The Third Portal: Chapter Ten (Patreon)

Figuring out how to get the blueshade to produce the same mildly citrusy scent as the ant’s non-threat pheromones took some time and experimentation. 

Enhance Plant Life was a good spell, but it wasn’t capable of doing fine, on the fly adjustments to the structure of plants. I could flood the blueshade with power and eject a burst of whatever scent it had been tuned to make, but tuning it took a lot more time and continual application of both it and the harvesting spell, like alchemy. 

Maybe one day someone would invent a spell like Plant Manipulation, that could do everything related to plants at a time, but I had to work with that spells I actually had, not what spells I hypothetically wished that I had. 

Once I finally managed to tune the plant to match the scent of the non-threat pheromone, I plucked several leaves, grabbed some slowleaf, water, mana-grass, and leaves from my red star tree, then set about doing some rough field alchemy. I’d never actually made a potion like this before, but Dusk had used the blueshade to make stink potions, and this worked on a similar principle. I concentrated the scent power as much as possible, boiling and using my cauldron to extract the extra bits I didn’t need, then put the hyper concentrated scent in a small bottle, before topping it with a spritzer head. 

I had, in essence, made a perfume. Or a cologne, I supposed. Essence of Non-Threat to Ants. 

Laughing at my own joke, I shifted the scent around, preparing to test the other scent that I’d picked up on while exploring this area of the forest: the rancid olive scent. I wasn’t sure exactly what this one did, so I’d need to be more careful when I used it, so I’d start with spraying myself around a weaker ant, like the kind that I’d run into earlier. 

Dusk suggested that it might be some sort of marker for food, since it had been near the trolls. Maybe they collected some of the carrion that the trolls left behind? It was definitely possible, and if an ant tried to eat me, I’d have to slip back into Dusk to take a shower and apply a new scent. 

Creating the Essence of Unknown to Ants, as I temporarily dubbed it until I could get a better title, was a lot less pleasant than the Essence of Non-Threat, and I was suddenly very glad for my scent suppressing ungated spell. 

With my two potions in hand, I emerged from Dusk’s realm and cast my senses out around me, tracking down the nearest ant. Once I’d found it, I spritzed myself with the rancid olive scent, then headed over that way. 

The ant I found was a bit smaller than the one that I’d interacted with earlier, and it was also slightly weaker, clearly having only just recently opened its second gate. Once again, though, there was a sense of stability and firmness to its power that suggested that it had strong power. 

When it scented me, the ant wiggled its antennae, then spritzed me with more of the oily scent, before continuing with the task that it was occupied with. It wandered over to one of the cherry groves, climbing up one of the trees that was bearing fruit, then started snipping free cherries. I watched in fascination as it forged a bucket out of mana, allowing the cherries to fall into it. 

It collected cherries from about half of the grove, but when it realized that it wasn’t able to collect the rest, it released another pheromone. This one smelled slightly moldy, kind of like blue cheese, or like an old house that hadn’t been cleaned out well or taken care of. It was a little bit gross, in my opinion, but the ant didn’t seem to care. 

Then it started heading away, laying down trails of the moldy cheese smell. When it passed me, it started to mix in the rancid olive scent in with the moldy cheese one, laying down a trail of both as it headed back to its nest. 

I followed, curiously, and the ant seemed to be more aggressive with the laying down of the olive. Not aggressive in the sense that it was trying to hurt me, though. If anything, it reminded me of when I or someone else told an object that was about to fall to stop acting foolish. I paused, and the ant continued onwards, no longer annoyed, as if the object that was tipping had stabilized and not fallen. 

I shrugged and decided that I could use the time to practice the Depths of Starry Night technique. This third layer was a lot more complex than the one that I’d practiced with my first and second gates, and even the complete circuit of forms could take upwards of an hour to complete correctly. 

Midway through, a pair of ants emerged. One of them was third gate, with mana that tinged ever so slightly more to the death part of its blend, while the other was a standard middle second gate. The second gate one forged a basket and started collecting cherries, which meant the moldy cheese scent was probably used for food. That was good to know. At least I hadn’t doused myself with ‘food here’ pheromones. 

I examined the third gate one with my senses, and it battered them aside, clacking its mandibles. It reached out and grabbed me with them, then started pulling me along. Dusk let out a burst of alarmed raven caws, and I had to wave her down. 

“It’s okay, it’s okay, I’m fine!” 

The ant’s grip wasn’t exactly soft and comforting, but nor was it angry or attacking. It wasn’t trying to puncture my soft human skin, it simply was used to moving and dealing with ants. If I hadn’t reinforced so much of my body’s telluric and life energy, it might have been a problem, but as things were, it was fine. 

