Originally, the Bee Empire—considering that some dodos were given to humans to boost their wellbeing—only had 20 dodo chicks. But each year they laid two eggs, and within a year an egg became a mature egg-laying dodo.
We had breeding pairs, and although I knew inbreeding might be a problem *eventually* if Dalmanrach doesn’t do anything, for now it wasn’t.
So in the two years that passed since they were saved, our dodo chicks grew and created a new mature generation of dodos. The Bee Empire now had 40 dodos in total.
Only 20 were actually tame, though. The rest were kept prisoners and didn’t accept the bee authority much despite the beast tamers doing their best to subdue them.
Those 20 dodos, the beast tamers to control them, the Beehounds and the Beemarines have moved out on my and Bloodhero’s orders.
And the purge has begun.
In the list of Great Purges compiled by Archivist Letteria (her name was on the bottom of the scroll), this one was 17th chronologically and in the top 3 by scale of it.
Not as massive as the purges of the Naregan Kingdom—those reached far wider and had piles of enemy corpses as tall as houses—and not even as large as purges of the newly conquered neutral territories, but also very impressive.
However, this purge was the most destructive!
In order to get to the hidden metal-eaters, dodos have dug deep underground. Things got worse when the metal-eaters hid underneath buildings or railroads—then we had to wait for them to move somewhere first.
Thankfully, most metal-eaters turned out to be not underground at all. They hid in any dark and wet places, especially ones close to bees’ dwellings. The metal-eaters even burrowed their way into hives sometimes! f.(r)eew ebnov\ll.com
Within the first week of this massive purge, my girls have found several clutches of eggs in burrows left by the metal-eaters. The Foremen Bees (they were guarding the inner parts of the Empire from any stray insects while also organizing the work process—not too far from their original job description) were told to watch out for any new beetles.
If the beetles inherited the hiding abilities of their larva, I doubted the Foremen will spot anything. But the Beehounds and Beemarines that searched for the larvae could.
It was also clear that the purge will take at least several weeks to be fully complete with the forces we had, but Undecided’s prognoses already showed that the chances of sabotaging incidents in the Bee Empire were falling drastically.
I would say it was a success, if these chances weren’t instead on the rise in other countries.
After Judji was conquered, the worst of Kachi-Chi’s flood had gone away, and Barahi ate their evolved chickens, the three out of four kingdoms were... somewhat stable.
The process of their saving was still ongoing, of course. The first food canning manufactures were being built, the first lines of delivering food and other items were created between the new protectorates of the Naregan Kingdom.
The High King Farini had a lot on his plate, dealing with all this, but he didn’t complain—the man took the mission of saving humanity on his continent to heart.
I also put plans into motion for the conquering of the Hatha kingdom, but those plans were in their early stages for now.
But the Oracles that were monitoring the future of the protectorate kingdoms were bringing alarming predictions.
Although I thought that we’ve dealt with most of the evolved chickens, ducks and other domesticated dragons, the Oracles promised more attacks in the near future!
"The dreams are solid on this. It’s not a probability, it’s a guarantee, Father!" Undecided told me when she brought this report. "Almost a guarantee. The future might still change in some places, but it will only make it more solid in others. I haven’t seen those dreams myself, but this is what my sisters from those remote places say."
"But where from? I thought the humans in the protectorate kingdoms did a good job of bringing all these beasts to extinction! Undecided, what did your sisters say about this?"
"They... They can’t say much, because they aren’t in these places to see the future with their own eyes. My sisters have to rely on reports on others and human rumors... Their predictions aren’t even on time," Undecided said, lowering her eyes. "I apologize for this lack of precision. We are doing what we can."
I let out a long breath and patted Undecided on the shoulder.
"Oh, don’t blame yourself, please! You all *really* do what you can and more. So, you only know that there will be multiple attacks?"
"Yes, Father. Most likely..."
Undecided explained to me about the locations mentioned in prophecies, and together we marked them on a map spread on my office table using small pebbles.
This map was a smaller, less detailed copy of the one in the Council Chamber, but it was good enough for me to see the pattern.
"Before, most of the attacks happened in populated places where humans kept dragons as cattle," I commented, looking at this. "But this time, it looks like most of the attacks will happen in remote areas close to the wilderness. You’ve mentioned a lot of small villages that aren’t even on the map, Undecided."
Since they weren’t on the map, I could only mark their general area with larger pebbles.
Now, as I saw this, a realization dawned on me.
"The chicken-dragons... and whatever other kinds of evolved human-hating dragons there are... They’ve all laid eggs in the wild! The ones that have attacked the humans openly were just a part of the general number—the rest have hid in the forests and plains so they could breed. And now a new generation has grown enough to attack again!"
How quickly could these creatures grow?
Probably as fast as their god has evolution points!
"Fuck. Just one last push. The protectorates must make one last push and not fall apart just one more time..."