It has been a few hours since the two started their ‘stakeout’ of the shack of the master of Elizabeth.

Ivan has noticed movement of the thing inside, like it has been looking for something and refuses to come out unless the thing finds it.

The original excitement of starting his first stakeout has worn off and now only sits boredom within Ivan.

Sitting in a tree for a few hours isn’t exactly the most fun thing Ivan can think of. In fact, when Ivan looks down he can see Elizabeth has fallen asleep on her perch.

Ivan sighs when he sees the small girl peacefully sleeping. She must be fairly worn out from all the excitement from this night.

Ivan on the other hand feels perfectly awake and shows no signs of feeling tired at all. Unfortunately, time might be the only factor in which this stakeout ends horribly.

Ivan looks up at the sky and sees that there is a small ray of light shining out from the mountain range. A quick sense of panic floods through Ivan’s brain as he doesn’t know how his body will react to sunlight.

Ivan hops down onto Elizabeth’s perch with the nimbleness of a cat. He gently picks up the sleeping girl and takes one last look at the house.

Just before he finds somewhere to seek shelter, the thing Ivan has been sensing as dangerous is finally making its way towards the door.

Ivan decides to take the risk of getting burnt by sunlight to see why someone who sends his instincts into a ‘do not approach’ frenzy is inside of shack of Elizabeth’s master.

It isn’t long before a monster Ivan has never seen before makes it way out of the shack.

It has the full body of a beautiful woman but the only thing is attached to her rear is the abdomen of an arachnid.

The spider woman has four eyes and looks around to see if anyone is looking at her. Ivan actively tries to hide him and Elizabeth from the spider woman’s gaze.

Ivan’s attempt to hide works flawlessly and the spider woman suspects that no one has seen her at all and walks away triumphantly. There is a dusty book in the woman’s hand as she walks.

Ivan sees the source of his anxiety and sighs out a breath of relief. Ivan then walks out of the woods and up to the shack, afterwards trying to see if he can sense anymore dangers inside.

Sensing nothing worth noting within the shack, Ivan opens the door and tries to walk in.

To Ivan’s surprise, nothing stops him from going in. Ivan is used to Earth’s rendition of Vampires and thought he can only go inside of a house if he is invited into it.

That would be kind of inconvenient if I even wanted to go shopping so I’m glad it isn’t like that here.

After walking in, Ivan closes the door behind him and looks around.

The inside of the shack is larger than Ivan though but the place is completely thrashed.

If this place once had decor, it has long been destroyed or torn apart.

Ivan doesn’t know this place at all and decides to wake Elizabeth up to tell her about what had happened.

She is probably going to be devastated seeing the place she grew up in broken and mangled.

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Ivan expects a sad expression to spread across Elizabeth’s face from within his arms but he is surprised as to what actually happens.

An excitement and happy expression takes over Elizabeth tired face as she jumps out of Ivan’s arms.

“It is just like how I left it! It seems that person didn’t do anything bad to our home!”

Ivan raises an eyebrow in interest at how the girl can switch to serious mode so quickly and also her choice of words in saying ‘our home’.

The girl runs around and inspects everything just to be extra sure nothing is missing.

“I managed to catch a glimpse of the thing before it left. It was some human mixed with a spider. She left with some old book and a happy expression.”

Elizabeth froze when hearing about what kind of thing left the house, but the worse reaction came after that.

When hearing the woman spider left with an old book and seemed very happy about it, Elizabeth’s pale face drained even more color. Her pale face turns grey and Elizabeth nearly passes out.

Ivan steps forward to try and catch Elizabeth before she falls but she manages to catch herself.

“Hey, are you okay? What is the matter?” asks Ivan with a slightly worried voice.

“She… She has my brother and my master’s book…”

“Who is she?”

“The Duchess of Blightwood, Duchess Arachnida. Duchess Arachnida is one of the Lords of the Underworld. She is a horrifying cross between a human and a spider that has evolved into a powerful creature. She was obsessed with my master and when he died, she tried to take everything that was his to try and get his power.”

“Is that why she took your brother?”

“Correct.”

It all starts to make sense now. Ivan was a little confused on why someone powerful enough to challenge himself according to Elizabeth would enslave a kid, but it seems she’s after his master and not the kid himself.

“What was that book exactly?”

“Truth be told, I don’t really know. Master said if either one of us wished to inherit his power that we needed it to respond well to us. Unfortunately it didn’t respond to me and Alexander got taken before he could even try.”

Ivan uses context clues to connect that Alexander is the big brother Elizabeth always talks about.

“So what do we do now?” asks Ivan.

“What can we do?” Elizabeth asks while tearing up. Emotions have been welling up inside of the small girl and finally she is starting to crack under the pressure.

Ivan walks up to the girl and crouches down on one knee. He rubs the girls head and tries to calm her down.

“Don’t worry, I can think of a plan soon enough. In fact, I already have one in the works.”

Elizabeth wipes her tears and looks at Ivan with eyes of a puppy.

“You do?”

“I sure do, but I need a little bit of time before we can do it. Is that okay?”

Ivan had plenty of time with his own thoughts so he has come up with some ways to be able to become stronger.

“Of course, I can’t really do anything myself so I have no choice but to wait till you’re ready.”

“That’s fair, now my biggest question is where is the easiest place you think I can earn money?”

The first problem anyone in a new world has is money problems, and Ivan has too much pride to ask Elizabeth for money.

“Hmmm… For you it would either be stealing, murdering, being a hitman, or taking quests from the Company.”

“That’s a no for everything except for the Company. I have a few things to do so if I need your help I will ask you.”

Ivan doesn’t plan on doing crime so he can achieve his goals, and he knows that the Company is like a Guild in which people take quests for money. The only difference is the Company is found is places with high amounts of evil and the Guild only works with ‘good’ or ‘righteous’ people.

“Sounds good! I am actually going to clean up this place for once since master never did.”

“Alright.”

With that, Ivan decided to test his luck with sunlight. He slightly opens the door and a hint of light shines through the crack.

Ivan sticks out his finger to touch the sunlight and then all of the sudden…

…

…

…

………

Nothing happens.

Well, this is gonna be good.

A smile spreads across Ivan’s face as he now knows he is not hindered by the time of day.