A series of glowing notifications appeared in view. There were so many that Han could barely focus on a single one.
『A Queen Rank Bee has been detected in close vicinity.』
『Trait skill: [꧁Queen's Gaze꧂] has been disabled until conflict of authority is resolved.』
Han just stared wide-eyed, heart thundering as he opened his trait screen to confirm
And as he feared, Queen's gaze was now gone from the skills list.
'Wait, wait. You can't disable that. That's all I have.'
However, the notifications just kept coming.
『You have been marked as an intruder within the nest.』
『 Drones' aggression has been set to 100%.』
Han's head snapped up from the notifications, eyes darting the walls surrounding them, as if these 'drones' would pop up at any moment. 'What the fuck is this? Drones? Intruder? Is this a...'
In that moment, he realised something.
The way the walls were positioned, six of them identical in size, seemed a lot like a hexagon if he looked at them from a bird's eye view.
'Holy hell. We are in a bee nest.'
『[Warning] The Hive watches.』
『Failure to dominate foreign Queen will result in excommunication.』
And with that, the notifications cleared.
Han was left staring at empty space.
His mind raced, thinking of the implications. What did excommunication mean? Were they going to disable his trait if he failed to complete this quest?
And besides that, what sort of monsters would be in a beehive?
He highly doubted that the drones the system spoke of would be the kind he found back on earth.
An image of a massive demonic bee came to mind. His spine shivered at the thought.
And if Queen's Gaze had been disabled due to a 'conflict of authorty' did that mean there was a bee here that was capable of using it?
'Fuck. Too many questions, not enough answers.'
He recalled the system notification right when the quest began. He had to find an 'embryo', so it was likely the queen bee wasn't born yet.
They still had a chance... they just had to make sure that Queen's Gaze wasn't going to be used against them. Otherwise...
A hand touched his shoulder, snapping him out of his daze. "Han?"
It was Chul. And his hands and face were smeared with brown residue.
Han looked at his now-stained shoulder with a disgusted expression.
Chul rolled his eyes. "Calm down. It's just chocolate," he said, before pulling out another bar from his pocket. "Anyway, what's going on over there?" he asked.
Nolan was on the floor, crying over a Heron's body.... or what should've been Heron's body.
Han moved closer to get a better look at it and found that the middle school girl was gone. The body that now lay on the floor was the woman from earlier. However, her arms -and now even legs- were broken, just like Heron's.
"Get away!" Nolan screamed. "Get away."
Chul walked to stand beside Han, smacking on his chocolate bar. "Jesus, what happened to her?"
"Long story," Han replied dismissively, grabbing the chocolate bar from him. He'd almost forgotten just how hungry he had been before entering this dungeon.
Chul punched him in the shoulder before pulling out another. "Luckily, I brought more than one."
Han gave him a side glance. "Should you even be eating that?"
"What? Are you calling me fa-"
"Are you guys crazy!" Nolan got to his feet, eyes wild and red. "My sister is dying, and all you can talk about is food!?" He pulled out his sword, gripping it desperately.
Despite being an adult man, Nolan wasn't much larger than Han. He was malnourished, and time in the apocalypse had taken a toll on his body, with scars and scabs plaguing his arms and neck.
If anything, he looked more pitiful than intimidating.
"Calm down," Han said, feigning fear. In this situation, he had to make Nolan feel like he had the power. A trick he had learned from pandering to the rich and wealthy all his life.
"We'll figure something out. Right now, we need to avoid injuring each other unnecessarily," he continued. "We're in a very difficult situation, in case you haven't noticed."
Chul scoffed. "Speak for yourself," he said, taking a bite from his chocolate bar. "The last quest was a breeze. All we had to do was scan-"
Han elbowed him in the stomach to stop him talking.
"I know you're angry. But I wasn't the one who did this to your sister," Han continued explaining. "That girl Heron did this. Not me."
Nolan stared at Han for a moment before sighing and dropping his sword.
"Look at me. Threatening kids," he whispered. "For fucks sake. I just want to go home."
He retreated back to his sister's body.
Her eyes were open, but she was unresponsive to his touch. And apart from slight shivering, it was almost like she was dead.
'I could heal her. But then I'd have one less healing potion for myself,' Han thought.
He wasn't evil. But charity in this situation would just be idiotic. No, healing her out of the kindness of his heart was out of the question.
"Look. We're on a bit of a time crunch. There's a boss monster in this quest, and if we wait too long, we won't be able to defeat it."
Nolan just waved his hand at Han. He clearly didn't care about much else past his sister.
Han sighed.
He could leave without them. But without his Queen's Gaze, he wasn't as confident in his abilities anymore. And although Chul was quite powerful, he was also... sort of insane.
"Do you have anything to trade?" Han asked suddenly.
Nolan looked up. "You have a healing potion?" He rushed towards Han, twisting his shirt. "You had one this entire time?"
He slammed Han against one of the walls and pushed him up by the neck.
Chul rushed behind him, palm against the back of Nolan's head. "Oi, best drop him," he said, still munching on his chocolate bar. "Unless you're fire-proof."
They were at a standstill.
Nolan clearly wasn't going to let go until Han gave the potion. And the only reason Chul hadn't fired yet was because Han kept shaking his head, telling him not to. But even then, Chul didn't seem to mind much.
'This idiot still thinks we're in an anime. He's going to kill Nolan if I don't think if something.'
"Look, Nolan, right?" Han said softly. "I get you care about your sister. But we're strangers here. I can't just give you a healing potion for free," he explained.
However, Nolan didn't budge.
"You've been here... in the apocalypse a while, right? If you don't have anything in your inventory to trade with. Then what about information?"
Nolan's face twisted.
A moment later, he sighed and let go of Han's shoulder.
"Deal," he whispered. "Now call your bulldog off."
Han gestured for Chul to stand down.
"Bulldog?" Chul mumbled. "I'm more like a wolf... an alpha wolf, you know..."
While Chul mumbled on about his strange fantasies, Nolan and Han walked back to the woman.
"Information first," Han said, calling out the healing potion from inventory. "I'll give her a little bit for every piece you give me."
Nolan scoffed at that and tried to grab it.
"Fireball!"
A fiery ball of flame rushed right past his head, sizzling the ends of his hair.
"See," Chul announced from where he was standing. "Actually, I'm more like a phoenix."
Han ignored him. "First bit of information."
"Who... or what brought us here... to this world."