The hivemind is conquering for me?

"Are you ready Orchid?" I asked as I raised Zircon with one hand into a headguard. Orchid spun the Bone white swords in her hand as she replied. "Worry about acclimating to your body's new form, Orchid will start off with the strength we used in our last battle and adapt her strength from there." Discover more content at My Virtual Library Empire

She then melded her armour onto herself before casually lowering her centre of mass like an exalted warrior. As I began to silently circle her, I drew up my advantages and disadvantages. I was now stronger, faster and had higher brain processing power. I had active combat experience and knew now that strategies break down the second combat begins.

I was also naked except for some underwear to keep my bits from getting in the way as I thought, and against an opponent that while holding back, was still a more efficient killer than I was and had the adaptive capabilities of the hive hiked up beyond normal thanks to the special role she plays inside of the hive. With that and the fact I was still unfamiliar with my new proportions meant I could not take this spar any less seriously than all my times before.

As I began to circle the target freely, She not making a single move, I waited for the perfect opportunity. From the edge of the room , who was unbothered as she sat next to an Anti Psionic Queens guard, shouted. "Whooo Get her Apollo! Pull out her entrails and feed them to herself!"

In the back of my mind I decided to have a word with Keyla about wanting to disembowel Orchid later and used her shout as the minor distraction it was to begin my assault. As I had been walking around Orchid, I used the fact she had kept her back turned to me to tense my legs without being seen.

All at once, I released the energy stored within and charged towards her and was swinging Zircon down towards her shoulder within a second. Orchid felt danger behind the attack and brought her blades up into a defensive position as they prevented Zircon from getting her fill of Orchid blood.

The power behind the attack surprised Orchid as she was sent skidding back a meter or so. 'And that was not even a powerful blow from the way his arms were tensed.' Orchid held back her delight at her mate becoming stronger and focused up in time for the next attack.

Adapting almost instantly, Orchid only used one sword to deflect the oncoming attack away from its desired point of contact and used her other sword to swipe at Apollo's fleshy torso, causing him to jump back before immediately reengaging.

As the spar waged on, Keyla had a knot in her stomach the entire time. She could barely keep up with Apollo's speed, never mind Orchids, who she had noticed had adapted her strength and speed to match Apollo's and with her natural grace, seemingly made the attacks look faster.

As Apollo suffered a nick to his abs, Keyla grabbed the nearest thing to her and squeezed tightly as she internally yelled 'Not his abs! They are so perfect!' Keyla's hand suddenly began to sting, bringing her out of her thoughts and looked towards the source of the sting instead of just removing her hand from the pain source.

Her hand was grasped upon the edge of a large chitin plate. Keyla then suddenly felt a presence. Looking up, with her hand still radiating pain as she continued to touch the guard, realised it was looking directly at her for the first time.

The guard looked between Keyla's hand and its own body, wordlessly expressing its demand. "Oh sorry big girl, didn't know you didn't like being touched." *Clang* Keyla then reflectively pulled her arm away as she turned back to the fighting only to witness sight that made her blood run cold.

On the floor was Orchids entire right arm, whose hand was still clenched tightly around her blade. Keyla gave zero shits about that though. For her other sword had pierced Apollo straight through his chest.

Keyla's mind suddenly became hazy, her vision red as she stared upon Orchid with hate. That faded quickly as she felt a claw touch her head, suppressing the instinct to murder Orchid as quickly as it came about.

As Orchid pulled her sword out of my chest, I grimaced before falling to one knee. "Owww." I wheezed out as she had punctured one of my lungs clean through. "Orchid has told you countless times Apollo-love, you grow complacent after inflicting wounds upon my form. It creates easy openings."

"Yhep" I wheezed once more, thanking myself for enhancing my lungs so I only need one while the other fills up with blood. Orchid then picked up her arm off the floor and held it against the cut I inflicted, before kneeling down in front of me to collect her prize.

It had been too long since she tasted her mates blood. The moment she licked it up, she quivered with euphoria before she lost herself in the licking frenzy. A few minutes later, Keyla walked over as Orchid was 'feeding' and asked. "Apollo, are you ok?"

As I turned my head slowly towards Keyla, I noticed her hands were shaking. Extending my hand out slowly, she got the message and took it as she knelt down next to me. "I am fine. My regenerative factor has increased and my internal injury has already stopped bleeding into my lung. I am just waiting for the outer wound to bond together a bit better as the serrations on Orchids sword did a number on me. Once that is done with, I will go to the nest pods and heal the rest of the injury there. Should only be an hour."

I then fought off the overwhelming urge to cough, as even though I spent an entire week in agony much worse than this, pain is still not fun and I am not a masochist. After waiting for a short while, a drone suddenly walked into the room with a parcel attached to its back.

It hastily scuttled over to Orchid who, with a satisfied 'Aahh!' After having become drunk from my blood, she picked up the drone and removed the parcel on its back before throwing it away. Opening the thin skin that was keeping the item she requested be made from falling off the drone, she smiled.

"Here you go Apollo. Let Housewife take care of you! Hehehe!" Orchid then raised a large thin and extremely sharp needle into the air with her good as new arm before she jammed it with a surgeon's precision directly through Apollo's chest and once more pierced his lung.

There was a short whizz of air escaping from the end of the needle before Orchid lay on the floor and opened her mouth, just in time as blood began to drain from Apollo's lung.

I gasped in relief as I felt the pressure begin to relieve itself. "Oh you fucking miracle worker." I exclaimed with my eyes closed as I faced the ceiling.

Keyla watched on as Orchid drank Apollo's dripping blood. Her mouth felt incredibly parched and as she looked at Apollo's back, there was still some fresh blood that had not dried yet. She ran her finger across the wound and stared at it as she brought it close to her face.

Her mouth was so dry as she held the blood up in front of her. She was about to place her finger into her mouth before she heard. "I wouldn't If I were you." Looking up, Keyla saw me staring at her.

"Why not? She asked. "Orchid is drinking from you like you are a water fountain. I only want a little bit." I smiled at Keyla. "Orchid here is a pro and even she is going to have side effects. The last cultist to taste my blood was Jinx, and she was immediately knocked out by it. With that and your other form being all about blood, I would advise against- and you just put your finger in your mouth..."

Keyla's eyes suddenly dilated to their maximum capability and instead of becoming loopy, a sense of overwhelming clarity took hold of her. Walking over to Apollo, she kicked Orchid away from her snack and without even fully understanding, focused her attention towards the needles and motioned in the air a pulling gesture.

All of a sudden, the remaining blood in Apollo's lungs spurted out of the needle and formed in the air, coagulating next to Keyla's hand. She then focused on the wounds that were still open on her love and removed all the excess blood while making it so the blood in his body would stop escaping from the wound.

The blood in the air had now fully coagulated and turned into a ball that dropped into Keyla's hand, staining it red as she stared down at it. Keyla gulped as she looked at the small ball and took a bite out of it.

She moaned at the rich iron taste before laughing hysterically. "Hahaha, hahaha, Hahahaha-Oh!" Keyla then collapsed backwards onto Orchid who was too intoxicated to get up and began snoring with a delighted expression on her face.

As I watched Orchid pry the ball of my blood from Keyla's hands and consume the rest, pecking at it like a fine delicacy, I stood up and began to walk away towards The Queen guard and instructed.

"Keep an eye on those two for a bit, I am going to the nest pod and having a drone cleaning. That was a bizarre couple of minutes and my head needs a rest before I investigate further."