I sat there unmoving for several seconds, but as the adrenaline started to fade, the realization of what I had done started to sink in, I had just killed another human being. I actually didn't feel that bad right then, maybe my brain had some kind of protection so I could get somewhere safe before freaking out. For now I closed my eyes, turned around, and unburied him with a dirt control, rotating him so his body was laying down. I took a few deep breaths before turning back towards him, I scrutinized his body with magic sense to find if he had any magic gear, there was some kind of amulet and a bag on his belt that were clearly magical. I carefully maneuvered a pair of dirt hands to take both items off the body, I had no idea what effects they had all together so they could have a safety lock that blows up anyone else handling them.

With magic taken care of I had the soldiers strip the armor off him and gather the daggers before I sunk his body back underground and placed the magic items on a dirt disk. I then moved to check on the soldier that was knocked down during the fight, she couldn't move with her chest plate shattered but was otherwise okay, that was a big draw back of having your skin be armor, if it gets damaged you can't just take it off and fix it. I asked her to clarify what she meant by "couldn't move", and she explained that if she tried to sit up instead of rotating at the waist her chest could bend and crush her lungs. The rest of her torso plates were holding her together for now but it would take forever to heal this without celestial assistance, since they were level four they knew the queen could make some.

That fact was the only reason she hadn't killed herself, being a useless burden on the hive for an extended period is something they couldn't abide. But since recovery of a wound like this was nearby it was okay, now all the soldiers saw it as a mark of pride to be wounded in the line of duty. It was a confusing mess of rules that they all seemed to know instinctively, I could only tell them all to pass it around that if someone was wounded to uselessness they had to be brought before me so I could decide if they were truly useless or if they could still do something. They wiggled a bit at eachother before agreeing to my demand, I was smarter than they were so they accepted that my ability to judge usefulness would be greater than their own as well.

I gave my hardened dirt disk to Christina and told her to not touch the things sitting on it, another soldier was tasked with carrying the clothes, daggers, and armor. With my magic free again I reached under the wounded soldier and formed a dirt bed under her before I lifted her off the ground. It was a lot easier than I expected, I knew how much force it took to lift various things with a dirt pad before and this took comparatively less effort. That reminded me I had finally gotten level fifty in dirt control, which must have given me some kind of milestone reward, I focused on the notification from blue box while we all walked back home.

Earth Magic: Dirt Control mastery level changes from "Intermediate" to "Advanced"

You have obtained 1/2 requirements for a trait upgrade

Due to improving one spell's mastery to Advanced without formal instruction

Nice nice, now let's see what exactly being advanced in dirt control gets me.

"Earth magic: dirt control"

Mastery: Advanced

Level: 50

Allows freeform control over earth particulates

Speed is based on Int and level

Volume is based on wis and level

Mastery bonus 1: greatly lowered cost for materials half step removed from dirt

Mastery bonus 2: lifting, pushing, pulling, and crushing force amplified

I stare at the bonus a bit before I am forced to slap myself in the face over how obvious it was I hindsight, I never crushed anything with dirt, I squished the dirt into itself but never so much as snapped a stick with pure crushing force before. It was shit like this where a teacher comes in handy by making sure you do everything you need to master a skill instead of flailing around in the dark until you stumble ass backwards into the exact set of things you needed to gain a mastery level. I close out of the menu and continue on, getting back to base I see two soldiers on guard by the hole, one of them that was hunting must have come back and joined with the guard already on duty.

I had Christina and the one soldier put the carried stuff down next to the hole before dismissing all soldiers back to regular duty now that the crisis was averted, they saluted before they scattered to work. Next we headed down and I placed the wounded soldier off to the side in the entrance chamber and shuffled the dirt under her so it was more comfortable to lay on. Then we continued down to see Victoria and reassure her that everything was okay, I don't doubt someone gave her a worrying status report. When I entered she was pacing around the room like mad, I coughed to get her attention and she bolted at me and gave me a crushing hug.

"When that soldier told me you went out to confront another human I was so scared!" She sobbed before burying her head in my shoulder and crying.

It was awkward getting my arms around her to hug her back but I managed, as I slowly rubbed her back as I said to her "I had to, you know that, it's my responsibility to keep you safe, but I swear that if I got hurt I would have run away. Because if I died then you would die too, and that is the worst thing I could do to you."

