Chapter 1387 – Brilliant Deductions

“Oh, I don’t like this. I don’t like this at all,” Brilliant muttered.

“What have you gotten us into this time?” Experimant groaned looking over her leader’s carapace.

“Th-th-that… looks nasty,” Assistant agreed.

Brilliant clacked her mandibles in irritation.

“I’m not investigating this because I want to,” she told them. “The Eldest asked me to work out what the Church of the Path were doing in their fancy, secret rituals, and that’s what I’m doing!”

“The Eldest did?” Experimant said. “Then why haven’t you finished yet?”

“Because it’s difficult. Do you think just anyone can put together the pieces of an extremely complex ritual with only a few faded scraps to work with?”

The little ant looked at her two trusted aides sideways.

“There’s only one type of ant who can….”

“Which type?” Assistant asked before Experimant could stop her.

“One that’s BRILLIANT!” the little annoyance cackled, throwing back her head and flailing her front legs around.

“O-Oh… I sh-should have known….”

“Yes,” Experimant growled, “you should have.”

She looked around the lab they were currently standing in. At the moment, it was filled with little else but Brilliant’s scratchings. Half-formed engravings, bits of slate with designs scrawled over them, several enchanting arrays, the purpose of which wasn’t at all clear.

“Is there a reason you’ve pulled us from the projects we’re managing?” Experimant finally sighed. “My team was on the verge of making a breakthrough.”

“Without me? I doubt it!” Brilliant cackled once more, causing Experimant to grind her mandibles. “I called you here because I need your help, and because I don’t want any other members of the team to work on this.”

She gestured to the enchanting array she was working on with one antennae.

“As you can see, this is ugly stuff, potentially dangerous. I don’t want any of our other work tainted by this… thing.”

It was a first for the two followers to ever see their leader encounter knowledge that she seemed to find distasteful. Their own burgeoning sense of unease grew stronger.

“Only the three of us are going to work on it,” she told them. “I want both of you here, full-time, to assist for the next week. Make sure your teams know what to do in your absence. Though they should barely notice.”

The two ignored the jibe as they continued to stare at the array. It was… uncomfortable to look at it, for reasons they couldn’t quite understand.

“What does this even do?” Experimant wondered.

“Oh, I can tell you that,” Brilliant said offhandedly.

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“If you already know what it does, then what do you need us for?” Experimant demanded.

“Because I need to know how it works!” Brilliant snapped back, uncharacteristically harsh. “It isn’t enough to be able to say what it does, that doesn’t give us a full understanding. I have to know HOW! It tells us so much information that we can’t afford to leave on the ground and not pick up! This thing is the work of our enemies, would you have us ignorant of their methods?!”

“N-no. No, I wouldn’t,” Experiment stammered.

“W-w-what d-does it d-do?” Assistant asked hesitantly.

“It’s a monster distillery. Put a monster in one end, get distilled essence out the other.”

That didn’t make much sense to either of the other two ants. They glanced at each other to confirm their mutual confusion, then turned back to Brilliant.

“Can you… elaborate?” Experimant asked.