Dusk hesitantly agreed, following along on her cloud. We were lead down a rough trail that I would have thought was a deer trail if not for the fact that we encountered a few ants on the way. 

Whenever we encountered another ant, it would wiggle its antennae. The one holding me would let go as it did the same. The pair would rub their antennae against one another, sometimes letting out brief flashes of scents, before heading back to whatever task they were doing before. Despite sometimes getting antennae twitches in my direction, none of the ants moved over to greet me, and I figured it had something to do with the rancid olive scent that I had on me. 

A few of them noticed Dusk, and after a pair of third gates examined her with her senses, they spritzed her with the ‘not a threat’ citrus smell. 

Eventually, I spotted the destination that I was being led to, and Hannah sucked in a breath while whispering to herself. I didn’t know why she sucked in her breath, given that she didn’t have lungs. Habit from when she’d been alive, I assumed? 

“They’re taking us to the nest.” 

Dusk rustled like leaves in the wind, saying that she agreed, and that I should be ready to duck back into her realm if need be. Maybe the oily scent I’d been marked with was actually some sort of advanced food scent, indicating that I was food that should be brought directly to the queen, or something of that sort. 

It was a real possibility, so I agreed. 

The anthill that I was led up was far more solid than any that I’d seen mundane ants build, and it seemed to have rudimentary enchantments actually holding it in place. The magic of these ants, I presumed. Rare, for a beast to evolve enchanting style magic, but not unheard of. Especially in communal groups like ants, who needed to defend their home. 

The mount was also riddled with entry and exit paths, and it swarmed with dozens of second gate ants moving around like wild. The smell of their greeting pheromone was so thick that I finally got a good lungful of the scent. It was a faintly aniseed and herbal scent, but there was a sharpness to it. It honestly somewhat reminded me of the herbal and anise liqueurs that my dad used in some of the anise cakes, and the smell brought back a pleasant memory of me helping him make a batch of four when I’d been about thirteen or so. 

I’d been questioning who I was at the time, and trying to probe my dad for how he felt on certain topics. The confusion and worry certainly weren’t a pleasant feeling for the me of the time, but now that I was looking back on it, I could smile. 

I was pulled into the colony by the ant leading me, where we joined a stream of ants moving about, sometimes on the roof, sometimes on the walls, and sometimes on the ground. Given how large these ants were, I was able to stand upright, though Kene or Ed might have needed to hunch slightly to fit. 

The ants climbed over me and around me as I was led down the tunnel, occasionally stopping to greet the one carrying me, and even though that seemed less common inside the colony itself, it was still common enough to give the tunnels. The tunnels were reinforced with wooden and stone structures, almost like a mineshaft, which impressed me more than it probably should have. These were ants!

We moved through the nest, passing several dugout chambers that almost reminded me of barracks, or the simple, free housing that Elio was providing back in Port Ruby, though these were somehow even more cramped. Ants were stacked on top of one another in neat rows, with layers of dirt between them to serve as shelves. The ants would wander in, find an empty spot, and then settle down, while others would emerge in a steady stream. 

I didn’t think ants slept, not in the same way that humans did, but they did need rest. These chambers seemed to be something akin to that, and I struggled against the ant carrying me to watch for a little bit. It sprayed me and pulled me away, this time with a lot more worry and frantic insistence than it had when I’d been outside. 

The ant dragged me deeper in, and I saw a set of several large chambers that looked to be filled with food. The ant leading me then did something strange, moving me in an oddly inefficient and circular route through the colony, rather than going straight and passing by the food chambers, which I couldn’t understand for the life of me. 

It led me down winding ramps, past a set of chambers with small doors. Those doors absolutely reeked, and when I used Surveyor’s Eye to peek a little deeper in, I wished I hadn’t. The chambers hid away a trash heap, filled with massive amounts of shed skins, ant waste, rotting wood, and other things. 

Past the trash heap, we entered a long, straight tunnel that led away from the colony. As we headed down, I pinged my spatial sense and realized that we were approaching the same area where I’d smelled the other rancid olive scent.

When we emerged into a new chamber, my sense for death energy started going wild, almost like I was in a cemetery, or some other place of great death. A sneaking suspicion started to come over me, and I flared Vampiric Senses to pierce the darkness.

I found myself in the ant’s funeral chamber. A dozen other third gate worker ants were arranging the bodies of the dead ants into strange, triangular patterns, then casting spells over them. The spells seemed to disperse the death energy of the ants through the room and into the soil, enriching it through the deaths of their kin.

I was being dragged towards an open spot in one of the triangular patterns when a new scent rushed through the tunnel. This was sharp and peppery, and it stung my eyes and throat, and it carried enough significance that the monolinguistic spell actually impressed the meaning into my mind. 

Invaders.