“Wars tend to be bloody. Anyone who hears me speak these words would think of me as some kind of dimwit for announcing what even a village idiot would know by heart. Wars lead to plenty of death.
But it is not merely the nature of conflict alone that leads to such a truth; it is the nature of the System itself. Martial classes come with a curse, a terrible price that anyone who wields them quickly learns. Experience is only granted upon killing.
Such a revelation leads to the current stratagems the Shostran Kingdom employs in forming and managing their army. There are only so many living beings available to kill that truly deserve it, very few of them gathered together in large enough numbers for a large army to fight at once, which makes battle the only viable way for soldiers to level up. And many people live for levels. Many will fight tooth and nail, continue to fight for longer, or even strike at fleeing enemies, just for more experience.
That is why the bulk of most armies are meant to be just that; bulk. The true elites come from long-lived veterans who have fought in many battles, and adventurers, who travel in small groups to seek out monsters to slay. The monsters themselves who have Systems hold a similar curse, in that they are forced to slay others to level up, even though the Noble Races do have classes that can gain experience peacefully.
Trade Classes don’t deal with combat, and are thus known to level up by performing the relevant task associated with them. A [Baker] or [Farmer] will level up from baking bread or farming wheat respectively, for example. No killing there. Just practicing a trade that sustains life instead.
The nature of these trade classes is what motivated the creation of a workaround for the bloody nature of martial classes; the hybrid-class. I don’t mean something like [Spellsword] or [Man-At-Arms], which combine multiple ways of combat, but [Shostran Soldier], a Class that takes the martial [Soldier] and adds an aspect of a trade to it.
The [Shostran Soldier] is one of these hybrid classes; its owners gain experience by performing soldierly duties, such as practicing drills, marching with comrades, or winning battles. Of course, most of the experience is still obtained by killing, so the battlefields continue to be painted crimson. Just… not as much as before.
But as long as war exists, so too will the bloodshed continue.”
-Excerpt from the “Memoirs of Magnus Silvershell,” written by the retired general of the Shostran Army
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Why do we only get experience when we kill something? Click thought to themselves while seated on top of Bored the Alpha. We won that fight, the predators fled! Why don’t we get anything from that?
Even if none of the other spiders were able to comprehend what they all missed out on, their leader was more than offended enough to make up for them. And they were about to make it up to them.
Hundreds of newborn spiders, already in their secondary Juvenile forms, marched along their more evolved brethren. Closer to the main group were Bored the Alpha and Click riding on top of the gargantuan spider. Beyond those two, [Shadow Spiders] snuck around the edge of the crowd while [Webslinger Spiders] rappelled between stalactites. Their silk spinning and web launching had gotten much higher over the last few weeks while they constructed the web, allowing them even greater mobility around the cavern, much to everyone’s amusement.
[Command Subordinates]! Find where these tracks go, [Shadow Spiders]!
It was something that felt like it should make sense to Click. If the small and sneaky spiders were so good at avoiding detection, they should be able to stop others from doing the same. But…
A pair of [Shadow Spiders] began to follow the scattered footprints that went both left and right. Their paths curved heavily, going in a near full circle, and the arachnids followed until they bumped into each other.
Some of these tracks could be from days, or even weeks ago! Click let out an internal sigh. There hasn’t been anything around to cover them up, after all. Not since the invaders killed everyone else.
The sensation was bittersweet. Many of the invaders’ victims were spiders that Click knew, albeit for only a few weeks, so it wasn’t like they had that strong of a connection. Not that Click was interested in making connections with brethren who were incapable of reciprocating the feeling. But those few weeks happened to be Click’s entire life.
A series of howls echoed out from the distance, grabbing the spiders’ attention. Without missing a beat, they all ran over to the sound, baring their fangs in preparation for the battle. It had only been about an hour since their first meeting, and it was unlikely that the injured predators would be able to do more than lick their wounds, while the spiders had only grown stronger in that time.
As the tribe made it past a small rock formation, they came face to face with a trio of [Juvenile Dungeon Hounds]. The three of them, who looked to be in an adolescent state of growth, were standing over the predator corpse much larger than them. The body was covered in slash and burn marks, and looked to be in an extremely advanced state of decomposition. The trio was looking at it intently.
Is that their parent? Click thought to themself. I know their parents have a strong instinct to care for their young like us spiders, but does it work the other way around?
One of the hounds poked the corpse with their muzzle before opening their mouth and reaching out for its limb, teeth first.
Or maybe not?
The [Juvenile Dungeon Hounds]’s ears flicked and they turned to meet the spiders. Saliva dripped from their mouths as the muscles in their legs began to tense, ready to pounce.
