Everyday Legend

Hivetopia was the home of the bees. It was the perfect place for a bee, and even though they did not live in a democrabee, they lived in a honabee. Life there was perfect, for in Hivetopia they had a working beeconomy, a loving communibee, a strong beelitary, and a sweet education for everyone. Everyone was buzzing happily around the golden walls of the kingdom. If this kingdom had gender equality, it would be the best kingdom in the ecosystem! One day, their perfect kingdom met an imperfect fate. A massive flood the previous month had killed all the young virgin queens who were meant to inherit the throne.

One great day, the queen was sitting on her throne when she looked at her reflection in the luxurious honey hexagons of her hexagon-decorated palace. Anyone else would see power, might, or wealth, but she saw something else—or rather, she noticed a lack of something, and that was youth. She realised she was getting too old. Most of the nurse bees told her she would not live to see next winter, and since all her daughters had tragically died the previous month, she had to find a plan quickly so Hivetopia could establish a new dynasty.

The queen could not sleep at night as she carried this terrifying and horrible thought in her golden brood nest. The next day, she refused to be destroyed by this thought. She found a way to choose her successor wisely, in a manner that had never been done before. She decided she would hold a competition for all the female bees to participate in! As the news spread of a competition where the winner would become the new queen, everyone gathered at the palace doors—every female bee, to be precise.

Beela was a young bee who had a secret. She was in love with a male bee called Hiven. He was the most handsome of all the bees in Hivetopia; his eyes were like diamonds and his hair was so soft that it moved with the wind. The problem was that the citizens were forbidden from loving any of the males. They all traditionally belonged to the queen, and no one could get married besides the queen. Beela went to see Hiven in secret this morning to tell him about her plans. Beela walked up to Hiven. When he saw her, he looked around to make sure no one else was nearby and approached.

“It’s been long since I saw you,” he said.Beela smiled affectionately at him and said, “You must have heard of the competition.”

Hiven nodded. Beela explained to him how she would try to win this competition so that she could become queen, and then they could finally be together.

The queen stepped forward. She looked at all the participants with pride, smiled, and said, “All bees of Hivetopia, today you are gathered here to compete to your final breath until one wins the prize! The rules are simple. You will spread across the foreign world to gather the father of all things, the one motivation that keeps us living: food,” she said glamorously. “The bee who collects the most food before the sky turns red will take the crown!”

Beela had her eyes on the prize; she was determined to win.

“On your marks,” one of the queen’s gigolos said, “get set, GO!”

As he said go, all the competitors flew away at the speed of light. Beela went west towards the city. As she flew around the streets, she saw ultraviolet light! That’s right—unlike humans, bees have the ability to see ultraviolet light. Beela knew that flowers reflected ultraviolet light, so the light she saw must be coming from a flower. Beela approached the light. It was quiet, and only the whispers carried by the light could be barely heard. Beela couldn’t make out what the whispers said, but she caught just one word: “Come.”

Beela got closer as the ultraviolet light grew brighter and brighter. Luckily, her exoskeleton protected her from the radiation, but today held a far more dangerous threat that her exoskeleton could not protect her from. Beela landed on the most unusual of grounds. It was composed of many stings and had many gaps. Beela didn’t see a flower, or anything except the antennae of some bug. Beela felt something unsettling in this place and decided to leave… but she couldn’t. The villainous ground horrifyingly kept pulling her back down, holding onto Beela as hard as it could. Beela was terrified. She couldn’t escape this dark place, and her thoughts were suddenly silenced by the arrival of the beast who lived in this palace of stings.

A dark grey cloak covered his deformed body, but it was visible that the beast had at least six long, skinny arms or legs adorned with bracelets and rings. A hideous face was hidden beneath his hoodie. You could see his eight soulless eyes even when his face was covered in darkness, because his eyes glowed bright red. He was a spider.

“You think you can leave the demon’s mouth after stepping into the darkness behind his teeth, little one?” the spider said calmly, in a rusty yet disturbing voice.