We stood there in each other's embrace for a while before she replied "I know, you have to lead the fight because right now you are the strongest one here, if you hid then all the soldiers could die then you would have to fight by yourself anyway. I just can't stand it, every time you do something dangerous I feel like my heart will explode."

"That's just what love does to people, the fact you let me go anyway means it is real love instead of something dangerous." I explained to her, before I let go and pointed towards Christina, "how about ask her for more detail? she should be able to send you some interesting images of the fight."

Victoria thought over that idea for a moment before she agreed and started an intense antenna wiggling conversation with Christina, she gasped at one point, and let out a short laugh at another, then her eyes went wide and she turned back to me "you killed someone by moving dirt?! I... I have to take this training more seriously, I thought being able to move dirt around with magic was just a handy utility."

It seemed she was feeling better already "anything can kill if you know how to work with it, like drinking water is deadly if you drink too much too fast. You just need to think of things in the proper mindset and work out how it can kill something after you have it." After a second I added "Speaking of mindset, I am still not feeling bad that I killed someone, normally killing someone of your own race is supposed to make you freak out, you think I picked up some of your ability to just not mourn?"

She cupped her chin and pondered before saying "Maybe, I don't know all the rules of how the consort class works, just that it exists and what it gets up to level ten, level six gives light magic, level eight gives something called 'boost', and ten nets a trait called improved nutrition. The powers are clearly based on the ant type I got two levels down, so I am sure you will gain something fire based at twelve."

I had to agree with her assumption, but I wondered "so, what is the highest level unlock ant type do you know of?"

"Not much higher than that, level twelve gives me a sort of command ant, she is weaker than a soldier but can link up with other ants into a group and enhance them in some way, one commander to twenty others, no idea what that could translate into for a consort." She admitted with a shrug.

"Well, do you want me to stay here or are you okay now? I don't want to just ditch you but by letting you be by yourself you can get back to training." I asked her.

She smiled "I'm fine now, I just had to freak out a little at you for being such an insane but wonderful husband. You should get back to your training, so next time this happens I wont have to freak out as much since you will be stronger."

I gave her another kiss before me and Christina went back to the surface to finish training and see if she could use any moves she saw in the fight. I conjured a life sized dirt statue of the guy in a battle stance and armed it with two of the daggers he accidentally gifted us, she would send an image of a position he was in and would attack it with the same strike as before but try and tweak it to bypass the block. She managed to break guard on only a few stances, but most of them could only be bypassed by using a harder feint, which I couldn't help with because real time dirt puppetry was still beyond me. Still, she was glad she was able to use some of the lessons from a real fight to grow stronger, all soldiers were like that but she was the best at applying those lessons.

After she was sure she got all she could get out of the battle I had her switch tasks and train me, she had clearly gotten more skilled than I was. I grabbed the daggers from the statue before flattening it and taking a stance, I wasn't ambidextrous but ever since I gained Dex doing things with my off hand had gotten a lot easier. So we started mock combat once more and this time she took the lead and corrected my stance by flashing an image of how she wanted me to stand. I improved a lot slower then she did, because unlike her battle wasn't part of my very being. At the very least I learned some things, I was more confident I could deflect a blow instead of being stabbed, and in teaching me she learned some more things as well.

Suddenly, the guard soldier poked her head out of the hole and singled at me that Victoria was laying the eggs now! I counted the time in my head, and sure enough, it had only been four days this time. That means her size up did indeed accelerate her egg growth rate. So we all hurried back down to the queen's chamber. With six workers on stand by for the eggs, as well me, Victoria, and Christina the room was starting to feel crowded, but with celestials around we can start digging downward without needing to worry about carbon dioxide buildup in the lower levels. The eggs popped out of Victoria will little effort, they were the same size as before while she was bigger, well the celestial's egg was slightly smaller than a worker's but still.

I checked them all over with magic sense to see if I could feel anything different between the eggs, and I could tell that celestials had a bit more energy in them despite being smaller but otherwise they were the same. After that I performed my 'kingly duty' and Victoria queued up two more of each ant type. As I drifted off to sleep in my wife's giant embrace I started to wonder if there was a way to save the Celestials from their eternal nap.