Ralph sat up, groggily. “I don’t feel so good.” He said, rubbing at his temples. Lana checked his status, before pulling out a vial containing a murky brown liquid from her satchel.
[2 x Poisoned: Dreadspinner venom - -20% to all stats for 4 hours. Causes minor paralysis and disorientation. Can stack effects.]
She handed the vial to Ralph. “It’s a generic antidote. It’ll help.” Ralph failed to grasp at the vial a couple of times before Lana told him to be still. She took the back of Ralphs head in one hand, and fed the antidote to him with the other. A few moments later, and his colour started to return. Ralph mumbled a quiet thanks as he got unsteadily to his feet.
“I should get poisoned more often.” Ralph said weakly, with a smile at Lana.
She winked at him, before turning to the group. “Hey, I levelled up!” She said, with a beaming grin. “But damn, giant spiders are super creepy.”
The group all voiced an enthusiastic assent to this statement.
“Why does it have to be spiders?” Said Chris, with a barely suppressed shudder. “I’d rather take on a forest of exploding trees than more spiders.”
Dillan looked at Chris, asking him frankly, “Are you going to be alright against more of these? You don’t have to, this is a game, after all.”
Chris shook his head, “No, no, I’ll be fine. They’re not real. They’re definitely not real.” He poked at the nearby spider corpse with his boot, and then shuddered again.
Ralph punched his arm lightly, “Hey man, you never told me you’re afraid of spiders. Dillan’s right though, I ain’t judging if you wanna walk away. These suckers are massive with a capital M.”
Chris forced himself to composure, steeling himself. “I’ll be fine. It’s not a phobia or anything. Just a strong dislike. And spiders this big? I’m having a hard time computing it.”
Dillan answered, “OK Chris, but feel free to take a step back at any time. In fact, Elaine, if you’re up for it we’ll swap you upfront information, and Chris can use his spear from behind the line.”
“Sounds good.” Came Elaine’s voice in reply. “Thanks, that’d probably be for the best.” Said Chris, dejection laced with relief in his tone.
Morgan noted he’d levelled up too, and turned to Lana, “Congrats on the level, I got one too. Level 10, finally out of single digits.”
With a smile, Lana replied, “I just made teenager. Unlucky level 13.”
Lauren cut in with an amused snort, “You’ve always been a teenager at heart. You’ll catch up with me soon at this rate.”
The discussion turned to loot, with Chris suggesting that Dillan keep the most prized treasure as they went, with the reasoning that he was the most likely to make it out if they encountered real trouble. This proposal was met by a hearty agreement, and Dillan started out by looting the nearby spider corpse.
He was left holding a spider fang attached to a glistening red organic mass almost the size of a fist. With a grimace, he identified it before popping it into his satchel. “It’s a venom gland. Should sell pretty well, I guess.” With this, he looted the second corpse with the same result as the first, and the party started to move slowly further into the deepening valley.
After a few minutes more walking and the group had to slow to a crawl, as the amount of spider web that criss-crossed between the rocks and trees became thicker.
Morgan whispered to the group. “Guys, wait. If we continue and come across an enemy; we’re going to trigger these webs anyway in the chaos. Perhaps we should pull back to a defensible location and stamp on the web. Take on the reinforcements before the fight, rather than during.”
The party mulled over this for a long moment, before Ralph’s loud whisper disturbed the eerie quiet. “But dude, what if they all come? Like, all of them?”
“Then we all die horribly.” Said Elaine, Morgan noticing Chris shudder from the corner of his eye.
Dillan spoke next, “I think it’s a good idea. I don’t think we’ll be able to avoid the webs forever and be able to actually proceed, let alone if we got into a fight in the middle of it. We’ll get smothered by the stuff. I saw a small grotto a few minutes back to our right that looks like a good place to fight. We’ll have our backs and heads covered.”
Lana and Lauren shrugged simultaneously, then both looked at each other and supressed a giggle. Lauren indicated for Lana to proceed.
“We’re up for it, it makes sense. We’re not going to be able to gymnast our way around those webs forever, let alone Ralph.” The elf said, lightly,
Ralph, with a look of mock offence on his face, retorted, “I don’t need to do acrobatics when I can just walk under the webs.”
With a shared stifled laugh, the group turned and headed towards the grotto Dillan had indicated.
A few minutes of careful stepping later, the party arrived at the grotto, a large divot in the side of a steeply sloping hill. The recess was perhaps five or six meters across, and equally deep, with one side of the entrance partially blocked by a large boulder.
