The Eccentric Entomologist is Now a Queen's Consort

"Guilty." He bit into the twist, honey glistening on his lip. Still warm. Lira outdid herself.

The camera swung forward, revealing a marshy gulf ahead. Sickly green water burbled beneath broken bridge stumps. Damp heat fogged the lens edges, and ceiling vines swayed like sleepy vipers, droplets sliding from glossy leaves.

Mikhailis straightened, curiosity sparking. "He's gonna vault."

Elowen angled her head, eyes bright. "He'll pause to measure wind shear first."

On‑screen, Rodion paused. Optics narrowed—digital irises contracting. A cascade of data scrolled: WIND 3 kph ↘, VINE TENSILE RATING 78 %, WATER TOXICITY HIGH.

Scarab scouts zipped across the chasm. Each dropped a thumbnail‑sized beacon that embedded itself into root knots, pulsing soft blue. A dotted line formed—an improvised runway only Rodion could see.

Then the sentinel sprang. One boot hit the bridge rail, coils in his calves releasing a taut whumm. He flew, cloak streamer snapping awake. Mid‑air, a vine dipped under his weight; he used it like a pivot bar, flipping in a single fluid wheel. The far ledge approached too fast—he rotated hips, brought both feet together, and hit moss with a controlled skid that drew twin glowing lines in the ground.

Monkey squealed. The jump replayed three times: once normal, once wireframe, once sepia with silent‑film piano. A glittery SUCCESS! banner unfurled across the bottom corner.

Rodion's optics glowed the AI equivalent of an eye roll. The facial sub‑plates even twitched downward, as if sighing.

Elowen buried her face behind her mug, laughter muffled. "Monkey's going to drive him positively mad."

"Builds character," Mikhailis replied, licking honey off his thumb. "He needs more chaos in his life."

A faint breeze hissed through Elowen's loose hair. She tucked a strand behind her ear, eyes never leaving the projection. "The ambiance feels… wrong. See the ripples on the water?"

Mikhailis squinted. The green pool shimmered as if something breathed beneath. "Pressure change. Spore pocket rupturing?"

Before he could finish, silvery mist pooled at water level, coiling upward like reversed rain. Six globes drifted free—Plague Spore Wisps, each a glassy sphere swirling with chartreuse cinders.

Rodion's HUD splashed crimson WARNINGS. Microscopic readouts drew spikes: TOXIN VOLATILITY +120 %.

Across the map overlay, the Chimera Recon Soldiers tightened formation, ready to intercept. But Rodion held a hand up—non‑verbal command: standby artillery.

Scarabs reacted first, shooting ahead. Micro‑launchers coughed nets of shimmering thread, aiming to cocoon the wisps before they scattered. Two nets connected—filaments wrapping like spider silk, anchoring two orbs to a toppled branch. Rotten wood hissed as acid spores began eating through, but containment held.

The other four wisps caught an updraft and spiral‑danced away, staying just outside entanglement range. Their internal lights pulsed, brightening each time they inhaled swamp gas.

Elowen set her mug down with a soft clink. "Their pattern is erratic. Unpredictable airflow—he'll need a planar strike."

Mikhailis nodded, brushing crumbs off his chest. "Chain attack or they'll split again."

On cue, Rodion's dagger hilts slid from gauntlet caches with a metallic hiss. Mana‑thread, impossibly thin, unfurled from each blade, running up his arms to luminous nodes at his shoulders. The strands crackled turquoise, a visual heartbeat synced to his power core.

He dashed, low and fluid. One wisp darted in; he slid under, dragging a dagger edge through its lower arc. The orb split with a muted pop—spores venting upward in a harmless sparkle shower.

He used the momentum, pivoted into a cross‑step. Second dagger lashed out, bisecting the next wisp. Green motes sprayed like fireworks, dissolving before they hit moss.

Up above, Scarab mini‑turrets corrected their aim. Resin bolts shot in crisscross patterns, corralling the remaining two wisps toward Rodion's centerline.

He leapt, knees tucked, body rotating in midair. For half a second he looked weightless—a spinning coin of steel and cloak. Both blades flashed outward in an X‑shaped slash. Twin wisps met the arcs, ruptured, and collapsed into glitter.

Rodion landed in a low crouch, one hand touching the ground to bleed velocity. Cloak tails fluttered down around him like settling petals.

Mikhailis exhaled an appreciative whistle. "Good angle— though he burned five percent excess mana on that flourish."

