The building-sized spider starts leaving but not before the nest of baby spiders on its back scuttles off their mother’s abdomen. The cacophony of noise is grating on the ears, thankfully real music comes before we are completely swarmed. “Burn at the Stake wan!” A large stake raises up in front of us, the circle of its end meeting at our fronts, a whoosh of flames rotates around the screaming of the woman at the stake as the spiders respond in kind.
“That's at least one side covered! How long will it last moo?!” A group of spiders including some of the bigger ones cautiously start moving around to my side.
“It’s got 20 seconds on the clock! I’ve got this side wan!” I look over and see her position her body and aim, “Bone shot wan!” A finger-sized bone needle shoots out from the crystal on the top of her scepter and pierces through the first spider that goes around her fire circle. I think she’s going to be fine… maybe better than me! As I turn around and a baby spider has started getting ready to pounce.
I get into a stance and lower my body weight to steady myself, It leaps and I throw out a straight punch into it’s oncoming fuzzy face instantly pulverizing it, its legs shooting off to hit the spiders behind it, they shriek in anger and also start getting ready to attack.
{ Accumulated skill has allowed learning of new Ability }
< Ability Acquired - Battle Stance - (Uncommon) - Active Ability - >
Battle Stance (Uncommon) Active Ability
1 second to get into stance
Cannot move while using ability.
+5 damage to overall attack.
10 second cooldown once you leave the stance
‘This area is my zone, are you ready to… go into the zone?!’
< Dealt 31 damage to Tiny Baby Arachne Spider after reductions (14 BD x 1.5 < Counter > x 1.2 < Slugfest > + 5
< Tiny Baby Arachne spider killed >
< 50 shared exp gained >
< 1875/8000 exp until next level >
Zelia had already incinerated so many of the babies that I had gotten a free exp spree~ it’s a shame they don't give much compared to how much exp there is but I have a feeling there is more where that came from! Every few seconds I either heard her casting a lower level version of burn at the stake so that she could cast it faster or a bone shot attack, both of course followed by a cute WAN~ She had it easy with all her area attacks.
Every spider that jumped at me received a quick punch and splatter, exploding them onto their siblings. Thanks to my new Ability Battle Stance I was able to do more than their health in each hit regardless of if I was doing critical attacks or not, that on top of my 20 points in Strength, when I did though you could tell, my fist would create a hole through them. Each time they attacked me I would get my counter bonus and do extra damage meaning they had no chances to survive. After what felt like minutes but was exactly 20 seconds the large Burn at the Stake ran out, I paused and looked over the area.
“Hey Zelia! We are going to need a big one again Moo!” The large amounts of spiders had started to encircle us, all of the ones that were patiently waiting behind their kin now had a direct route to us, we were soon going to be surrounded on all sides!
“Where do I put it though wan?!” Fuck fuck fuck, we could put it against the front and try to get to the wall? but they are starting to crawl all over it! Oh fuck this is gonna hurt!
“On top of us! Start casting, I’ll guard moo!” Zelia instantly starts getting to casting her highest level Burn at the stake as we get surrounded, I try my best to rotate around her roaring (mooing) to try and get all their attention, Stomping and feeling the hard chitinous shells break under my hooves. The larger of the spiders were gathering closer and stepping over their fallen kin.
“READY WAN!” I hold onto Zelia as an ephemeral Stake comes up from the ground, with us as the center, casting finished I hoist her under my armpit with a yelp and tell her to hold on tight!
One of the bigger spiders is out at the exit tunnel, guarding it diligently, where the big one went through I target it and get ready. As the fire starts spreading around us and the screaming pierces my brain, I get into position < Running of the bull > We’re off!! I pelt through the fire, with it licking at my hooves, the crunch of burnt spiders beneath them as I feel my skin tingle. It hurts, I can feel the burning but thankfully just for the first second.
We emerge from the ring of fire, the brazen bull of Siscily they call me! Or they would if people like… thought I was famous or something! IDK!? I slam into my spider target with my horns, both slamming into its head, piercing straight through its mouth and going all the way into its abdomen. Still holding onto Zelia I drop her to the ground at my feet as I attempt to dislodge myself from deep in the spider guts, one of its fangs is close to my eye so I’m trying to be careful. I hear Zel scramble and try to pull me back, I fall over with a ringing of my bell as I fall onto my butt, just missing my cute Lupine in the process.
Turning around I see that what's left of the spiders have realized we escaped. Most of the large spiders have either burned up or escaped with barely any of their body attached, the smaller spiders all burned up in its flames. “Through the tunnel! We go after the big one, easier to kill them when we’re not out in the open moo!” Zelia really has been the star of the show this time, wouldn’t have made it without her. I check my health and see that just from the fire alone I've taken 20 points of damage, fuck! my girlfriend can really do some damage!... My girlfriend?... Fuck d-did we ever talk about what we were calling ourselves?! FUCK THIS IS NOT THE TIME FOR SUCH THOUGHTS! We leap down the tunnel, Zel quickly refreshing the light on my horn in case we get caught in a fight and it runs out.
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More bags of webs lay along the way, all I can do is cut into them as quickly as possible, I ‘Pull out’ A second bone knife and hand the first one to Zel. She looks at it and then looks back up at me, rolling her eyes. I can only look away bashfully, yeah can't fool her. We work our way through them, some are just bones, more goo, some even have more ‘alive’ corpses, animals and other things like goblins, we haven't seen any more intelligent creatures yet but I'm sure we will get there eventually, I can only imagine we are finding the castaways, there's usually a big room for food for the queen and what-not… or is that just ants?! I might be getting my bugs wrong.
