Mastermind: Genderbent Villainess

"Your highness, is there anything you need today?" A young maid asked while pouring Serena a cup of tea. It was already the next morning and Tanya had left the room after spending the night on a separate bed. Now Serena had to think over the words that Tanya had previously spoken to her the night before.

She blushed ever so slightly as she remembered the light kiss she received on her forehead, swearing to herself that she would get back at Tanya for doing that to her. She was going to make sure Tanya takes responsibility.

"I have everything I need for the day. I just need to go over to my morning classes. There has lately been some disturbances caused by Tanya's fame. I want to see some entertainment for once, you know?" Serena grinned. She again thought back to Tanya kissing her forehead.

"My my… I am growing a tad soft now." She sighed.

Meanwhile, the forest deity, Crea, had finally made her appearance in the forest again. Tanya was quite bored of the academy at the moment, feeling as though she could not learn a single thing in a place that would guarantee her whatever she wanted with such little effort. It was simply no fun for her.

She figured that growing her follower count would be far more productive than sitting around, doing nothing at school. Therefore, all she needed was to ask Rose for a pass and she left just like that.

Truth be told, the student council was already making a new school rule that would guarantee that Tanya would be valedictorian. They were also making a rule that would make her minimum attendance zero days. Alpha and the homunculi were all quite shameless.

They were shameless to the point that they outright displayed their unethical agendas for the public to see. Yet, no one criticised them; they were hailed as great people that supported Tanya, the idol of the academy.

"Hmmm…" Tanya's body hovered over the ground. She travelled through the forest easily and manoeuvred the tree with no difficulty. With the avatar of a forest deity, she could easily have free reign in the forest. Even if she had no amazing abilities, the ability to look like a deity was enough for her. It would make people think twice about attacking her in the forest, lest they want to anger the forest.

"Mmm…" Tanya stopped her hovering and finally took a break from expending her mana needlessly. Sitting by a tree, she was surrounded by more irrelevant bushes and trees, it is a forest after all. 

After a few hours of searching for more prospective followers, she had none to brag about. It was as if no one had travelled through the forest, simply disappointing.

It was at this point Tanya just looked at the ground, bored and tired. She had wasted yet another day of her long life. All of this for the chance of upgrading job that might never be upgraded in her lifetime. She had to slap her own face for that much. 

'What am I supposed to do? Turn ants into followers? This is far to unworthy of my time. I can settle for the ability to grow plants at 10 times the speed, at least I can make my own wine.

'Oh look. It's an anthill.' Tanya yawned as she stared at a line of worker ants entering and exiting a small lump on the ground. It was like a conveyor belt, always in order and transporting items efficiently. Tanya could not help but admire the structure of the ant civilisation.

"All of you, worship me as your deity!" Tanya laughed so hard as she said this, thinking to herself 'Who am I kidding? Ants won't worship me.'

[Followers: 1,857,208]

[The azure shell ant race has submitted to you]

Tanya stared blankly at the ground. She did not expect this to happen, not in her wildest dreams. As someone that did not believe in chance very much, she could not believe that it was a coincidence. To her, it had to be an indication.

'Master! We are now your loyal servants. As deity of the forest, please command us to do your bidding!' A voice suddenly popped up in her head, more accurately, a ton of voices. It was as if an entire room of people were talking to her at the same time, saying the exact same thing at the exact same tune.

[Level up: Forest Deity 3]

"I have influence over animals too?" Tanya became very excited. Her face lightened up from the previous boredom and she jumped to her feet to walk over to the anthill.

Sure enough, an army of nearly 2 million ants bowed down to her in a box pattern. None of them dared to face their insect heads up to her, not even the queen dared. They had already been subdued by this new domineering forest deity.

The scene would seem surreal if one was the size of an ant. From their perspective, Tanya was an absolute giant of a deity, towering above all the way to the skies. Tanya's mere presence was enough to make the ground quake in fear and her voice was enough to destroy an entire cave system. The ants could only have reverence for a deity so power as her.

"Subjects, do you know of my powers? Do you understand the power that your deity possesses? I will bring you to a new age where you can thrive as a civilisation and make friendships with those around you. As my followers, I will guarantee that every ant will become equal to a human.

The ants went into a trance of praise. They had never seen a deity that considered them as worth a cent of their time. Ants had always been used as derogatory titles and had never enjoyed the respect of large animals. Today, the ant race had been honoured by an unknown deity. Of course all of the ants would become incredibly excited over Tanya's words.

'ALL HAIL THE DEITY OF THE FOREST!' The ants proclaimed, kowtowing to Tanya.

'Was that all it took for them to become like this? Well beggars can't be choosers. These ants will do for now. At least my follower count is much higher than it was a while ago. I am quite glad I went on this trip now.' Tanya smiled, it seemed like the trip was not a complete waste,

"Since you have all committed to worshipping me, I will give you an important task. You may be ants, but you can become one. Together, you can take on the multitude of denizens in this forest. I task you with spreading the religion of Crea across the land and spreading my name so that all nations can hear it."

"Of course, Master!" The ants all bowed and began stacking on top of each other.

"Man form." After a few minutes, the ants formed a man shaped figure. The figure was entirely made of ants and appeared to be constantly moving. Tanya assumed that the queen either resided in the heart or brain, but she did not really mind. The ants are her servants.

"Master, this form can allow us to speak in a rudimentary fashion. We will use this form to spread your word across the world. No being will stand against you when we have conquered everything. As proud ants, we have hundreds upon thousands of 3rd ascension fighters."

"..." This Information was absolutely insane for Tanya. Not many nations could hire 3rd ascension fighters into their armies. They were rare and usually were the grand leaders of armies in smaller nations, or the elite of a large nation. Nevertheless, they were always treated with respect wherever they decide to reside.

And yet, so many ants had already reached this stage of existence. And now they made up a 2nd ascension humanoid figure. 

"Start in the forest and recruit the insects if you can. You can battle some larger animals like frogs already, but I would not recommend it. Please make sure that my name spreads far and wide.

"Yes, Master!"

The ants finally left, abandoning their previous anthill to explore the surface. Tanya sighed, confused. This was clearly a broken way of leveling up, but she did not dare question something that probably cannot speak. Tanya just left and went back to her dorm room to consolidate what she had seen today.

Although these ants still would not be able to amount to anything much, the followers gained in insect territories could not be looked over. Tanya had witnessed first hand how powerful insiders are for the progression of her class. She needed more, more until she can finally see what her next skill will be.

'Let's see how this goes.'