Kain’s mind worked in overdrive trying to figure out a solution.
Lady was too injured to attempt a similar strategy as yesterday. He also didn’t have enough spiritual power to channel to Bea and stall two, or maybe even more, attackers. Especially since he used the majority of it to increase the size and density of the mist.
‘First things first we need to slow them down.’
Kain once again whispered in Bridge’s ear his plan. “We may need Princess. Does she have any skill that could instantly decrease the temperature in an area remotely?”
Bridge nodded and called out his second contract.
‘Thank god! We may be able to get out of this without any more injuries’
“I am going to point in the direction it currently is and whisper to you distance. Would you be able to convey the distance to Princess accurately?” After all, she was just a baby.
Thankfully, he nodded again. Bridge had not been slacking with the education of his newest contract.
He asked Bea to let him know when one paused for long enough to attack.
“Stay ready” He whispered.
A few seconds later he pointed diagonally 30 degrees to the left. “12 feet away”
Screeeeee thump
Kain quickly ran to the source of the scream with he spear in hand.
Just as he had planned. The water droplets in the mist around stuck to the wings and caused them to freeze over when the temperature suddenly dropped.
The wasp was now unable to fly and struggling on its back
Bang
‘Ugh! But it’s still clearly not defenceless’ Kain thought after deflecting a heavy blow from the stinger it waved at him.’
Moving swiftly, he delivered a deep blow into its abdomen, hoping that it’d be fatal, before running away. He couldn’t risk delaying for more wasps to arrive or for its wings to thaw.
Kain crept quietly back to where Bridge was waiting and held a thumb up to show that the plan had succeeded.
Kain wanted to try the plan again, but he sensed through Bea, that there was suddenly another guard wasp that had entered the mist, while his spiritual power was continuously being drained to maintain the mist.
“We need to move. Keep Princess ready to do the same things again if we need to while we leave while I maintain our coverage.
They slowly crept towards the tall line of trees while Kain used Bea to monitor the location of the wasps.
Thankfully they seemed distracted by their fallen comrade and they were able to leave safely. Once under full coverage, they burst into a full sprint for several minutes until they returned to where their mounts were tied to a tree branch.
“Haaa…Haa…How’s Lady?”
“She’s okay, it was just a graze. We were both just shocked by the sudden attack” Bridge calmed down when Lady informed him that the injury wasn’t serious.
“I don’t understand what’s going on. For a red-grade queen, there should be at most 2 guards. The rest should be harmless workers.”
However, there were at least three in the mist just now, plus the one they defeated previously, totalling 4 guards, exactly double what there should be. Also, strangely despite all of the time they’ve spent around those flowers, they haven’t seen a single worker bee. Just what is up with this queen?
“Well, it’s not our concern anymore, we got what we came for so we can just continue looking for your second contract once lady heals up.”
True. Although Kain was incredibly curious about this situation that seemed to contradict everything he had learned about the species in textbooks.
They decided to move further away from the field of flowers before stopping to rest for the night.
However, Kain wasn’t sure if it was some kind of post-traumatic stress response, but he kept feeling like he could hear the buzzing of wasp wings before he went to sleep.
The next morning, Kain decided to finally activate the 24-hour radar he had previously exchanged for.
Instantly in the bottom corner of his vision a circular display appeared with a black background, and 3 concentric rings like a bullseye target, each ring Kain assumed was indicating the distance of 1 mile. At the very center of the bullseye was a blinking white dot, Kain’s location. Every few seconds sweeping lines would pulse outwards to scan the area.
‘Figures there was a catch. It can only detect up to 3 miles? That’s practically nothing in this huge forest’
As Kain expected, the range was too short for his potential contract to show up on the map. He and Bridge on horseback rounded the field of flowers and began to move in a zigzag maneuver to cover more area.
‘I’m certain that we are almost at the distance the train was at when I felt the pull.’
Kain thought correctly, although he could not see any changes to the map, he began to feel the faint pull again. He turned to Bridge in excitement to let him know and they set off in that direction stopping every second to make fine adjustments in the direction they were headed.
Eventually, the pull led them to another clearing full of flowers.
This field was much larger than the previous one. The quality of the spiritual plants was also of a higher grade. While most were still of Black-Iron quality, Kain could sense red-grade spiritual power from at least 3 fully-grown plants, meaning that they were of Bronze-quality.
Unfortunately, he couldn’t get a closer look at them from beyond the field to identify them.
Also, learning from his previous mistakes he didn’t dare to carelessly enter the field, afraid that there would be another ambush.
Bzzzzzz
His hunch was correct. The next moment, 4 Vespirae guards flew from the center of the field towards the field of flowers and extended a long, slender straw-like structure into the flowers to suck up nectar.
‘What the hell is going on? Why are there so many guards? And where are the male worker Vespirae, isn’t this their job?
And beyond the group of Vespirae, in the center of the field beyond his vision, was the source of the pull from his contract.
*Beep* At this moment a new red dot appeared at the edge of the radar.