Elder Cultivator

“Help others free,” Velvet explained, projecting her voice to the freed slaves. “Stay together inside the facility for the moment.” She thought they would be more likely to listen to her if she displayed her power as a Domination cultivator, but that would give too much away for others. Revealing herself to some would risk outsiders noticing something. It wasn’t a huge risk, but if people couldn’t make proper decisions she wasn’t going to intimidate them into doing so.

But everyone pretty much paid attention, probably because they were too dazed to do otherwise. Velvet felt a connection forming between them, a subtle one but immediately clear. Or rather, a connection they already had strengthening and seeking out others of the same kind. Each individual was feeling weak, so they didn’t do much.

The void ants that had been responsible for keeping everyone safe the moment Velvet released them had already hidden themselves. Not because they didn’t deserve recognition, but because they were getting into position.

Unsurprisingly, Numerological Compact cultivators swarmed in. They tried to make use of the building’s formations, but that didn’t last long when the void ants began to tear apart the threads of energy that made those formations function. They also tore apart the cultivators and their internal energy.

Surprise void ants were extremely effective. Cultivators expected to have energy. A little bit of body tempering wasn’t sufficient for them to withstand void ant attacks, and they easily slipped under armor.

It was brutal. But Velvet had a role to play. Normally, she would have picked off the strongest cultivators. That was something someone of her position should do. Her current role wasn’t much different, except she focused on those who were fastest. Cultivation power didn’t matter to the void ants, as long as their foes weren’t Domination cultivators or extremely strong Augmentation cultivators. Fast cultivators were hard to catch.

Likewise, if there were any that could create wide area attacks that created lingering effects not tied to upper energy Velvet would want to take them out- but the Numerological Compact’s style was pretty straightforward as such things went. They tended to keep their energy as pure as possible, including the weapons they added to their ships.

Aside from particularly fast cultivators, any that had advanced body tempering would have been troublesome for the void ants. But that wasn’t an issue in this particular place. Mostly, Velvet went for whoever was closest unless she noticed an anomaly.

Many void ants died, still. Stomped and cut and swatted, hundreds or thousands of them perished every moment. Mostly, those were weak ones. They might not even be people. But if they were, they were fully informed of the risks. Tiny and proud soldiers.

Velvet took them down, slicing their necks or if she could driving a dagger straight into their dantian to immediately cease their flow of energy. She wasn’t holding back now. Anyone who could sense her at all would know she was in Domination. For the most part, everyone was surprised when they found themselves as her target. She crossed a distance of ten or a hundred meters in an instant, slaying dozens before the first could fall.

Elsewhere around the planet, different strike teams were doing their best. The void ants in each place were likely sufficient to kill incoming cultivators on their own, though having humans to communicate was highly helpful. Even as she fought, Velvet kept in contact with the people in her zone.

“The ants are here for your protection,” Velvet said. She didn’t say void ants, but that could still be intuited. There would still be some prejudice… though it was unlikely any of the slave class had ever experienced trouble from void ants. They probably weren’t even alive the last time they were seen in the upper realms. At most, they would have heard secondhand tales of them showing up in the Little Alliance. “Do not harm them. They are friends. Watch how they fight your foes.”

That last line was probably the biggest factor in the reactions of the freed slaves. They would see how the void ants did not harm them, while the incoming cultivators died in droves. That experience was shared with their neighbors hundreds and thousands of times. Along with the strike teams, some cultivators from the Alliance were charged with direct stabilization of the developing hiveminds. It could be a traumatic process- though a worthwhile one. If the mind didn’t fully break it would generally recover quickly, but there were always exceptions. Plus, some would die of shock.noveldrama

Either way, stabilizing the connection would save a significant amount of mental pain and help keep the planet from utter chaos. The majority of individuals would recognize how the others were being helpful and go along or in the worse case pull away at which point they were well enough in control for the Alliance to leave them alone.

Velvet felt a little bit bad about killing Numerological Compact cultivators. Not because they didn’t deserve it, but because even their best were… weak. Without their ships, without the power of others, they were nothing. Of course, she only felt a little bit bad. They were still enemies, and they’d chosen a horrific and oppressive cultivation method when it was an easy step to a much more pleasant version. They had clearly witnessed the Alliance’s versions of similar methods and still chose to stick with the methods where they only took.

Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

There were a few Augmentation cultivators around. However unless they were already in an active ship patrolling the skies around the planet, they pretty much didn’t have any hope of doing anything. It was a slaughter. And the Alliance had plans to deal with the active vessels as well.

Velvet moved on to them, while keeping her senses on the area she’d directly freed. She was responsible for them directly, and it would be a shame should she let them come to harm when she could prevent it.

