May Volarosi was tired of the woods. She was sick of the plains. She was done with the hills. She wanted a hot shower more than anything she had ever wanted, and what did she have?
A stupid knife that makes uncontrollable spiders.
A plant trying to kill her, sending mind-controlled slaves to hunt her down. Mostly humans and small mammals, but lately? Birds. Not just any birds, but huge, angry, preternaturally smart birds with talons the size of steak knives.
A group of deep woods meth producers, now a group of monstrously fast quasi-cannibalistic demihumans. They looked a lot like humans, but their arms, legs, toes, and fingers were longer, and they had a jaw capable of unhinging, filled with two and a half centimeter teeth. May shuddered as she looked over the rift and considered her options. Tweaker Mages.
Oh, and the giant jumping spiders that seemed to be everywhere.
She had gotten the knife from one of the spiders, as well as some coins. She had barely looked at them before stashing them into her backpack. It had been beginning to get a little bit full, but she had realized that she no longer needed to carry her coil of rope and had discarded it, leaving it hanging on a tree branch near the edge of the rift.
Alright, I guess I need to decide. Keep going on the rift and risk a confrontation with the Tweaker Mages, or try going down, over, and up the rift, braving the birds, some of which are Poached?
May had seen more and more of the signs as she went along the rift. They reminded her of the wooden stick symbols in The Blair Witch Project. She had thought they were cheesy when she had seen it; they looked like stick-art made by a particularly poor child.
They were much more unnerving in person.
The birds, though, were gigantic, and she could easily see one of them cutting off a limb with their unfairly sharp thin talons in a struggle. The Poached birds - Pirds? Good evening, I’m Pird Hapley, and I’m going to claw you. Yep, pirds it is. - were very clever, and she suspected they might drop rocks on her or try to interfere with her webs.
Good luck with that last one, Pirds.
She realized that she had already decided and was just stalling at this point. She scanned the treeline behind her, and feeling confident nothing was about to rush at her, walked to the edge of the rift.
May activated World Wide Web. She would likely (hopefully!) be moving too quickly for it to have the full effect, but it was invaluable for finding the perfect placement for the webs she used to travel with her Web Skate ability.
May took a deep breath, closed her eyes, and leapt off the edge.
She felt the webs connecting tentatively to the feathers of the Pird before she heard it. It wouldn’t slow the thing down at all, but she knew it was there. It had been waiting to swoop at her until she was completely clear of the treeline, and had used the ability they could manifest occasionally, abruptly increasing massively in speed.
No secrets on the World Wide Web, pollensucker!
This was what she had been planning on. She attached a web to the left foot of the massive winged predator as it reached out to snag her, using her other hand to point to the spot on the wall where she wanted it to connect. She flexed her will and the web connected, instantly snapping the bird downward, its momentum ruined. The bird tumbled downward, slamming into the side of the rift. It dangled weakly, fluttering broken wings.
May was still falling. She extended a finger and connected a web to the wall. She braced herself; this was the part that would hurt.
She hit the wall, rolling slightly, her teeth and skull rattling. Her web manipulation skills were the only thing that allowed her to keep her grip, but even so, she felt faint.
It worked! Now head down before another one comes along.
May began spooling out web, coiling it around the arm from which she was creating it, holding onto the web attached to the wall with her other hand. In a few minutes she had a decent amount of web created, and her MANA was tapped. She attached one end of her coil to the wall of the rift and dropped the rest of the coil down.
“Here goes nothing…”, she muttered.
She leapt outward onto the line, curled her legs in, and activated her Web Skate ability.
May rocketed down the line, her body position maintained exactly by the spell. She saw a nest of startled Pird-babies squawk at her as she shot past, but didn’t have time to react. Crap, that probably means the parents are around here somewhere…
She was not disappointed. The male of the nest, notable by the large red and blue crested feathers on the head of the otherwise gray-white bird, apparently did not like how close she had come to his nest. He was diving after her, his claws extended in front of him.
May smiled at the bird. It was almost like he was racing her down the wall. Too bad, though. May broke one hand from the effect of Web Skate and touched the wall, attaching a web. She focused on the bird and attached the other end of the webline to its chest. The line yanked taut and the bird was slammed into the wall with the full force of the dive it had been preparing to inflict on May.