“Please, let me live!” Beela cried in fear. “I just wanted to find food so I can become my hive’s new queen.” She couldn’t bear the thought of never seeing Hiven again. “This way, I can finally marry my love.”

The spider was silent for a minute before saying, "You want to rule a colony of your own for the noblest of reasons: for love. And here I am, living in isolation. You remind me of myself when I was younger; I wanted a family above all desire. But my gigantic mate’s hunger made her spideranity dissolve. She wanted to devour me even before I met my adored moppets. I fled with my life, but I couldn’t save my dream… shame on my soul if I destroy your dream like my wife did to me."

“So you won’t kill me?” Beela asked. “Or are you just telling me your life story?”

“Yes, I will very well spare your life, little one.” The spider then pulled Beela out of the net and told her before she could even thank him, “If it is food you are seeking, then if I may advise you, I know of a place—a sanctuary of consumption. They call it… the fantastic market. Do not be blinded by what looks like honey; it’s actually poisonous. Bring water and sugar only.”

“How can I get there?” Beela asked.

“Human vehicles will take you there. You will find a red bullseye at the entrance. Be careful; the road to heaven might lead to hell.”

Beela flew towards a dark blue car and landed on the roof. However, she was once again not alone, for there were two insects wearing dark red robes with hoodies covering their heads, and a charming ant prince who had magnificent wings, also known as an alate. Beela asked the prince where he was from, and he responded, “From the ant hills of Antatolia,” he said with a heavy Spanish accent that resembled that of an actor born on August 10, 1960. “My name is Brandant. I am on a mission to start a colony of my own…” he said, before he froze in deep concern.

Beela didn’t understand what seemed to trouble Brandant, but before she could ask, she realised the car had stopped. Beela looked around to see the “fantastic market” from afar. She kept looking for any red bullseye when, out of nowhere, a rain of white goo started to fall from the sky. Beela looked to the heavens and realised that on one of the branches of the tree the car was under, a pigeon was reading the newspeepwhile somehow causing the white rain. The bird finished reading and was going to wash his hands until he noticed the bugs down below.

“Uh, hello?” Beela said, before the bird flew even faster than the wind itself towards the insects.

The flies were quick, so they flew away, leaving this monstrous, insect-eating bird with Beela and Brandant. The pigeon let out a roar that resembled that of a dinosaur in some guy named Steve’s movie. Beela flew as fast as she could, and so did Brandant, towards the fleeing flies.

“Help us, amigos!” Brandant shouted to the flies, who seemed to ignore them.

“The plan seems to be working, comrade,” one fly said to the other.But their happiness didn’t last long, because a bee is three times faster than a housefly, so Beela outflew the flies! This left Brandant on the menu, who was much slower than all of them. Brandant knew he was on the edge of his demise, but before the pigeon could eat him, one of the flies rushed towards the pigeon. Pigeons are not active predators but rather opportunistic granivores, so the beast was satisfied with the fly whom he devoured and went back to his nest towards the mountains (“the trees were considered mountains by the insects”).

Brandant was so exhausted by his flight that he fainted and plummeted from the sky; the surviving fly, who was surprisingly nearby, flew down and caught him. He then landed. Beela landed nearby; when she got to the ground, she found the fly putting the fainted Brandant in a bag.

“What are you doing?” Beela asked.

“This is nothing of your concern. We needed to capture the ant prince due to some… lack of diplomacy. I advise you to move along.”

“You let your friend die so you can kidnap Brandant?” Beela asked.

“Sacrifices must be made,” the fly said coldly.

“Why do you have such a bitter rivalry with ants… I thought ants were cockroaches’s enemies?”

“Ants are not our enemies; they just refuse to help us against the ultimate enemy…” The fly said,

“Humans!” He then flew away as fast as he could.