Elowen's foot found his calf and nudged. "Let him have fun," she chided, smiling wide. Her heartbeat still pattered fast in her throat. She loved the elegance as much as the efficiency, maybe more.

Rodion re‑sheathed his daggers, quick magnetic clicks. The immediate area cleared, swamp gas drifting lazy again. His internal sensors pinged, chart lines smoothing back to green.

He pressed two fingers to the side of his helm—a commander's gesture. On the side display, blue glyphs representing Recon Soldiers rearranged, forming a spearhead directed toward a massive circular icon ahead. A larger mana reading pulsed there like a drumbeat: >BOSS CHAMBER DETECTED<.

Monkey, helpful as ever, exploded the mini‑map into a floating 3D schematic. It hovered over the bedspread, casting ghost‑lights over Mikhailis's knuckles.

"Big room," he murmured, tracing the radius with a finger. "Multiple siphon nodes. Expect traps."

Elowen leaned in, her hair brushing his shoulder. "And he's clearing a fallback lane." She pointed: tiny blue dots—Scarabs—were flitting to the outer ring, planting runic charges. Workers behind them unraveled spools of glowing silk, stretching tripwires across dark alcoves.

"He's planning escape routes," she said, half pride, half nerves.

Mikhailis felt that same swelling pride. "Learning." He rapped two knuckles on the mattress, as though to say well done, sentinel.

The great doors at the chamber's threshold groaned—a deep, ancient rumble that vibrated through Rodion's audio sensors and, by echo, through the royal bed‑posts half a kingdom away. Root‑lattice hinges cracked like a volley of musket shots, years of sap and dust shearing free in brittle flakes. A breath of stale mana rolled out, cold enough to fog Rodion's visor for a heartbeat.

Inside, something enormous roused itself. Wood grated over wood, a sound halfway between grinding millstones and an old tree yawning in a storm. Hot sparks of green‑black mana spat from the door seam, tiny fireflies of malice fizzing in the gloom.

Elowen's fingers dug unconsciously into the blanket. "Listen to that… it sounds angry already."

Mikhailis—now sitting cross‑legged instead of lounging—nodded, tone low. "That right there is the soundtrack of ego. Dungeon cores love to show off on the first floor."

On the feed, Rodion's HUD flared to bright amber. Warning glyphs bloomed against the lens; he dismissed them with two quick blinks and tightened his stance. Scarabs snapped into final positions, each tagging itself with a blue chevron on Monkey's side map. Recon Soldiers melted into alcoves, chitin armor blending with dark bark; longblades braced, antennae quivering for signal cues.

Just before the doors fully split, Rodion rolled his shoulders in a quiet ritual—metal plates sliding, servo cables humming. His silhouette seemed to draw itself taller, helm tilting forward until only twin silver slits glared from the gloom.

In the bedroom, Mikhailis set his mug aside for good. "Showtime," he breathed, voice suddenly crisp.

The twin doors buckled outward, then swung wide with the finality of a gavel. Wood chips whirled in a cyclone of corrupted mana. Two stray shards even struck Rodion's breastplate, sparking harmlessly.

He answered by signaling the Scarabs with a terse hand chop. They streaked off their perches, each launching a canister that burst mid‑flight into webby nets of spectral thread. The sticky lattice arced across the threshold, ready to slow whatever emerged.

At first only darkness stared back… then roots—thick as ship masts—slid forward, dragging a torso made of knotted trunks. A hunched neck followed, crowned with a mask of bark fusing into an antler‑spread of splintered limbs. Where eyes might have glowed, raw mana hissed like swamp gas trapped behind glass.

Monkey obligingly tagged the monstrosity: ROOTBOUND SHAMBLER—THREAT RATING: 1‑D. Underneath, a fresher line appeared: EST. WEAK SPOTS: LATERAL JOINTS / CORE SAP NODE.

Elowen swallowed, the sound small in the huge quiet. "It's… beautiful in an awful way."

Mikhailis gave a tiny nod, eyes flicking over the numbers. Slow, heavy, armored. Textbook first‑floor bully. Yet he felt that old alchemist's thrill curl in his chest: How does it move? How does it die?

Rodion fired a test volley— twin bolts of condensed mana. They struck the Shambler's bark hide and fizzled, leaving only charred kisses.

Monkey's overlay flashed damage: 2 %. Elowen's brows knitted. "Not enough penetration force."

Rodion pivoted without hesitation. He lifted his left arm, palm open toward the ceiling. A Scarab recognized the gesture and remote‑detonated one of its mines. The blast erupted beside the Shambler's forward knee joint—BOOM—shearing off a plate of spongy sap‑wood. The monster roared, an avalanche‑deep bellow that shook stalactites.

