The ant queen had waited for Ackster and Karandiel to finish up their conversation, but they could tell it wouldn't wait anymore. So, they obeyed as an ant lieutenant, and the ant general guided them through a set of winding tunnels back to the surface. They had already agreed to the deal and bade their farewells.
Since there were only two ants next to them, Ackster briefly wondered how successful they would be if they tried to flee, but he discarded that thought as he could feel the general's heavy eyes on him. Although they could only see the two ants next to them, they were still right above the ant nest.
Ants would swarm out and overwhelm them in moments if they tried anything. And that was if the general didn't take them down first.
Ackster felt he could almost put up a fight against the general if he went all-out. But he had no confidence in securing victory. And that was without taking the rest of the colony or Karandiel into account.
Ackster, the lieutenant, and the general watched Karandiel trek through the tall grass with hasty steps. Ackster kept watching until he could no longer see her grey hair bob over the grass nor hear her body rustle against it as she walked. Even then, he kept watching in the direction she left for as long as possible to make sure ants didn't spill out from the ground and attack her.
Of course, they could have dug out the ground below her and gotten rid of her that way. But with the ant general next to him, Ackster didn't think they could do that before she screamed. And while he couldn't hear her walk, he was sure that in the vast, almost deathly silent field of shoulder-high grass, he would her if she shouted. He was sure she also trusted him to be capable of that, so if the ants broke their end of the deal, Karandiel would cry out as loudly as possible.
But once the sun was at its zenith, the general wouldn't indulge Ackster anymore and urged him back into the tunnels. This time Ackster didn't consider running. He felt trepidation, but he was also excited.
He was in a perilous situation—no doubt about it. But if he survived, he would once again come out on the other side a stronger person, both mentally and physically. He was also curious about the ant nest, the ant queen's intelligence, and what the ant queen wanted with him.
If the ant queen had been an ordinary ant before, something had to have induced its evolution. If not, he wanted to find out what kind of monster it was and how tasty Monster Muncher would find it.
Ackster might have peacefully accepted staying, but he had no intentions of leaving the same way.
The ant queen wasted no time as soon as Ackster returned to the hall with white stones in the ceiling. It had a soldier ant deliver the remains of his bag and its contents, the ironwood box containing Nold's secret technique and the tools, as well as his Nomi, which he hadn't gotten the opportunity to look at in what felt like quite a while. But now wasn't the time to do that.
The queen was impatiently looking at Ackster and the soldier ant in front of him. It didn't say anything, but it didn't need to for him to know what she wanted. It had already fulfilled half of its side of the deal. It was time for Ackster to show some sincerity.
Ackster grabbed his sword, which caught the general's attention. But the ant queen held back the general with a click as she watched Ackster put the sword to his arm and draw a line in his skin with it.
As soon as blood spilled out of the injury, the soldier ant was there with its mouth gaping wide and swallowing the blood like it was its sole life purpose.
"I'll give you some of my flesh once I've eaten."
The ant queen nodded distractedly as its gaze was trained on the crimson blood streaming out of Ackster's arm and into her soldier. The blood sparkled in the white light with a radiant gloss that almost made Ackster understand why the ant queen wanted it.
He hadn't thought about it much since he didn't think he was at that level yet. But just as certain strong monster's and beast's bodies were excellent tonics and nourishments for humans, it wouldn't be weird if strong human bodies nourished beasts.
Ackster had thought about it a little while eating, but he hadn't noticed any differences in the monsters he had eaten recently compared to the first ones he ate. Though, he hoped that would change in the future since that would help Monster Muncher rank up and become more effective.
However, it came as a surprise that he, who was between C and B in general ranks, had a body that could drive up the ant queen's desire to such a degree that it was willing to negotiate with a human, even if it didn't think he was one. His only explanation was Strong Body.
It made him stronger and all that, but it also possessed a seemingly endless vitality as long as he ate. It also kept healing him without pause, and it did it in a way that made sure his body was fine and without sequelae.
If he had gotten past his first toe with Nold's secret technique, that could possibly have been an alternative as well, but Ackster didn't think it was. And the only thing that made him unique was Strong Body. Others were stronger than him and had gotten further with the secret technique. But no one else had Strong Body.
Ackster was beginning to think the name was deceptively simple, especially since it had already healed the wound on his arm and stopped the bleeding. The skill hadn't evolved yet, but it was certainly better at healing him than it had been after he first transmigrated.
He looked at the soldier ant walking over to the ant queen, who was too transfixed by the blood to care about him cutting the supply. At the excited gleam he could sense in the ant queen's eyes, Ackster almost got a little worried that she would renege on her deal once she got a proper taste.
However, his worries were temporarily put on standby as the ant queen grabbed the soldier ant with its front legs.
He hadn't really noticed how much bigger the ant queen was than all the other ants until it easily shoved the entire ant inside her mouth and bit down with a powerful crunch as it crushed the ant to mush and squeezed Ackster's blood out of it.
'Let's hope that won't be me.'