Two down! Were there any more Pirds? Or were the rest just birds?
May sensed the edge of her web line approaching and ended the skill. The skill stopped the transfer of her momentum, preventing her arm from being ripped off, but it still stung. She clung to the wall and grabbed the end of the line. She focused on it, testing the cord against her will. At the top, the web popped off of the wall and fell down the rift. May watched it fall past her as she attached what had been the bottom of the line to the wall and prepared to start her dive over.
May waited a moment for World Wide Web to extend itself into her environment. The speed of her dive had rapidly surpassed the area the skill had covered, much faster than she would have expected. Maybe I should use the spell. I really, really don’t like the “.01% of mutation per casting” thing, though. Aggggh. It would help so much! I wouldn’t have to wait here like a fly on a wall.
ting
May froze. She had definitely heard that, and it didn’t sound like one of the massive birds. She had felt the vibration in her fingertips. It sounded almost like a giant striking a champagne glass with a spoon.
She had seen a lot of unusual animals in the time she had spent traveling, many of them showing magical traits. She had not heard this noise before. She wasn’t sure what it could be, and World Wide Web wasn’t telling her anything was nearby. She wouldn’t be happy about it, but she could wait for the skill to spread. She waited, patient only on the outside, her thoughts a tense, grinding loop.
The area slowly grew long, silver-gray spiderwebs, covering the wall.
A few minutes later, she felt what she thought was the source of vibrations. It was below her, roughly two hundred meters down on the wall. It confirmed her suspicions almost immediately, lashing back like a baseball pitcher readying a throw, then whipped down and struck the wall in front of it, which seemed smoother than the stone around it. It seemed like a long arm, reaching out of the wall, although it seemed almost tentacle-like. Her webs didn’t cling to it as well as she was used to, but she could feel the shape through the webs it ripped through. May frowned. Was it slippery, covered in acid, or maybe fire? She had seen a flaming rabbit chewing on a root two days prior, so she was not prepared to rule anything out.
May gave the web a yank to test it, more from habit than any true necessity. She prepared to activate her skill, but froze as she felt the probably-acidic-arm-thing below grab the quivering rope and sever it, the bottom part of the web falling slowly into the mist below. There was no yank on the web, it simply grabbed it and the web was cut.
Shit. Okay, almost definitely acidic. The arm released the web and it resumed dangling in the wind that blew in gusts through the rift. It struck the wall, breaking through webs without seeming to notice.
ting
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It reared the arm back and struck the wall again.
ting
May pressed herself back against the wall, ducking her body partially into a groove in the stone. Whatever it was doing, it couldn’t be good for her. She could use the time to fully regain her MANA and PHYSTAM.
Is it digging for prey like a woodpecker?
ting
May heard the screeches of the birds coming from above her. She glanced up and immediately activated one of her most powerful skills, Spider’s Web, Horse’s Hoofprint, and felt herself blend into the background of the wall. Her MANA dropped precipitously low; she hadn’t had time to regenerate it fully.
Worth it. It would last until she made a dramatic movement, so she was set for a while. She began webbing herself a makeshift vertical hammock, moving her hands at a glacial pace. Can’t afford to use that again, so. Take. It. Slow. Slow is smooth, smooth is fast.
ting
The birds, of course, ignored her entirely, flapping downwards towards the source of the sound. They passed by close enough that she could have hit them with a stone, buffeting her with the wake of their passing. The force of the small flocks wings was actually enough to disperse the mist that pervaded the rift, at least in her small area. She could see!
A smell intense of enough to make her eyes water made it difficult for a moment before May pulled her scarf (made from webs, of course) over her face. The mist must have been blocking it, she thought as she wiped her eyes to see more clearly.
ting
She wished she had not, and regretted every choice she had every made up to this point in her life. She finished making her hammock, trying not to think too hard about what was below her, and then checked her MANA. It hadn’t recovered fully, but… She added two of the several dozen system points she had banked into REGEN. Her MANA began recovering at a rate she found much more acceptable, considering her circumstances. She prepared to activate the skill she had been dreading the moment she had enough MANA. When the time comes, I need to be completely ready. I will have to move.
ting
The arm, or rather, tendril, was coming out of what looked like a snail-shell formed at least partially from the stone that made up the walls of the rift. The shell was about the size of the mini-fridge May had in college, although her mini-fridge had not had small stone spikes covering it.. The majority of the arm was covered in a thick, gel-like ooze, but the end of the tendril-arm appeared to have a crystalline tip, like a jagged harpoon. The crystalline barb had tiny little holes riddling it, like a semi-conical cooking strainer. Each hole had dozens of hairs coming out of it, which it retracted when it struck the hardened crystalline growth on the end of the snail foot. May was fascinated, but not terribly concerned with the creature.