Rodion darted sideways to bait a counter‑swing. A roof‑thick root‑arm hammered down, cracking the stone bridge where he'd stood an eye‑blink before. Dust fountained. Elowen gasped, knuckles whitening on Mikhailis's sleeve.

"Bait taken," Mikhailis muttered, approving.

Rodion dashed up a leaning pillar, magnet soles sparking. Halfway he kicked off, soaring like a thrown spear over the Shambler's back. During the leap, twin hilts telescoped from his forearms; energy condensed into crackling spears the color of summer lightning.

Scarabs kept their own rhythm, two of them strafing wide to fire resin shells that popped against the monster's ribs, exposing more tender cambium. Recon Soldiers emerged in sync, slashing at unarmored leg sinews, then retreating behind fresh tripwire lanes.

Elowen's pulse thundered; she felt it flutter in her ears. Every strike lit the chamber on screen like storm lanterns.

"Five silver he does another dramatic flip," Mikhailis whispered, unable to resist the bet even as tension strung his shoulders.

"You're on," Elowen answered, a spark dancing in her eyes despite worry.

Rodion landed on the beast's spine, balanced a breath, then kicked off the ridge of knobbly bark. Mid‑air he twisted—yes, a perfect aerial somersault—and drove both electrified spears down into a glowing sap node newly revealed by Scarab fire.

Mikhailis groaned—half pain at losing the bet, half delight—digging silver coins from a pouch. He slapped them onto Elowen's palm without breaking eye contact with the fight.

Electric shocks tore through the Rootbound Shambler. Blue‑white forks danced along every root vein. The creature shrieked, flailing branches like wounded serpents. One wild swing clipped a pillar, snapping it clean, boulders clattering.

Monkey highlighted fracture stress lines in bright orange. A flashing CRITICAL icon pulsed where Rodion's spears pinned the core.

Rodion rode the convulsions, servos compensating. He triggered overload mode: the spears flared brighter, outer casings melting into silver rain. Streaming power drilled deeper until sapwood exploded in a fountain of luminous syrup.

A boom—like a hollow tree splitting—rang out. The Shambler gave a final heaving roar. Then, piece by piece, it collapsed inward, bark shell falling away in slabs, roots shriveling as corrupted mana bled off in harmless sparks.

Dust settled slowly, glimmering under ceiling fungus lights like gentle snow.

Victory.

Monkey couldn't resist. A gilt script scrolled across the feed—VICTORY!—trumpets blaring. Confetti animation burst, rainbow pixels tinkling against the screen's edge.

Rodion simply stood, spears retracting into harmless hilts, cloak fluttering in the residual draft. He performed a small self‑check gesture—hands rolling, neck tilting until armor clicked back into default.

Scarabs swarmed the corpse fragments, tiny mandibles sawing loose mana crystals the size of grapes. Recon Soldiers sheathed blades and erected perimeter runes that glowed faint blue, warding stray toxins.

Elowen sat back, letting out a shaky exhale that turned into a laugh. "Best first‑floor clear I've ever seen."

Mikhailis flopped sideways, forearm across eyes in mock despair. "You say that like you've cleared dozens."

She winked, slipping his forfeited coins into her robe pocket. "In my dreams."

He didn't answer. A sober hush fell over him—he knew how strong she truly was beneath soft laughter. And dreams, in this kingdom, often became plans.

On screen, Rodion bent to lift the boss core: a rugby‑sized lump of crystallized sap pulsing orange‑green. The moment his gauntlet made contact, every HUD panel hiccupped. Down in the far corner of the feed, a new waveform jittered— faint, deep, rhythmic, like a second heartbeat beneath rock.

Monkey's sensors squeaked an alert. A thin red ring appeared on the 3‑D map, concentric and far below current coordinates.

Elowen saw the blip first. Her spine straightened; the blanket slipped unnoticed to her waist. "Did you see—?"

Mikhailis's easy grin melted. His grey eyes sharpened the way steel hardens in a quench. "I see it."

He tapped two fingers against Monkey's housing; the bot zoomed the anomaly. Just a pulse—one, two—then gone, like a wink from the abyss.

"Second floor's going to be harder," he said, voice low. Determined.

Elowen nodded once, murmuring a silent prayer— or perhaps a vow.

The projection dimmed, screen lingering a heartbeat longer on that black pulse before fading into darkness.