Pov The Supreme General

  My shoulders were still a bit stiff, but that’s always been a problem when changing into a human form from an ant one. It’s just that I feel so much more comfortable in my own form.

  Yet the change is necessary, as I can’t deny the advantages of a human form. Unfortunately, my position doesn’t require any of the advantages my original form gives, so here I am—elected as the leader of the entire armed forces of the dungeon, the Supreme General, as they call me.

  We were gathered around a table, waiting for word from our forward scouts. So many strong people were here, and Father was once again advancing, having pushed himself in record time to finish the 73rd floor.

  Everyone here could single-handedly beat me in combat—some quite easily—but my talents never lay in actual combat, even though I did it quite a lot when I was young. No, my talent gave me the opportunity to learn from my experiences and turn that into wisdom, simply by not dying when I should have.

  There are some powerful talents out there, but mine didn’t grant me immortality—at least not in the form I would have liked. It gave me time, and as it turned out, that was all I needed to succeed.

  Back then, the ant nations were young and in constant war. Slowly, I watched my race grow smarter. There were individuals capable of complete reasoning even before me, but I watched in fascination as everyone became as intelligent as the few of us who had already reached that stage.

  I was far from leadership back then. I was just a simple worker ant, but unlike my sisters, I did not perish from growing old as they did. Then the wars came, and even though I was not a soldier, all of us still received a bit of training back then so we could protect our colonies.

  The constant fighting allowed me to get stronger, but I was also captured, as my original colony didn’t survive. It was back to working then for quite a while.

  Our Queens were gone, so it didn’t take too long for all my sisters who survived that fight to be gone. Time passed like that, and more fighting followed. Then champions started to appear, but I was still just a lonely worker, even though I had grown quite powerful.

  Everyone had forgotten about me as I was not important, so when another floor opened up for colonization, I just left.

  Back then, I was already starting to feel my age, but as I grew stronger, advancing in the silver ranks, as I now know them, I was able to stave off old age as I continued to fight mostly alone.

  This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

  When I finally reached gold rank a few floors down, after many more battles—since I couldn’t escape the wars of nations entirely—I realized why I had survived so long. I also understood that, through all of that, I had been working on instinct a bit too much. But gold rank brought many advantages, including the proper activation and reveal of my talent.

  Long-lived. Those were two simple words, but unknown to me in my early life, they allowed me to watch my entire civilization grow—from a few colonies that had developed intelligence into mega nations whose technology even challenges the civilizations outside of Father.

  It didn’t take long for others to see my wisdom, so I became a general, leading huge armies in what seemed like an almost never-ending war. Fortunately, that era came to an end, and while I did not enjoy the structured wars that followed, I think we could have done without it. Even so, it was good that I had the practice, as I can now help Father defend against those who pursued our end.

  I continue to go through my life so that I could remember it all, as with knowing history comes wisdom. While not every situation is the same, so much can be learned if you just look. Fortunately for me, I did not just have to read or be told stories about what happened to obtain some wisdom—I had personal experience, surpassing almost everyone here, perhaps excluding Ismael. But while he can do some covert operations, he hasn’t the mind for complex large-scale warfare.

  I wish Father would have used me before, but I was too focused on my own civilization, on the ant nations, to realize the dangers of the outside. I should have at least accepted the Academy’s briefing on the outside world, as they often offered knowledge seminars for those of us who had reached the top of leadership in at least one area.

  Too sure of Father I was back then, and a little bit of bitterness was there too because of the endless wars we had to endure. I know now that, unfortunately, nothing could have changed that.

  If Father had interfered, it would have just made things worse. Many want to forget those histories—the brutality we could show—but it was just the way back then, and we shouldn’t forget what we’re capable of just because it’s more convenient not to remember.

  The crystals on the table started to light up one by one. Our technology had advanced quite a bit; the Academy was doing miracle work. Gone were the days when we needed to listen to what the other side said.

  Now, these crystals—beyond my knowledge of how they worked—transferred the knowledge that came with the message to everyone holding the correct crystal. It was meant to cut back on the lag time of communications, and now we instantly knew of the approaching armies and what routes they were currently taking.

  “The armies have been out of reach until now, too far from our home. But the Delvers are now close enough, and we know the routes of many of the other powers’ armies. Usual defensive works like diverting rivers or even dropping entire mountains in front of those armies would be entirely useless. As we have agreed upon before, the only way to delay them without committing too much of our forces too early is to start making traps.”

  My words rang out with absolute authority, and so the discussions started. We were going to use everything we had—runic traps, bombs, spell-woven horrifying area-of-effect traps, and many more.

  The table quickly transformed from a simple table into something perfectly capable of showing the minute details of the terrain in every location we deemed important enough. And now, that work was showing itself, as we could plan truly devastating delaying attacks.

  Unfortunately, we all also knew that this could only buy us perhaps a few days. But there were also some truly clever and capable people amongst our ranks that I was certain would be able to come up with traps that could perhaps even get us a few diamond ranks.

  When the approaching armies got closer, it was time to start with a more active defense plan. And of course, when they reached Father’s territory, they would come to learn why you should not march against a dungeon.

  Everyone here would be only focused on the surface, but as soon as this meeting ended, I went through a gateway to another operational headquarters. This time, I was at the South Pole instead of the North, close to the second entrance of Father.

  While there were some adventurers here, this defense was almost entirely of father's children. On this front, we would be fighting other dungeons, and in all honesty, I think this would be more of a desperate fight than the one that would be at the surface.