Beela followed him quietly until he stopped at a garbage bin; he then entered inside the dark hole. Beela was scared to go through this silent void, but she wanted to save the prince. When Beela entered the bin, it was no longer silent; she could hear chanting. The music grew louder and louder. Beela heard the chanting coming from the left:

“O Beelzebub, domine noster, utinam tenebrae alarum nostrarum omnes ab exitio quod homines afferunt protegant, novi heroes ex foveis Vuokko oriantur, utinam bombus noster eos ab eorum natura mundum delente distringat, Beelzebub, benedic nobis omnibus.” The chorus said. When Beela got closer, she found, on a damaged Sir William Golding’s Lord of the Flies book that someone threw in the bin, a group of flies dressed in dark red robes were seated in chancel seating in front of a dais where a bigger fly with a purple robe was, as he led the chanting; at the edge of the dais was an altar where any bags with something alive were within. The room was dim, lit only by flickering candles. The flies suddenly stopped chanting.

“Humans!” The fly with the purple robe said before the other flies started to jeer. “We are sent on our unholy mission to be the ultimate distraction against these monsters, for we were assigned by Beelzebub himself to annoy humans in every minute and corner, to make their life a living hell so that their rage stops them from being in a clear mind; for if they are so, they will find ways to eliminate us from the realm of humans. When the great Loki took the form of a fly, he took it to distract Dwarves from the creation of a weapon of destruction, or how Étaín the fly was once a gorgeous goddess of all things, and so are we; we also avoid a weapon of destruction and have a magnificent nature. Some humans might resist—like Theodor Kaiser, Virgil, Robert Montgomery, Tsao-I-Shih, Frank Ross, Jerome Hogsette, Sung Tz’u, The Brave Little Tailor, David Carlson, Robert Heath, Ron Shneidmiller and the despicable William Frost—but their zappers can’t kill our hope and we won’t let the demons of P&G defeat us, and we will use the courage we had when we won rights over cows’ eyes from the queen, or the endless wars we had with the descendants of Lawalawa, or our victory in Birgenair Flight 301 or Baoshan, and therefore we will continue to save the world from humanity’s ferociousness!” He said, making his fellow flies cheer loudly.

“As humans are becoming more numerous, we wanted for ants to be our allies—to steal food from the humans and plant paranoia in their hearts about how to keep candy away from ants—but they refused and preferred their own development over the greater good of all insects; this is outrageous! Even some humans helped us in our cause, like Giotto or Joe Chappell; that’s why we kidnapped their precious princes and princesses, so their cycle of life ends unless they join us. It is to note that one of the flies lost his life kidnapping one of the princes, but may he join Frederick who died 1678 in the heavens of Nasu! But their decided heroes are equally heroic as Akitsuno or Tsetse or even Gnataly who won the Lion-Fly War in 547, so we will honour this fly next year in the sacred month of May. But unfortunately, we won’t bury him, because we don’t even know how to bury our mothers for some reason.” He stayed silent for a minute and then said, “We will make the ants help us so that no human will come close to discover our secret again, like Thomas Morgan or Mike Pence; it’s too dangerous for our kind. We sacrificed our children to make myiasis, we made Anthrax, we started Covid-19, we made the Great Depression, we made 9/11 and we started the Crusades, so we will not hesitate to do what we did to the river Texcoco to the Nile and we will kill them for our sport!”

“Hello? I’m sorry, can I come in?” Beela recklessly asked.

“What the Yemenkonjy are you doing here?”

“Sorry, it’s just I came here to save my friend, so I won’t let you weirdos blackmail the ants!”

“Do not be angry, holometabolan sister; this is for the greater good of all insects.”

“Sister?”

“Yes, bees and flies come from the same camp; bees descend from the Bunnyyarl while flies descend from the Wurrunnunnah. The Bunnyyarl evolved into the Hymenoptera and flies evolved into the Diptera; we are brothers from the four horsemen of Holometabola.”

“Who are the other two?”

“Coleoptera, the race of the beetles, and Lepidoptera, the race of butterflies and moths.”