After another 10 minutes we hear more scuttling. Nothing has seemed to follow us through so far, hopefully they got too scared by how many of them we killed, learnt their lesson. One we may have to teach again and again until we clear the place. I mean we will have to go all the way back through again so not an issue if we leave ourselves something to do.
Another cavern has opened up in front of us, rinse and repeat! Except… there's nothing in here, at least no spiders or web sacs, It looks like its just the discards of the spiders, corroded weapons, Items, and deflated and ruined egg-sacks lay in here with 2 tunnels viering off to each side, the walls of both of which have been corroded through and made larger for such ones as the house sized spider, comfy.
The scuttling noises seem to come from the right side tunnel, it echoes all the way to us. The tunnel slopes downwards deeper into the expanse of the cave system. We look at each other and both point to the one that does not slope down first, surely that's the way to the boss! Gotta clear out the rest of it first, that's just classic game rules.
We head to the left entrance and hear the thumping of large mandibles smacking the ground, slow and steady. JACKPOT that's the keeks grabber! Or at least I hope it is, god we could use the backup for the boss! The tunnel bends a few times before another cavern comes into view, once again it's about 20 meters each way, the house sized spider has stopped and is depositing the web sack it was holding on the ground with at least 30 others, some of them squirming and others just sitting listfully, I hope they have a system cause its going to suck to get through all these! Keeks whhyyyy.
Zelia pokes me on the shoulder and motions that only the house spider is in here, we already burnt up all the babies it dropped before, and none of those freaky reflective eyes are on its butt anymore! Free kill! R-right?!
Zelia motions for me to stop and with a glint in her eyes she starts casting, moving her scepter around she pushes it towards me. OH A BUFF! MY FIRST BUFF!! “Endless courage wan!” As soon as the words leave her mouth I charge the spider, it's crouched low to the ground so I'm about to stab straight into its abdomen, my horns aren’t enhanced but they should still do some damage!!
The rushing wind fills my ears as they flap back, each stomp against the ground makes it quake. In a second I'm already upon it, my unsuspecting victim, A tearing sound fills my brain as I not only pierce but enter the soft squishy abdomen of the spider, creating a void in its backside as I’m thrown through it mercilessly with the force of a raging bull with no care for its own sanity or safety!... I'M INSIDE IT HOW DO I GET OUT! I can feel its juices all around me cocooning me in, I shouldn't be surprised that I'm caught in such a situation again, I’m only thankful that I can't see anything but darkness, my horns thoroughly wedged further in so no light is shining out. I really don't want to know what the inside of a spider looks like.
The panicked, fearful screaming of pain vibrates through its whole body, making me feel like I'm on a rollercoaster as it flips over and I'm sent tumbling with it. The smells of its guts and inertia really doing numbers on me! oh god I'm going to be sick, barfing in the darkness It splashes over myself and I retch again. “LET ME OUT I WANT OFF THIS RIDE MOOO!” Suddenly I feel the entire area around me heat up, turning into a blazing inferno, the cooked insides of the spider smelling much better than what I do right now, my hero! I think as the flames damage me again and again, oh! I can’t stay here.
I close my eyes and try my best to tunnel my way out. I'm not sure how far I went but surely it wasn't that far, going back the way I came I can feel fresh air , hoo lannddd! I plop out and tumble to the ground feeling more gross than anything I’ve experienced in this game so far.
“Lilia! Lilia, are you okay?! Say something wan!” I attempt to open my mouth to speak but only more vomit comes out as I throw it up to the side. Instead I give her a thumbs up and weakly ask her to drown me. I can hear fiddling and then movements, “Create water wan!” you beautiful fucking lifesaver! I feel cold water drenching over me, washing all the filth away until it’s off my body. I still feel icky but I think it’s safe to look. Zelia is looking over at me with worry, next to us the giant spider is roasted, with a massive hole in it. It was house sized, now at least it has a door.
With the vomit taste in my mouth, I resist the urge to try and kiss Zel, “Can you put some water in a bowl or something, I really need to wash out my mouth moo…” She complies and a few minutes later I’m feeling at least somewhat alive. Checking my log I see my handy work.
< Dealt 130 Critical piercing damage to ‘Arachne Hoard Mother’ after reductions (2 horn attacks x 10 BD x 2.5 CD x 1.5 Weak x 1.2 < Slugfest > x 1.2 Charging (item) x 1.3 < Running of the bulls > )
< Arachne Hoard Mother killed >
< 1400 shared exp gained >
< 6975/8000 exp until next level >
That explains the big ass hole, LilMoo shaped damage. I probably nearly one-shot it since I hit its weak point. That and it getting toasty with me squirming inside… oof no more thoughts like that please brain, gonna throw up again… weh!
Looking over at all the web sacks, I sigh, if that didn’t get screams out of Keeks to be let out, I don't know what would, but we still have to look, maybe she’s incapacitated or something.
“We could just… light them up and see if she comes out wan?...” Looking at all the different wiggling ones and having to check through them all I’m nearly tempted. Shaking my head I know it's better to check one by one, what if we kill innocent little animals that got captured!
“Nah, we should do it properly. What if we accidentally kill something in there? Could find baby wolves moo!” She instantly starts wagging her tail with excitement.
“Wan pet wan pet wannn!” There we go, there's the excitement back!