Dillan looked critically at the grotto in its small clearing. “OK, we’re going to have to make this defensible. We know now that spiders can leap and shoot webs. The cave will protect us from being surrounded, but puts us at a disadvantage if they just web us in. Any thoughts?”
The group looked around, trying to work out how to counter giant web shooting spiders. Harl spoke up first. “Well, we should clear the nearby trees. The webs don’t come too far up the hill, so we should be able to take most of them down without triggering anything. That should stop them shooting down at us from up high.”
Elaine was next, “We can use the logs to build a barrier in front of us, between that and the hill they shouldn’t be able to get a clean shot off.”
Everyone in the party was nodding in agreement. Chris chipped in, “Spikes. We can use the branches to make spikes to drive into the earth to funnel them to us, and also protect the roof of the cave.”
“Great ideas.” Dillan states. “Let's get started.”
Ralph and Harl strode over to the nearest trees and started swinging, as the rest of the group watched. As soon as the first tree fell, they were on it like a swarm of locusts, stripping the branches and sharpening them. It took a couple of hours to clear the handful of trees nearby, but by the time they were done a waist high palisade stood at the entrance to the cave, and the ground around and above were littered with dug in spikes that ranged from half a meter to over a meter and a half in length.
“Great work everyone. Let’s get set up.” Dillan announced. The party moved into the small cave, and arrayed themselves in the entrance, with Ralph, Morgan and Elaine up front, and the rest behind. Harl experimentally waved his axe around. “Guys, I’m going to have to move to the front, I don’t have any space to swing in here.”
Dillan nodded his assent as Harl moved up to stand beside the other frontliners. The four shuffled around, trying to make the most of the space.
Once everyone was settled, Dillan asked the group, “OK all, are we ready?”
A chorus of assent, mixed with a low groan from Chris, echoed out from the grotto.
Dillan walked forward past the palisade and down the hill to a strand of nearby web. He looked around carefully, withdrawing his daggers, and with a swift downward slice severed the strand, then immediately dashing towards the grotto.
The runner squeezed in between Morgan and Ralph, making his way into the cave to his position.
The party waited, tense.
A few silent seconds passed. Morgan looked over to Ralph, who was peering with squinted eyes into the forest beyond. Ralph caught his gaze and grinned. Morgan let out the breath he hadn’t realised he’d been holding.
Another long moment passed.
Morgan was about to open his mouth to speak when he caught a sound carried on the light breeze. A gentle chittering sound, like that of cicadas on a warm evening, was coming from the forest.
The sound grew louder as more seconds slipped by, the party gripping their weapons in white knuckled hands as they all scanned the forest for the source of the noise.
This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.
“I don’t like this.” Said Chris, quietly from the back.
“It’s pretty damned creepy.” Replied Lana. “There! Movement.” She pointed down the hill past the treeline in the rough direction of the spider caves.
Dark shapes crawling in the shadows of the trees resolved into a wave of spiders as they approached. The tide of huge insects seemed endless, and sharp intakes of breath and curses came from the group as they saw what they’d be dealing with. Six massive arachnids approached with speed, each almost twice as large as the pair they’d fought earlier. Around their scuttling legs flowed a sea of smaller spiders, each with a body around the size of a football.
“Oh no. No, no no.” Whispered Chris to himself. His spear was shaking in his trembling hands. Lana started to fire arrows with an inhuman rapidity into the onrushing spiders.
Morgan took one look at the approaching horde, and pulled out the bag of cats, releasing them onto the ground. He called to them once they were upright. “We’re going to need your help. Stay low and behind the front line. Do what you can, but don’t die, OK?”
The cats all stared at him for a second, before turning and dispersing through the line of defenders.
The chittering grew deafening, almost drowning out the sound of hundreds of legs scratching on the hard dirt ground and the thrum of Lana’s bow.
As Ivycat settled in on Morgan’s head, he saw the larger spiders pause their charge and turn, around 10 meters away from the makeshift palisade. “Webs! Get down!” He cried out, just as the webs were released. They had all been expecting it, and they ducked behind the parapet as wads of sticky webbing flew overhead, with most hitting the back of the cave. Harl grunted in surprise as webbing hit the head of his axe, the shock of the blow ripping it from his hands where it fell to the ground and stuck hard.
The smaller spiders didn’t halt in their charge, racing ahead of their larger counterparts.
“Here we go guys, look out for each other!” called Dillan to the group as they approached.
“Whoever kills the least spiders buys the drinks later!” Ralph shouted, with forced cheer.