That, at least, is kind of cute.
The birds were flapping in circles, slowly edging closer to the snail. They snapped at each other, vying for dominance over their shrinking airspace. The smaller birds clung to the wall and watched, shrieking at the competitors. Huh. When you see them up close, the spikes on the bird are kind of shaped like the ones on the snails. Just System shenanigans? There's no way it could account for localized evolution of advantageous characteristics to compensate for the supernatural lifeforms it added to the ecosystem!
ting
May gawked at the sheer number of birds that were appearing. ...67, 68, 69, 70, 72. I’m not sure how it helps me, but thanks, “Know Your Foes” skill.
After using her skill, May was distinctly amused to note that the birds registered to her skill as “Hapley Birds.” She was more relieved that she did not detect any Hapley Pirds, the ones tainted with the pollen from the Poacher Plant.
Her brief amusement was cut down young as the thought that watching television shows to relax might already be a thing of the past crossed her mind. I wish my phone hadn’t died, she thought for the hundreth time.
It looked like they were just going to keep flapping in, but seventy-two seems like all of them, including non-competitors. They will almost certainly attack me or something else if given an opportunity, though, and I have to include that in my pathing for an escape route.
ting
The birds, however, were not the most frightening aspect of what she had seen, the thing that made her spend some of her system points. The hundreds of snails like the one below her that were crawling up towards the sound like children to a dinner-bell, an army of spiky-shelled wall-warts…
ting
They weren’t what spooked her, either. She was confident she could outrun them, or at the very least use Web Skate to ignore most of them. Nor was what frightened her that the ground was closer than she had believed, although that certainly played a part. She wouldn’t have hit the ground accidentally thanks to the advantages in spatial awareness she gained from her skills, but it would put her closer.
No, what frightened May Volarosi so badly that she was willing to risk growing extra eyes…
...was a pile of bones and carcasses. Some were older than others, and the one on top was relatively fresh. This, by itself, was not startling or even noteworthy, aside from the fact that she was in the territory of a predator and should behave accordingly. She had been in the bush for a while now and had encountered several similar piles, often at the base of a tree or in a small cave. Some had been larger than others, and she had gone a long way around a small copse of particularly tall trees when she found a pile where the deer bones were partially melted. She was no stranger to the brutality of nature.
She had never seen a pile of brutally devoured whales before, though. It was littered with the much smaller skeletons of what had obviously been birds, from the similar spike structure on their backs, much more prominent with the disguising fluff of feathers stripped away. Most were sun-bleached dry, which was puzzling to May. The System hadn’t been around long enough for that. She briefly wondered if the System had added fossils to the ground, as well, staring at the mammoth bones.
ting
Her head was pounding like something wanted to get out. She had been using skills and abilities nonstop for a while, and the stress, fear, and nonstop adrenaline was eating into her MENSTAM. That thing just kept hammering, making the awful crystalline ring pierce through her. Just watch. Nothing will see you until you move. You will be fine.
May noticed that the canyon narrowed quite a bit at the bottom. It should be possible to make it across without having to be on flat, uncovered ground for as long as she had thought. The idea of being the only moving thing running on the ground below a flock of terrifyingly massive birds filled her with dread. I wonder how long it has been since humans truly had to fear birds.
She once again pulled up her menu and checked to see if SPEED had gained a “+” beside it. It had not, much as she expected. She dismissed it with a glare. At least her MENSTAM recovered quickly. She prepared herself to move; whatever made the pile didn’t seem to be in the area. Besides, if it regularly goes after whales, it’s not going to care about your ninety-nine pound twig-self. She grimaced.
She willed her MANA into the words as she whispered “Eight-Eyed Aspect: Sight” into the gusty air. She felt the spell take hold of her skull and begin to sink in, the magic energy coalescing into six spots: one on each temple, one ten or so centimeters behind her temples on each side, and one six or so centimeters above each eye, at the top of her forehead at the hairline.