The actual numbers of Numerological Compact cultivators were small. After all, at a base they needed hundreds of others to provide them just a small bit of power for their Magnitude I vessels. Over all, they were less than ten percent of the total population- counting their Body Tempering cultivators and initiates who weren’t even really cultivators yet- with small numbers of other cultivators living on their planets.

With many of their strongest dying in their early rush to deal with the assault, their remaining numbers had dwindled greatly. By the time the hiveminds were vaguely stable- and devouring what food they could find nearby- the remaining cultivators had little hope.

As before, the hiveminds as a whole were responsible for judging the independent cultivators. Upon the memories of pain, they would be marked for death. After a certain point, the Alliance’s job was to make sure the hiveminds didn’t go too far in their vengeance. Though slaughtering the Numerological Compact cultivators was part of the expected result they didn’t want them to become monsters. Obviously they had a different upbringing than those within the Alliance, but it wouldn’t have been much different from the lower realms systems and everyone there developed into decent people. They had centuries of experience to work with as well.

The whole process was startlingly smooth, but it wasn’t an impromptu operation. The Alliance had been planning moves against various factions for some time, and the end of the cycle had turned into their opportunity. It helped somewhat that the Numerological Compact had lost quite a few of their cultivators trying to get a renewed foothold in the lower realms, returning with no more than their lives- if that. They had been weakened, but the Scarlet Alliance hadn’t worn themselves out with war.

-----

There was one slight hiccup with the Numerological Compact systems, but it wasn’t Velvet’s job to deal with it. It wasn’t that they’d revealed the void ants- it was well known that the Little Alliance had void ants, and the Scarlet Alliance had plans involving that.

No, the hiccup was that the hiveminds grew a bit too large. With the greater populations of the planets, they spread between planets- which was fine- and then into neighboring systems which was… also fine. But unexpected. It wasn’t necessarily a bad thing, just… significant.

It did mean that instead of thirty or so separate projects to communicate, the Alliance only had to interact with one group. It did still help to have multiple diplomatic cultivators involved, because the hivemind could interface with numerous individuals all at once, but they only had to do things once.

Understanding became clear rather quickly, and they even agreed to become part of the Alliance. After all, they understood the rest of their neighbors wouldn’t be so friendly and they weren’t eager to lose their sudden independence. If nothing else, they’d need the support until they actually had viable individual cultivators or ships that were modified to not forcibly drain the energy of thousands. Willingly was another matter, but the hivemind didn’t want to feel that helplessness again.

It wasn’t like they could just snap their fingers and retrofit the ships. Manufacturing wasn’t entirely manual, and there were even factories of sorts, but the hivemind cultivators unfortunately didn’t have much of the necessary expertise themselves. The Alliance could help, though it would likely take them decades to stabilize.

The only real rejection was of the void ants. Nobody wanted to kill them, but the hivemind was uncomfortable having them around. The Alliance hoped that they would eventually get used to the idea, but weren’t going to force anything. Nor were the void ants.

Besides, they were already getting opportunities to expand, specifically into the core of the Scarlet Alliance. Plans for that had been in the works pretty much from the inception of the Scarlet Alliance, though for various reasons it hadn’t been practical. After the Little Alliance both made use of void ants and weren’t annihilated, the Great Queen began pushing for the core of the Scarlet Alliance. Many of the council weren’t opposed to the integration, because they had lived and fought alongside void ants in the lower realms.

That was also true of many of their people- but not all of them. Thus, their plan was to delicately introduce void ants, instead of just plopping them down on every planet. Xankeshan was to have one colony in a metropolitan core to get people used to their presence. That included not stepping on them, though most void ants avoided that well enough. And they wouldn’t always die to unintentional stomps, especially if they were a bit stronger and more likely to have sapience.

The practical issues of integrating them would require some reworking of local infrastructure- but only very small portions. After all, void ants were small. A hive could live in an underground cube a few meters on a side and have an absurd number of residents. The proper, constructed tunnels they used to get around could be inlaid into any surface- and there were plans for how to do it.

Of course, in the lower realms and the Little Alliance it was done for new construction from the beginning, but they had some experience with older cities and shifting districts.

It was to be a ‘slow’ rollout, however. At least, the public number of void ants would be greatly toned down. If some Domination cultivators took exception to void ants and went after the main Alliance… well, the void ants would be worst for them. And the Great Queen could roam around the upper realms without discomfort just fine. She hadn’t had much in the way of opportunities to clash with Domination cultivators, but she could negate their overwhelming energy about as well as standard void ants could resist Spirit Building cultivators.

Since the Little Alliance had continued to exist, the Scarlet Alliance thought they would be fine. Void ants should actually bolster them defensively, and the great powers were already their enemies. This was their time of provoking people to action and testing their foes. They would still prefer for things to settle down in the near future, though. First, they’d have to see the reaction of the Trigold Cluster to void ants- as they hadn’t previously been exposed because of the Little Alliance’s position.