Chapter 886

Chapter 886

No matter how many times he experienced it, upper energy seeming to randomly disappear in front of Chidi was quite surprising. Obviously he knew how it was happening. He could feel the void of energy where Crossed Antennae stood, which was clearly different from the zones of energy she emptied. Upper energy would rapidly flow into whatever area Crossed Antennae drained, which meant her method wasnt any good for leaving clear writing. He appreciated the thought, however, and the void ant queen hadnt been willing to give up there.

She learned to do more than simply consume the energy from an area, but how to do it in focused patterns. In that manner, she could create whole words at once, using a modified writing style. Chidi wasnt used to written text to begin with, since he had to feel the shape of ink in paper. Many common letters lost their distinction with Crossed Antennaes method, so instead they made something entirely knew.

Chidi could most easily sense larger distortions in energy, and they remained clear for a few moments longer as energy filled in the remaining space. Thus, rather than proper characters Crossed Antennae created small and large voids, as well as wide gashes that could be rotated in four distinct orientations. It was a large undertaking just to talk to Chidi, but he appreciated the effort all the more because of it.

How goes the search for sword cultivators? Crossed Antennae asked, the distortions of energy that formed words appearing in sequence in front of her.

Only a very small portion seem to have both interest and aptitude, Chidi admitted. Though its possible I missed something given well, communication difficulties.

Indeed, Crossed Antennae said. We had not anticipated how troublesome it would be to teach my offspring to understand human speech. That was not an issue for the other colonies, who grew up among them.

Chidi nodded. He and the other humans had been helping teach them to understand speech, though his own part was minimal in that regard. They had been worried the communal learning sessions might fail- not because void ants were not good in such environments, but because of the subject matter. The void ants could not relay the spoken word to each other. However, they did sign the spoken words in sync. And words werent repeated just once.

Of course, they might not be staying with the colony indefinitely- that was where technology came into play. They had spare communications equipment on which they stored recordings. Not all created locally, but instead some were sourced from the core of the Scarlet Alliance. It was much simpler for thousand people to record a hundred words than for ten people to record ten thousand words. And even if there were some logistical issues, they werent anything insurmountable.The source of this content nov(el)bi((n))

Those who have the aptitude have shown success, at least, Chidi added. They are much more effective when using their mandibles as swordlike weapons. Though theyre mostly, uh

Quite weak, Crossed Antennae said. I have not had time to produce many at the quality of royal guard. And other void ants need quite long to develop unique properties. Soon, however, I will not be involved in producing larger quantities of offspring. The last of the queens we need for the foreseeable future will be placed around the planet. Thank you for your aid in larger scale changes, by the way.

When she spoke for a long time to him, Chidi noticed a large scale depletion in energy. Knowing that, she would fly around to different locations. He turned to face her as she did, though it didnt really mean anything. Were happy to help deliver things, Chidi said. Mostly, it was the ship that did the work. Void ants could obviously transport things for themselves, but moving them around the planet was a bit beyond their capabilities. At least in a timeframe shorter than years. Or decades. And reshaping the terrain in broad strokes is easy enough.

The void ants werent terribly picky about where they lived- as long as it could produce natural resources for them to consume. The planet named Bounty was missing some of the things Chidi could have considered necessities, but for the void ants purposes it made sense. Just enough wild plants to feed upon and sustain the upper energy was the threshold they wanted to reach. If the planet seemed to be something more than just someone scattering seeds on a planet with atmosphere, their goal might not be accomplished.

That goal being lying in wait for groups from the upper realms to use these planets as short term bases before invading the lower realms. From what they had seen previously, that might be a few decades- but they were only truly informed about what happened during an abnormal cycle one time.

When Chidi considered that, he realized that the seemingly frantic pace the void ant queen was working at was not so odd. She wanted to get the planet properly established before moving on. And she would have to move- traveling between planets to provide queens for others. If she spent a decade on every planet, she wouldnt actually get very far before the next cycle. And then the surprise factor would be lost.

That was the main reason their group had come. The ship that carried her from the lower realms to the upper realms was not expected to be able to make further trips. They came to deliver the first round of a small fleet of ships- each one being hardly larger than Chidi himself, but capable of hosting Crossed Antennae and a large quantity of others.

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I can see that, Uzun nodded.

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In addition to discussing her plans with work colleagues like Uzun, Catarina did like to pass them by her level-headed husband. She was rather surprised he hadnt completely shut down her idea to compress the various systems under Alliance control together, but perhaps that was because hed considered the defensive benefits.

Tell me about those warp gates, Timothy said. How would they actually work?

Theyd be something like a replacement for the individual drives on ships that perform the same work. Theyd create a corridor of distorted space that would allow ships to travel through either distorted space or a subspace, depending on various factors.

So this would be more valuable for civilian operations, Timothy said. Unless the expense is too much for military ships?

She nodded. It might increase our trade efficiency, if it ever gets working. And it could make military travel more effective, allowing them to arrive at the far end with more energy. But if going into a warzone, they would have to be aware of sabotage once information about these is disseminated.

How come nobody else has these things? Timothy asked. I understand the technological side of things. But the formation focused ones like teleportation portals

Who says they dont? Everheart certainly has demonstrated such things in the upper realms. It would just be expensive. Exclusive. We havent been spending a lot of time inside our neighbors borders, you know. Even Velvet would be cautious entering large sects.

Timothy nodded. Of course. It would be used only by the wealthy. And I suppose there would be risks for them to consider. Theyd want to keep quiet about it.

Thats right, Catarina said. But we can probably rule out quick and easy large scale teleportation mainly because Everheart hasnt been caught.

About that other thing. Intersystem teleportation. That would be easier if the systems were compressed, right?

Of course. Shorter distances would greatly help, Catarina said.

And if the locations were otherwise connected by formations, wouldnt that help?

Hmm I suppose thats true. That could significantly she began muttering to herself. ... but the energy costs emergencies

Timothy just smiled as he watched his wife. He might not ever be able to invent any of these things, formations or high level technology, but he wasnt without learning or insights of his own into the world. He had no guarantee if any ideas he tossed to his wife would get picked up or even that they were viable in the first place, but he could still put them out there. And if nothing else, it would keep her occupied and not focused on some of her wilder ideas