“Well, I wish I could say I care, but I don’t!” She said before snatching the bag that had the hostage ants from the altar and flew as fast as she could.

“May Beelzebub be with us!” The purple-robed fly said.

“May Beelzebub be with us!” All the other flies said before rushing to chase, except the elder fly who went back to make a few sacrifices.

The swarm of flies chased Beela who had the ant royalty until she got out of the bin. Beela kept flying as a violent buzzing sound followed until someone whose store was nearby started to spray a DEET spray on the flies. “Ah! It’s the storm of no return, retreat!” A fly said, and so all the flies went away.

Beela landed and got all the ant princes and princesses out of the bag; the ants were first unconscious but Beela woke them up. Brandant walked up.

“Branty!” She said.

“No, my nickname is not Branty, it’s Banteras.”

“Oh, sorry… Banteras, and now you are surrounded by princesses, so I guess your quest is complete.”

“Yes, I guess I will find a queen,” he said, “and pay the price that comes along with it,” he whispered.

All the ants were confused and started to question Beela what was happening, but before Beela said anything, all the ants’ attention was caught by an ant acting strangely and who didn’t look normal. “Hilton, my friend, are you okay?” Banteras asked.

The ant looked scary; he had mushrooms coming out of him and his eyes were as white as snow. “Hahakahahaka,” he said smilingly with his crooked mouth. He then started to move in circles as his smell got worse and he then ran away, but the prince of Mantasia used his wings to catch him,

“Oh no,” Banteras yelled in panic, “Hilton is acting even worse than Ant-ony Hopkins!”

Hilton started to scream terrifyingly as more mushrooms came out of him.

Beela helped the ants find a nearby insect church; when Beela and the ants went inside, they found the religious mantises praying. After the mantises finished their prayers they left the church, so Beela went to the priest mantis.

“Greetings, Father. I’m Beela from Hivetopia and I come to seek your help because this ant is acting strangely,” she said as she pointed to Hilton.

“I’ve seen this before. Come with me; I need to check his condition,” the praying mantis said.

Moments later, the priest was checking on Hilton on a gurney.

“As I feared,” the mantis said to the other ants and Beela, “your friend has an affliction; it’s called Ophiocordyceps unilateralis. A demon is possessing him to reproduce in him; this type of demon is known as a fungus. He is at the mercy of the Lord, for no exorcist can remove his curse. God be with this troubled soul. He will die once these young demons burst from his body,” he said before making the sign of the cross.

The other ants who once knew Hilton started to cry, and the ants who didn’t pretended to.

The other ants who once knew Hilton started to cry and the ants who didn’t pretended to.

“How can we at least kill the demon consuming his organs?” Brandant asked.

“Well, if we bury him now, the demon will die,” the mantis said.

“Then let’s honour our friend.”

All the ants gathered and they put Hilton inside a coffin and closed it so he wouldn't get out, and filled the coffin with holy water to weaken the demon. The mantis was reading Ecclesiastes 3:1–8 before saying, “and now may we bury this body in respect so that the fungus will die and Hilton can rest at last.”

Beela didn’t want to waste any more time, so she decided to leave as soon as the funeral ended, not even witnessing the burial, but before she left, she said goodbye to Banderas.

“Well, I have to continue my quest, but good luck in yours, Banderas.”

“Sí, it’s been an honour to know you.”

“Well, I hope I see you again one day.”

“I sure hope so,” he said in a depressed tone.

“There’s something you’re not telling me.”

“Well, you see, Beela, you… won’t see me again, because in ant traditions, the queen must sacrifice her king after he makes her bear 30 eggs, so I won’t even live long enough to see my kingdom.”

“So you’ll die?”

“Yes, it is the price to be the founder of a kingdom.”

“But you don’t seem willing to pay it.”

“Of course not, I want to live.”

“Well, everything has a price. If you prioritize life over being a king, which is very natural to do, then don’t deny your desire for life. It’s all about your priorities. So, which one comes first: being alive or being a king? It depends on which one you are more willing to sacrifice… but don’t sacrifice one too much, I guess..”