She wouldn’t know if any of them were permanent until the spell ended.
ting
May willed the web to fall away, and it blew away immediately like a newspaper snatched from a sleeping old man by a surprise gust. She attached a short web from each hand for grip as she maneuvered herself to be crouched on the wall.
May did not shout as she leapt, but the mental scream drowned out all other thought. The birds saw her almost instantly as she leapt and were on her moments after. She snapped a web to one as it dove at her, catching it on the beak. She triggered Web Skate and shot towards it, breaking her arm out of the lock placed by the ability to snap another web out towards a bird trying to regain altitude after being unable to find an opening for a dive.
She tagged the unfortunate Hapley Bird on the behind and immediately used Web Skate, snapping towards it, dodging the claws of another bird midway through the line. The bird she was attached to flapped furiously, attempting to remain in the air.
ting
The web suddenly snapped loose, the tailfeather coming out entirely with a small spurt of blood. She could see it glitter all the way to the ground.
May used Web Manipulation to straighten the length of now-adrift web line outwards like a pole, still attached to the feather. She focused everything she had into Web Skate, launching herself at the end of the web. She was grateful that her past self had maxed out her SPEED attribute.
Time to try something desperate, unless I want to fall on the spikey stone snails!
May reached the end of the web and did not end her skill. It ended automatically the instant she was no longer in contact with the web, but without the contact with the web, her momentum was not suspended at the end of the line.
Web Cannon, go!
May was launched off the end of the web like a fleshy railgun. She launched a web out in front of her, desperately, hoping she had the MENSTAM to continue using her biggest abilities in such rapid succession.
ting
She stopped less than a hand’s length away from the wall, her web only having extended that far in the time it took her to cross the canyon with her launch. Web Skate had completely negated her momentum, sparing her the fate of the bug on the windshield.
Her fear completely forgotten, May screamed aloud.
“YAAAAAGH!”
Maybe not her most proud moment, but her new title was worthy of her wild surrender to exuberance.
May broke a small rock off the wall. Attaching a web and letting it out slowly, she let herself further out until she was standing sideways on the wall, holding herself in place with the web and Web Skate. The birds were almost to her; she didn’t have any time to spare in which to just ...be happy.
No rest for the weary!
Reaching back, she flung the rock upwards as hard as she could. She could see it easily, the fine grain of the stone apparent with Eight-Eyed Aspect: Sight active. When it seemed to have reached the zenith of its arc, May snapped a web out to it, activating Web Skate before the web had attached, straightening the line with Web Manipulation as she went. A diving bird took off the tip of her left heel and shredded the line behind her, but she continued forward.
The web connected to the stone and the task of straightening it out became much easier. She devoted her focus entirely to Web Skate and launched off of the web, hurtling herself into the sky.
ting
ting
ting
ting ting ting ting
tingtingtingtingting
Below her, the snail was entering a frenzy, striking itself wildly. The other snails had climbed entirely onto the wall, and most had retreated into their shells.
Even as she flew through the gap at the top of the rift, her momentum slowing, she still heard it. It was still audible as she webbed herself over to the edge of the rift, gasping and laughing at simultaneous mortal terror and the awful realization that she was still very much alive and a painful death was still on the table, along with the magnificent personal glory at having survived such an experience.
She glanced down at the birds flapping confusedly around the canyon, unable to process what had happened to their quarry. The snail was… not beating the foot anymore. It had retreated into its shell, and it looked like some of the observer Hapley Birds were starting to lose interest.
Weird.
May was about to turn away when she saw the mist begin sinking towards the bottom of the canyon. She stared, fascinated. It reached the bottom and began flowing towards the pile of carrion.
She watched, her body telling her to run and her curiosity beating down the urge. The mist began to flow upwards and around the pile, looking like a misshapen soap bubble full of smoke that had just popped. It continued getting thicker, tightening, like something was drawing it towards the middle.
Details began emerging as the mist continued to tighten.
Very long neck…
Spikes, of course...
May identified reptilian legs and a very long tail before she realized that she was running away as fast as she could, towards the Laboratory.
Webmaster You have performed feats of agility and web-use beyond those of ordinary ken, demonstrating true mastery of the web. While touching a web, you gain +5 AGI and +1 SPEED.