their individual Classes, and clearly stronger than random farmers.

They were also more aggressive, unsurprisingly.

The first they met was a band of five people in one of the inner villages they’d reached so far, behind two others from their current position, more or less. Regina currently had two sapient drones there, and she wasn’t sure the swarm of War Drones accompanying them would be enough to protect them in a fight. Ben was already diverting others, and she quickly guided some additional Winged Drones into place in preparation.

“What are you freaks doing here?” one of them bellowed. He sounded a bit drunk, if she wasn’t mistaken.

“We are moving through and taking custody of the place for the moment,” Alf answered calmly. As one of the hive’s senior scouts, he was in charge of this group. He was also stretching the truth a bit there, but Regina was hardly going to complain about that.

“You what?” another interjected. He sounded just as belligerent, if not more so. “Who are you fellows, anyway?”

“Yes, and why do you think we’re going to let you get away with it?” the first one added.

Alf sighed. “We will not harm you unless you resist,” he said. “You sound like you could use some sleep, fellows. Go back inside and go to bed.”

“Mighty big talk for a stick-armed freak,” the second guy replied. He grabbed his weapon, a surprisingly thin and delicate-looking sword.

Alf repeated his demand for them to go back inside, while other drones edged into position. Meanwhile, two smaller flocks of Winged Drones approached the village. The adventurers didn’t listen, of course, but they didn’t attack right away. Regina was beginning to hope things would stay reasonably civil until the reinforcements arrived and could cow them into surrendering.

Unfortunately, just before they could, a third guy from the party spoke up. “What are you after, stranger? This is obviously a raiding party, what are you aiming for?”

“None of your concern, and we are not raiding anyone,” Alf replied. “Now drop your weapons and head back inside.”

The third man didn’t bother with any further words, but threw a knife at one of the Swarm Drones.

Regina cursed softly as she watched. The knife hit the drone directly in the chest. It was one of the weakest War Drones in the group, and the human clearly had high physical stats. The knife punched directly through its shell and she felt its mind start to flicker out.

Alf and the others didn’t hesitate. The other War Drones immediately charged the adventurers, piling on them to stop them from going after the sapient drones and hopefully overwhelm them. Alf nocked a javelin, tipped with a titanium spike, and threw it back at the guy who’d killed a drone.

He dodged, but that only opened him to a tackle from two War Drones. One of them grabbed onto his legs. Regina briefly slipped into the second drone to wrestle down his arms and knock away his weapons, before she nudged another one to sit on him. Then she switched to another to see the rest of the fight.

One of the remaining men charged Alf and knocked him back. Regina watched tensely as the scout sprawled to the ground, stumbling back to his feet. The pause cost him and the hammer-wielding man didn’t give him time to settle, smashing his weapon into him right away.

Alf twisted, but she could tell from the spike of pain his shoulder was broken. He stepped back, looking for a way to disengage. That was when a Magic Missile from his partner curved around him, hitting the human and staggering him.

Right on cue, the Winged Drones who had finally reached the village descended. Three of them piled onto the human, knocking him down. Just to be safe, Regina reminded them mentally to restrain, not kill, their target.

“Regina?” Ben asked.

Regina blinked and turned her attention back to her companions. “I was watching what we could probably call the first real skirmish,” she explained. “It’s going to be a bit of a mess to sort out.” And probably not the last one, she added silently, far from it.

“I know,” Ben said. “The Attendants can handle the healing, though. I wanted to point out that we’re going to have company.”

Regina raised an eyebrow. Instead of asking verbally, she focused on what Ben was sending through the psychic link. He directed her attention to a group of riders currently crossing the border to the east under the eyes of observing Winged Drones.

Regina smiled. Things are coming together. Galatea had headed back to central Cernlia to check on how things were going there, and she hadn’t heard from her yet. But there was one area she was particularly interested in and one source of information. It seemed like she would get both.

“It could be a trap,” Max warned. He frowned. “Is that, what’s his name, Edmund?”

“The earl’s bastard son,” Regina agreed. She remembered the guy’s face. He was currently accompanied by only a handful of other knights, not exactly enough for a military operation or even a good scouting team.

“They do seem to be heading to the village you designated as a meeting spot,” Max said.

Regina shot him an amused look. She hadn’t actually given him that letter to read. Figured he’d find out exactly what was in it, anyway, probably from Jen, the Keeper who had actually penned it.

“They’re fast,” Ben commented. “It’s only been a few hours.”

Regina shrugged. “He must have already been near the border, preparing,” she said. They had probably planned, or at least kept the option open, to get there early, just in case. She could respect that kind of careful preparation.

“I guess I know where we’re going next,” Max muttered with a put-upon sigh.

“It would be rude to keep guests waiting, Max, do show some consideration,” she chided him with a smile.

“I blame my upbringing and early childhood education,” he replied, deadpan.

Regina chuckled. She felt like she should be a bit upset at the jab in his retort, but she just found it funny. It was only now they started it again that she realized they hadn’t really bantered like this for a while.

You’re feeling better? he asked her quietly.

Regina smiled again. I guess I am.

She hoped it was more that the situation with the psychic was at least temporarily dealt with and she’d successfully distracted herself from thinking about the past, and not the part about invading a country with a horde of monsters, although she wasn’t completely sure.