“Come to think of it, I don’t really want to be king; it’s just more of a traditional thing. You’re right! I don’t want to be a legend, I want to be alive! Thank you, Beela. I hope you succeed in your quest.”

“Goodbye, Banderas.”

Beela then left and continued her quest. As she flew, she started to hear an incredibly annoying sound. She looked beside her to find a dragonfly at her right and another one at her left, both smellier than the other.

“Well, well,” the one at the left said with a western accent, “look what the road brought to us.”

“Yeah, the boss is going to love this cutie,” the one at the right said.

“Hey guys, no offense or anything, but I’m on my way to the fantastic market and I don’t think I can fly there if I have to trail behind stinking garbage on the way,” Beela said, angering the dragonfly on the left.

“How dare you, you yellow mime!” the one on the right said.

“What does smelling garbage have to do with offending us?” the one on the left asked.

“The garbage is you, idiot!”

“Oh! Oh, this one needs a lesson!”

The two dragonflies flew around Beela and kept getting faster and faster. “I gotta warn you, this is not a good idea,” Beela said, but as she said that, one of them went straight towards her with incredible speed, but due to his poor aim, he ended up missing and barrelling past her right side. Beela chuckled in pride even though she didn’t do anything. Sadly, her moment of victory ended soon because the other one hit her so hard she fainted.

Beela was unconscious for a moment or two and she then woke up where, in front of her, was a large audience at the last step of some stairs. She was surrounded by beetles who had built a wall of dung around her. The audience was mainly moths and butterflies who were basically nobility; they remarkably covered themselves with their wings, making them look like they were wearing a cape. As Beela started to question where she was, she realized there was a pile of shattered insect exoskeletons and green blood. “I don’t want to die,” Beela said quickly in horror after seeing the remains of fallen bugs. Next to the audience, a male ladybug with a top hat was standing.

“Today we gather here to play a game of chance! You will most likely pay, but if the very, very, very, very unlikely chance of that bee surviving this scorpion happens, then we give you money!” the ladybug said with a high voice.

Beela was terrified, and from the words of the ladybug, she knew that she was truly in trouble but that there was a large scorpion behind her. Beela was too terrified to look behind her, but before she could, the scorpion’s tail violently stuck in the ground behind her; his tail was dark and had hair around it. Beela tried to leave, but there was a wall of dung around her that the dung beetles installed earlier, so she flew, but the terrifying scorpion grabbed her by the legs with his pincers, which are usually called pedipalps, and the claw is called the chela. ”Where do you think you’re going?” the scorpion asked.

“Guess today isn’t your lucky day!” the ladybug said.

All female bees have a stinger and they can only use it once in their life, because if they sting someone, this destroys their life force and their body. The problem is, every time they are stressed, they are hit with a great temptation to use their stinger, so Beela had to think quick. (The following facts are not authentic scientific facts, but an adaptation of real-life bee behavior).

Beela suddenly found herself in a mental black void where a soft voice said, “Stab him, stab him, you need to protect yourself. Stab! Do it, get the job done, stab now!” Beela then came up with an idea to beat the bloodthirsty scorpion. Beela rushed to his back and said, “Stab me.” The scorpion automatically stabbed her, but she flew right before it hit her, leaving the scorpion to stab himself!

“O Fortuna!” the ladybug said.

The scorpion screamed in pain, but Beela had read in a book that all scorpions are immune to their venom, so before her adversary could recover, she grabbed a piece of the wall of dung and threw it at his mouth. As he began to choke in disgust and tried to spit it out, Beela rushed to his legs, twisted one, and ran as far as she could. The scorpion was in pain and couldn’t walk to her, so he yelled.

“Well, fortunately for you, little fella, luck was on your side today,” the ladybug said, “and this means you all get the money!” he said to the audience, “and equally, our fearless gladiator. Well, that’s it for today; Gargan needs to rest.”