So they’re just hungry and want to try for round two with us? Oh, I’ll gladly oblige.
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The predators leapt into the air with open mouths in an impressive, yet predictable arc. Click ordered the spiders standing around their landing spot to move to the side, while positioning the [Shadow Spiders] to flank them.
The creatures opened their eyes wide as the ocean of potential food opened up and left them tasting dirt upon their landing. The poison that followed as the second course was even less appetizing. They howled and began to snap their jaws at any and everything around them. With no exit, they had no choice other than to fight.
At least, that was how they saw it. From Click’s position atop Bored, the spider could see the easiest escape for the predators would be back the way they came, though that was quickly being rectified with the shifting swarm. But even the [Juvenile Dungeon Hounds] Click went up against earlier in their life were smarter than this, what was going on?
[Observation]
Juvenile Dungeon Hound (Level 1)
Name: N/A
Soul Link: Rockfort Hamlet Dungeon Core Ṁ̶̡̄̒͜o̷͚͍̊͒̃̓̿ǰ̵̧̢̭̫̪a̷͇̋̿̿̽͘ ̵̨̛̥͎͉́̋̈͘D̵̝̭͇̓̎̅ȋ̷̯͔̤̑͋̑t̴̛͉͈̟̽̑͑h̸̪̲̩̗̀̉̃͝͠ä̵͕̼̠́̊̓̕b̴̗͕̏͊̂̓̚ä̷̡̰̱͕̒̌̋
Classes: N/A
Type
Prerequisite
Species
Baby Dungeon Hound
Statistic
Amount
Health Points
35/40
Body
20/25
Intellect
5/10
Soul
13/18
Skill Name
Level
Description
Iron Fangs
1
Teeth are reinforced to be harder and sharper.
Pack Tactics
1
Instinctively understand the desires of the rest of the pack.
Prey Detection
1
Instinctually sense the location of prey, and its movements.
So it was level one? Click thought to themselves. Likely a newborn itself.
They quickly looked over the other two hounds, and saw that their stat sheets were the exact same, down to the level, attributes, and… wait, what was that strange formatting for the attributes? There was a slash that separated two of them. The larger one on the right was what it was supposed to be, while the one on the right was what it was currently.
The concept instinctively made sense, at least with Health Points, but everything else? What caused them to go down too?
[Observation]. This time, instead of targeting one of the enemies, Click turned their Skill towards an ally, the only ones who had a chance to strike so far.
Dungeon Shadow Spider (Level 13)
Name: N/A
Soul Link: Rockfort Hamlet Dungeon Core Ṁ̶̡̄̒͜o̷͚͍̊͒̃̓̿ǰ̵̧̢̭̫̪a̷͇̋̿̿̽͘ ̵̨̛̥͎͉́̋̈͘D̵̝̭͇̓̎̅ȋ̷̯͔̤̑͋̑t̴̛͉͈̟̽̑͑h̸̪̲̩̗̀̉̃͝͠ä̵͕̼̠́̊̓̕b̴̗͕̏͊̂̓̚ä̷̡̰̱͕̒̌̋
Classes: N/A
…
Skill Name
Level
Description
Venom Gland
33
Secrete a toxic substance from your mandibles that can harm lesser creatures, and weaken stronger ones. Substance spreads through victims more quickly, and will lower the victim’s attributes while active.
Silk Spinning
23
Secrete a sticky string that can ensnare weaker creatures. Effects of external forces such as gravity are weakened while moving on the substance. Know the position and identity of any entity touching the web.
Web Launch
18
Hold and throw your webbing. Weave webbing for this Skill more quickly.
Prey Detection
9
Instinctually sense the location of prey, and its movements.
Sneak
12
Shadows and obstacles provide better concealment from others. Sound created by movement is heavily muffled.
Shadow Travel
15
Move more quickly while concealed in darkness or shadow. Almost any amount of darkness or shadow contact allows this Skill to activate.
Click was astonished by the higher levels on all of the Skills, and even more so by all of the perks they had tacked onto them. As much as the lead spider wanted to read through them all right now for every single spider, they just focused on what caused the attribute drop. And that was [Venom Gland].
It seemed that dropping attributes also affected the creatures beyond their effect on the System and skills. Lowered Intellect really made the predators dumber too!
Click so badly wanted to thoroughly read through the rest of the Skill perks and get a better idea of how to use them, for every single veteran spider in fact, but there was still a battle to be won. The [Spider Army Commander] filed the idea away for later and continued to order the others around.
This battle was theirs.