And then the spiders were upon them. The smaller spiders tried to leap over the parapet, where they were met by the defenders. Elaine cut this way and that with her sword, deftly spearing and slicing anything that came close. Harl had abandoned his webbed axe, swinging at the airborne spiders with his meaty fists. As Morgan lunged to slap a spider from the air with his sword, he saw Harl punch one so hard that it bounced off one of the larger spiders behind the lines.
Chris was rigid behind the front line, but he fought through his terror to jab at any spiders that appeared in the gap between Ralph and Morgan. A few of the smaller monsters leapt clear over the heads of the defenders, landing towards the back to the cave. Dillan, turned to face the threat, to be quickly backed up by Scrap, Luna and Tom.
The spiders came thick and fast, with only the natural choke point of the grotto preventing the group from being swarmed under by the sheer number of them. The smaller ones had only 100 or so hit points, making them easy to dispatch with a clean weapon blow, but as Morgan swiped at one, two more would appear. He was putting his stick and vine shield to good use, using it to bash spiders away. The occasional spider that got past his armaments were swiftly dispatched by Ivycat, who had left his head for the more mobile position on his shoulders.
Ralph was not faring so well. His large two-handed axe was powerful but unwieldy. He crashed it down at an angle, catching three spiders in the blow, but a handful more jumped at him while his axe was stuck in the top of the palisade. Harriet moved in to support him, shooting icy claws at the spiders that now clung to his mail shirt. Ralph dropped his axe with a curse as small fangs slid through the gaps in his mail. One spider fell off him, frozen, to fall into the waiting claws of Trip, as Ralph grabbed two more and threw them out of the cave.
Lana shrieked as a leaping spider cleared the line to land on her head, it’s legs managing to find purchase in her hair. Lauren, who had been supporting Elaine, whirled round at the noise. The elf had dropped her bow and pulled at the spider, but only managed to tear a leg off as it sank its fangs into her head. Lauren, with incredible speed, speared the spider with a sword tip, before wrenching it off Lana’s head, where it then sailed into the wall with a meaty squelch.
Morgan saw another leaping spider land squarely on top of Luna, who had been finishing off a downed foe. The spider managed to dig its sharp legs in as it landed, leaving bloody rents in Luna’s fur. Scrap and Tom leapt towards Luna to assist, but the small grey cat had already wriggled out from under the spider, taking off half its legs in the process, before turning to savage the monster with such ferocity that even Tom looked taken aback.
Morgan grimaced as he took a step back to better deflect one of the leaping arachnids, only to step directly onto a small spider corpse with a wet crunch, soaking his canvas shoe in blue gore. He tried to heal Luna with his skill, but the small grey cat kept disappearing from his line of sight as she weaved through the defenders, scratching and biting at the foe with incredible speed. The monster corpses littered the small grotto and the ground in front of the makeshift palisade.
The party held like this for a full minute, and as the number of the leaping monsters started to slow; Dillan stepped back from the carnage for a moment to appraise the situation. The swarm of smaller spiders had taken a toll on the defenders already. Everyone in the front line had been bitten at least once and sported a multitude of scratches from their sharply pointed legs. Lana was bleeding copiously from her scalp and kept having to wipe blood from her eye before she fired. Ralph was the worst affected, having taken multiple bites before he’d abandoned his axe, and he was swaying as he flailed punches and slaps at the dwindling number of attackers.
Dillan took charge of the situation. “Ralph, swap with Lauren and get yourself some antidote and salve. Harl, try and free your axe, I’ll cover for you. Chris, you’re on medical duty. Take this salve and stop Lana’s bleeding, then help anyone you can.” Ralph unsteadily took a couple of steps back, leaving room for Lauren to take his place, before fishing around in his satchel for the antidote.
Lauren and Dillan were both whirling dervishes with their twin blades, spending excess stamina to hold the last of the smaller spiders at bay while the rest of the party quickly tended to their injuries the best they could.
Lana had managed to down one of the larger web-spitting spiders with her rapid stream of arrows, but the other five turned to face the cave. Morgan, while using his skill to heal his cats, looked over and saw them bring their bodies close to the ground, preparing to leap. He shouted a warning to the others.
As the defenders quickly fumbled their vials away and grabbed their weapons, three of the huge spiders leapt forward, directly into the grottos entrance. The other two spiders disappeared from sight as the first three swarmed the palisade. Elaine and Morgan were ready, hacking at legs that reached over the palisade to scrape and scratch at anything within their reach. Lauren dodged one searching limb to suddenly be impaled through the shoulder by another. Dillan, with a burst of speed, severed the impaling leg, dragging Lauren back as Ralph moved in to retake his spot in the front line.