Everyone clapped except a caterpillar on the side. “NO! Thanks to you, I will never become a butterfly! I wanted to fight the scorpion so I could get enough money to rent a good place so I can spin my cocoon degree, but you wrecked it!”

“Kid, if you want to be a butterfly when you grow up, all you have to do is to study well and get good grades in eating.”

“But my parents weren't rich enough to provide me a delicious education.”

“It’s not about the type of education you have; it’s about how well you will use this education, because winning money from profits might make you rich but for a short period and it won’t make you successful, but being highly educated will turn you into a beautiful butterfly.”

“You’re right, I have to pay more attention to my education!”

“Some times you might get lucky,” Beela said, making the ladybug happy she talked about luck, “because you can have all the money.”

Beela then told the ladybug to give the caterpillar the money instead of her, and if you’re still thinking about it, no, he did not give her dollar bills; insects use herbs as currency. The caterpillar then asked Beela where she was going, so she explained to him she needs to find the fantastic market.

“Oh, but it’s nearby,” the caterpillar said.

“Really? Where?”

“Two meters west,” the caterpillar said.

Beela then flew as fast as she could towards the market until she finally saw it: the red bullseye. She arrived at her destination. She might actually get to marry Hiven.

Beela excitingly entered the market and, as soon as she started looking, she found golden honey. It was shining in her face, but Beela remembered the warning of the spider who told her that the honey was a trick and it was actually poisonous, so she left and continued her search. But she couldn’t find anything, so she landed for a quick break and that’s when she heard his voice.

“Come inside, I bid you welcome,” a mosquito said with an Eastern European accent.

Beela, who needed directions, gladly entered his house (under a shelf).

“Come freely, go safely, and leave something of the happiness you bring,” the mosquito said.

The mosquito’s home was dark and he used the tip of a soda bottle as a table.

Beela found sugar on the dining table, so she wanted to ask the mosquito where he found it, but she realized he observed her without eating.

“Aren’t you eating?” she asked him.

“I never eat… sugar, I’m on a diet.”

“Oh, well, you can eat something else.”

“I have already dined,” he said before he started to sniff around. Beela didn’t know what he was smelling, but when he looked at her, she understood that somehow the smell was coming from her. The mosquito speed-flew directly to Beela and hit his face against her neck. Beela pushed him and said,

“No, you’re not drinking my blood today!”

“What? Why would I drink your blood?”

“Ah, because you’re a mosquito.”

“This is a very negative stereotype. We don’t actually drink blood. I also don’t say 'bleh bleh bleh,' in case that’s what you were going to say next.”

“So you don’t drink blood, but then why were you going all over me?”

“Because I feast on nectar and you smell a lot like nectar, but I’m physically incapable of biting you.”

“Oh, that’s great. I was kind of getting worried with all the 'come safely and go freely' performance.”

“No, I won’t drink your blood… my brides will.”

Out of a sudden, three female mosquitoes came out of the darkness, ready to devour.

“What the heck, man? I thought mosquitoes didn’t drink blood?”

“Yes, male mosquitoes don’t… but the females do.”

“Why didn’t you tell me this earlier?”

“Because I’m a good husband. What, you think I don’t love them, and I never loved, and I never love? No, I wouldn’t scare off their food, except that one time.” The mosquito froze in terror as he remembered “that one time.” “Anyways, rest in peace in advance.”

Beela ran away in terror as the female mosquitoes started to fly; they chased her through the

entire market until Beela was out of sight. Apparently they lost her, so they started to search.

“You can run but you can’t hide,” one said.

“If I bite you and you survive, I wouldn’t advise running away, because you’re going to die from malaria anyways… I think so, I’m actually not sure.”

Beela was behind the spray section as she kept thinking how she could escape the mosquitoes, until she remembered how she escaped the flies earlier! Beela started to walk slowly behind the sprays, searching for any garlic spray. Beela found the garlic spray, but she would use it against the mosquitoes.

