Queen Yula looked down with a bit of distaste on the males who had returned. They had gone on what should have been a simple hunting mission but had lost six members to what seemed to be a single attacker. She sighed, they were only males who had been born with the misfortune of having the warrior trait instead of the crafter, at least then they could have been put to use in Silk Nest but since they were warriors they were disposable. Well all accept one of them, her favorite Regald had been sent to gain some levels, he had been a breeder, he didn’t have the trait but his bloodline and ancestral mutations would have let one of her daughters breed excellent warrior stock.

  “I am tired of your ramblings,” Queen Yula snapped silencing the warriors as they talked over eachother trying to gain favor and deflect her anger. “Speak plainly, what attacked you.”

  They went silent until finally, Huragan, the hunts leader spoke up. “We could not tell,” he admitted.

  Yula raised and eyebrow and he continued.

  “It had some sort of camouflage skill or ability, it was very stealth focused, we tried trapping it but it cut through our webs and it had some sort of burning venom it shot from a stinger and its carapace deflected our swords, then it flew away and we couldn’t track it. It also reached down and destroyed the bodies of our fallen with a single touch, no biomass or blood remained when it was done.”

  “You could not smell it to identify it?” she asked.

  “No,” Huragan said. “Some sort of mask was over it we only got question marks, if one of us who had gotten close had survived, we only saw its level.”

  Queen Yula braced herself for the terrible beast that must have come from the great wilds.

  Huragan hung his head. “Level twenty-two,” he admitted. “It was heavily poisoned when it fled and its health was draining fast but none of us received an XP notification from the Mother to confirm its death.”

  She froze in shock, the entire story sounded like something out of a hatchling’s tale but for Huragan to humiliate himself by admitting he had lost six warriors to a single creature under half his level….it had to be true. She thought through every story, but no creature matched the descriptors. Camouflage was something the Ghost Moth tribe from the east could do but they were many sparrow flights away and the other descriptors didn’t match up. Moth’s didn’t have stinger, venom or carapace, the tribes that had those couldn’t camouflage and their venom wouldn’t burn that was what the extinct Fire Ant tribe possessed but only the beast variants existed now. Could a wasp have mutated to develop camouflage or a moth to gain a stinger? Such things were possible and entire sects of tribes had formed because of such, her own clan had developed a life-drain attack, only present in the female gene of course, which had earned them their sect here in Silk Nest high above the brook.

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  It could also be chimera, a rare half breed but a male and a Queen from different clans being compatible was a great rarity so that was more unlikely than being a new mutation. That was why she had been grooming Regald after he had hatched with the Extended Fang mutation and she had hoped to pass that along in their clan giving the protecters of the clan an advantage from the hatchling phase.

  “Leave us,” Queen Yula said. “Meditate on your failure and return to the warrior lodge.” While it was called the ‘Warrior Lodge’ it was just where those males who had not been born with Crafter or Breeder trait were kept. Her real warriors her daughters, grand-daughters and great-grand-daughters were here real warriors.

  The males did not argue or question her, their place already precarious enough. Queen Yula turned to her guards, her daughters wore fine silk and carapace armor forged by their chitin smiths. Their many eyes blinked and they gathered around her.

  “What is it mother?” her eldest, Princess Chera asked, she was being groomed for a breeder roll her abdomen large as she worked on her build to mutate it to guide the next generation by guiding their traits, and increase their strength as soon as they hatched.

  “I fear a new enemy has entered our territory,” she said. “And it is dangerous if only for the fact that we do not know what she is.”

  “You assume she?” her youngest Mayra asked.

  “Of course,” Queen Yula laughed. “Our males may be dull but not even they could fall to a single male half their level, it is likely a young queen driven from her nest and seeking to establish her own clan.”

  “Beast or humanoid?” Princess Chera wondered. “The males described a humanoid but a beast or monster would make more sense to be able to take out so many.”

  “But it stole items, which one of their kind wouldn’t do,” Mayra pointed out competing with her eldest for her mother’s attention.

  “True,” Queen Yula agreed appreciating the conflict, it would make all her daughters stronger. “We must wait but be warry if we can capture this young queen all is well but if we must kill it we will.”

  “Why capture?” her guard captain asked. “It sounds dangerous my queen I would not want such a creature brought into Silk Nest.”

  “Dangerous yes but if we can broker an alliance as we have with the Ground Beatle Tribe and gain a new nest to subordinate to us it will be worth it,” Queen Yula explained.

  “You wish for more aid against the Mud Daubers?” Mayra asked.

  “Mud Daubers!” Princess Chera scoffed. “I have already arranged a strike force to attack them, the Mud Daubers will be no threat to us soon.”