A resounding thud came from the palisade as one of the spiders withdrew its remaining legs and rammed the barrier, even as an arrow sunk into one of its eyes. The other two followed its lead, and the three giant spiders toppled the barricade inward, the meter high log wall spilling into the grotto. The defenders scrambled back, but Ralph, still groggy from the dwindling effects of the venom wasn’t fast enough and was toppled as a log hit his lower leg. Two of the spiders rushed into the breach, ignoring the fallen dwarf, to corner the defenders against the back of the cave. Morgan, Harl and Elaine took on one spider, as Dillan and Lana protected a wounded Lauren from the other as she tried to pull the impaling leg from her shoulder. The third spider scrambled onto Ralph, sinking its fangs deep into the dwarf’s unprotected neck.
Chris’ howl of terror morphed into something different, primal, as he saw the monster savage his struggling friend. Ivycat’s attempts to shield the dwarf couldn’t keep up with the biting fangs and piercing legs, and his health bar emptied rapidly in the party's interface.
As the rest of the party desperately fought the two spiders that rushed in, something in Chris snapped. Gone were the trembling hands and the fear, replaced with a savage anger directed at the foe that threatened his friend. He hurled his spear like a javelin, and before it had even found its mark he dived between the two forward spiders, ignoring the sharp legs that scraped his armour. He landed just past them, coming up from a roll to grab his spear that had sunk into the upper body of the spider, where it had narrowly missed its head.
He wrenched the spear free in a spray of blue ichor, dodging a flailing limb before driving the point hard into the monsters open mouth and up into its skull. The impaled spider froze for a moment, legs twitching, before slumping onto Ralph’s prone form. Chris abandoned his grip on the spear, slamming into the dead spider with his shoulder in an attempt to dislodge the corpse from his friend.
The two spiders that hadn’t made it into the cave before, now appeared in the entrance, quickly moving in to assault the unarmed spearman as he attempted to free the now unconscious Ralph.
Harl had finally managed to free his axe from where it had stuck to the ground, and he shouted out, “Morgan, get down!” Morgan dropped into a roll, narrowly avoiding a sharp limb as it carved a gouge in the cave floor where he’d been standing a moment before. As he rolled, Harl’s axe whipped over his head in a horizontal swing, hitting the spider just below the eyes, almost severing its head in two. The monster didn’t die immediately, it’s death throes keeping the three defenders from aiding their friends.
Lana had dropped her bow, fighting instead with one of Lauren’s short swords. Dillan was tiring, his stamina spent covering the others as they healed, and the pair were barely able to keep from being overwhelmed by the massive spider. Scrap darted under the spider, weaving between its legs to emerge behind the monster. The black cat leapt onto the spiders back, clawing his way up its carapace until he was slashing at the back of its head. Distracted by this attack, the spider shook itself like a wet dog, and Scrap clung on with his claws to avoid being flung off. Dillan made the most of the opportunity, driving both long daggers up into the spider's head.
Chris was in trouble, the two spiders forcing him to retreat from Ralph’s position or be savaged by their overwhelming assault. He had managed to grab Ralph’s axe and was swinging it in warding arcs as he gave ground. His face was a rictus of fury, and he let out a yell with each sweep of the weapon. Trip appeared suddenly on his shoulder, to quickly disappear again and reappear on the back of one of the assaulting spiders. Tom had also made his way up front and howled a challenge at the spider that Trip rode, forcing its attention on to the orange cat. The spider lunged its forelegs at the brave feline, who dodged and weaved with all the agility he could muster.
Chris took the reprieve to focus on the other spider, swinging Ralph’s axe with a strength that belied his lanky form. The spider retreated a step, out of range of the swinging blade, and as an almost casual afterthought, drove a leg into Ralph’s unconscious form.
[Ralph, your party member, has died.]
Chris howled with rage again, charging at the spider, trading a solid blow on its upper body for a leg through the chest. He dropped the axe, scrabbling with his hands at the leg that impaled him. The rest of the party finally caught up, surrounding and hacking at the two remaining spiders until they finally fell.
Morgan stood, panting, as calm finally fell upon the scene, broken only by Dillan snapping the spider's leg that impaled Chris, and pulling it out. Chris grunted stoically as the sharp limb came out with a small spray of blood and took the offered healing potion from Lauren.
A moment of silence fell across the party, as they all slumped down amid the corpses that littered the cave. Morgan span as he heard a crunching sound from deeper in the cave, only to see Tom dissecting a small spider corpse in an attempt to eat it, as the other cats looked on curiously. He sighed, and ignored the macabre scene, as the other cats decided to follow Tom’s lead.