“I hope those dumb mosquitoes don’t find me!” she said loudly, so the mosquitoes obviously heard her and went towards the sound, but suddenly they heard a spraying sound. The room became more toxic and the air became heavier; Beela was spraying! The mosquitoes ran away in horror as the spray’s fog terrorized them away.

After Beela survived the vampires, she decided to continue her search, but from a distance, she saw two red cockroaches walking. They dressed, walked, and talked like gentlemen. And before you say it, I will say it: it is a very dirty store to have this amount of insects, and this is for story narrative reasons only, not implying that all stores with a red bullseye as their logo are disgusting.

“There was this one ant who was very skilled at war against the cockroaches, but then a cricket helped us kill him at night.”

“Yes, wonderful, those ants are just the worst,” the other one said.

Beela approached these two gentlemen and asked where she could find water and sugar.

“Oh, well, greetings, young woman. If you are looking for anything, you can go to Senator Pee.

He’s like a taxi around here, and today there aren’t many bugs in the store so he should take you right away—well, after he takes us to our beloved destination.”

“Where is that?” Beela asked.

“We are going towards the shopping cart where we can watch the beautiful slugs and worms wiggle in mud,” he answered.

“Isn’t that disgusting?”

“Ha ha, you are a clever young woman, but part of the traditional tactics of being disgusting is instead ofsimply defying the natural order of sanitization, you fill people’s hearts with doubt for what is disgusting and what is not, and make them question their own ways,” the other cockroach said.

“Cool,” Beela said, as she realized that in the end they are cockroaches no matter what kind of clothes they wear.

Beela followed the two cockroaches as they spoke of how to make the perfect expression to disgust a human when they spot them, and how true responsiveness doesn’t exist anymore.

They finished walking when they arrived at the butchery where Beela saw Senator Pee, who was a centipede. That’s right, Senator Pee is a centipede.

He had many seats on his back—at least that’s how they used his back—and he drove them off, starting by taking the two gentlemen towards the shopping cart where there was a man in a suit calling his former driver to ask him what's on his shopping list. And then he asked Beela where she wanted to go, so she explained how she needed to get to where the water and sugar were, so Pee did so. But they had to take a journey to the freezing land of frost, which Beela found very cold, but in the end they arrived! Beela couldn’t believe it; the spider was right, this place had a lot of food. She was to become queen for sure!

Beela was happy until reality struck her with the thought of how to carry all this to Hivetopia with the limited time left. She started to tear up as she realized that this whole journey was for nothing, until another bug appeared. It was Escargomar the snail. He was a cute-looking snail who wore a hat on his shell; he had chubby cheeks and big eyebrows that were hairless obviously, because he was a snail.

“Ever heard of the expression work harder, not smarter?” he said.

“What’s your point?”

“It’s impossible for you to carry all that food, but there are still other ways.”

“How?”

“Follow me.”

Escargomar led Beela to somewhere nearby, and as they approached, he explained something.

“Snails aren’t very fast, but all snails have a little secret we don’t tell anyone that allows us to get from somewhere to another quickly. You see, there’s an underground tunnel with a string of rivers; you can transport your food using those rivers. The opening of this tunnel is… there’s the hole.”

Beela saw the hole that was under the noodles shelf. “There, your food will make it both safely and quickly. See, you just had to think,” Escargomar said.

Beela tried to move the water bottles and sugar packs. The sugar packs were easy, but the water packs were a bit heavy, but lucky for Beela, Escargomar helped, and without his help, she would have never made it. After 18 minutes, all the water bottles and sugar packs were in the hole. All Beela had to do was to sail across the tunnel to the colony.

“Thank you so much, Escargomar,” Beela said.

“Well, you’re welcome. Anything to help the heroine on her adventure,” Escargomar said.

Beela kept sailing and sailing with the boat formed of the water bottles, across the dark tunnel in the directions Escargomar gave her. She continued until she heard a voice. She looked behind her and saw a massive flood going towards her. She kept speeding her boat of supplies, but the storm hit her and it kept pushing her ahead, which actually made her go faster—but will it make her go fast enough?

Meanwhile, in Hivetopia, all the bees had arrived with their food, which was very limited in comparison with Beela’s—that is, if she had made it early. But all the bees were waiting for her so they could count the supplies. “I’ve had enough, let's count already!” a bee said, so an elder bee decided to make a countdown of 21 (they actually mean 7 because bees count in the Fibonacci sequence, which is like 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 21).

The countdown has began but Beela didn’t show up going it be will all her efforts bee for nothing, ha get it bee for nothing, anyways the could down was half way threw but she didn’t arrive but when they said eight Beela with all the bottles and sugar pack got out of the ground behind them letting them instantly know who is the winner is.

“Well, I think we have a clear winner,” the referee said.

“Excuse me?” a bee asked.

“Beela got the biggest amount of food. It’s not nectar or colony honey, but the rules said any type of food counts,” the referee explained.

“But we didn’t count yet,” that same bee said.

“What do you mean? The food she brought is clearly bigger!” the referee said frustratedly.

“Did you count, or are you just making a wild guess? My food is a lot too!”

The referee, to save himself from a useless deduction, counted all the food and wasted hours to confirm that Beela won.

Everyone celebrated and cheered for Beela, but all the cheer was silent to her as she approached to receive her royal accolades from the queen. The queen said,

“Beela, you didn’t just win a competition, you broke a record in the history of our kingdom. For your great service and patriotism, I grant you queen of our colony.”

The queen then took off her crown and put it on Beela’s head. The queen coughed and said, “my time has almost come, but now I die knowing Hivetopia is in great hands.”

“And now, I give you the stinger of rebirth, to start your own dynasty,” the queen said.

“The stinger of rebirth?” Beela asked.

“Yes, I hired one of the most charming of all drones, his name is Hiven, he will be your king. In order of starting your dynasty you must stab him, kill him as a sacrifice, and you will begin your reign.”

Beela saw Hiven kneeling in front of her in horror, and she carried the stinger of rebirth as she got closer and started to tear up as she couldn’t breathe. Beela dropped the stinger.

“I can’t,” Beela said.

“Don’t feel sorry for our drones, they are male. You give them power and you can’t imagine what they do, deep down inside they are all monsters,” the queen said.

“Ya, look at what we are doing right now when we have power, I’m queen now and I decided the fate of my people, so I call upon the “Interspecific social learning”!”

Interspecific social learning is when a species of creature starts to copy the social behavior of another animal; this can make them change systems or hunting tactics.

“Learning from whom?” a bee in the background said.

“From termites. From now on we will operate on a termite monarchy system, this means the king and queen rule hand in hand with gender equality, and all the slaughtering will end.” Beela then looked at Hiven, “And this is my new king who shares equal power with me.”

The bees respected their new queen’s order and prepared a wedding for her and Hiven. Usually the main character has to go through 8,000 sessions after finding out that they are in love with their love interest to get married, and then another 8,000 sessions where they are on bad terms and they try to get married but something bad goes wrong, so they go through 50,000 sessions until they come back together and all that before the stuff that makes you vomit comes in, so they get married as old people, but this isn’t this kind of story. This is a classic tale where stuff goes naturally as they go. Anyways, Beela got married and had a bundle of children to inherit her kingdom one day. She was a great queen and will always be remembered in the history of Hivetopia.

The thing is, Beela’s adventure is an adventure you can be a part of every day, where she went to a supermarket and faced some unusual characters, saw bugs doing bizarre activities, and struggled through exhaustion to get her groceries home. To be a part of such an adventure you need to get out more, because every time you leave your home there’s an adventure that awaits. But the spider never got out, and he’s happy in his interestingly destined home—in fact, it is better treatment for the soul to stay in your home and it’s more restful, and so both are cool, but this tale focuses on how life can be more exciting when looking better at what you see every day.

The End

By Omar SOHAIL MAYADA