Meeting the Lamia Queen was a pleasure, once she opened up she was a likeable person. And it was sad to hear about their troubles. That god-awful Worm devastated their food supply and apparently was a formidable opponent. To defeat it the Lamia Queen would need to send all of her warriors and even then victory was not guaranteed. Instead, they opted for waiting for the worm to leave; it would do so after it engorged itself just enough.

In turn for the help provided the Queen asked him if he wanted to see Lamia Village.

“Of, course I do! Let’s just load your fruit and we are ready to go.” The overfilled warehouses were now mostly empty, but this wasn't a bad thing.

Just as he was about to leave with the Lamia, he saw his spiders carrying something big. It piqued his interest, but then it got close enough he found himself frowning.

“What happened?” He ran to the spider.

A spider was carrying a spider scout on his back, the scout was dead. His spiders were not immortal, actually, they had short but happy lives; they would die by the second time they laid eggs. So he didn’t want to jump to conclusions. However…

“Attack.” The spider chirped in a sad tone.

“By whom? Forrest beasts? Maybe letting you guys scout the forest wasn’t the best idea.”

He only did that because he wanted the vegetables growing there for a more varied diet.

“Elves.”

“Elves? Well, I should have known it; we’re in their territory. But why can’t they just share a bit, we don’t take too much.” At this point, he was just complaining out loud to nobody in particular.

“Elves-sss attacked you?” The Queen must have overheard that conversation.

“Ah.” He sighed. “I didn’t tell you but I’m not in the best relationship with them. You don’t need to worry yourself with that.”

“They attacked you, killed your people-sss!” The Queen sounded more upset than him. “Are you letting them get away with this?”

She was right. He ought to protect his people, but doing so would only cause more death, that’s why he hesitated.

“I don’t want to escalate things. I will just pull out of their forest.”

“Their forest? Who decided that-sss?”

He didn’t have an answer to that.

“Let me tell you sss-something as a ruler to another ruler. Don’t be too kind because your kindness-sss can be seen as weakness-sss.”

He knew what she was implying, but it came out a bit two-faced.

“They will grow bold. Attack you and take what is yours-sss that’s why you need…”

“You’re right I need to protect my people. But war – I don’t desire.”

Lamia seemed thoughtful for a moment. “We are allies and allies help each other in tough times-sss. Let me lend you my sss-strength.”

He looked at the Queen in surprise.

“Take these-sss with you and sss-see what elves’sss do.”

Five Lamia warriors slithered towards him. They stood tall and firm with their heads high as if proud of the assignment.

“I understand. The elves might have no problem attacking spiders but attacking Lamia too…”

“Yes-sss.”

Attaching a lamia too would mean that elves would declare war not only on spiders but Lamia as well, plus this would show that he had allies to come to his aid if elves kept antagonising him.

“Splendid, I will treat your warriors well.”

There was one issue, however, one of the warriors was the friendly lamia from before and he was sure by now that she was more than a warrior.

He looked at the familiar face who smiled at him.

“But, what if your people get hurt?”

Lamia frowned. “What are you sss-saying? They are sss-strong, they are here to do their jobs-sss.”

“And how about her?” He pointed at the suspect.

“Sss-so you can tell. She’s-sss my daughter, but she’s one of many. Let her sss-stay, unless you have no use of her, sss.”

“No, no, I wasn’t implying anything like that. Of course, she can stay, I know she is a splendid warrior.”

“When I sss-shall go. Come and sss-see our village, when you can.” The Queen summarised that she will leaving her daughter to ward off the elves.

He wondered if he should go with the Queen to investigate the Worm. The spiders knew what they were doing and could manage the farms on their own. Actually, he needed to go now more than ever. There was something he needed from the mountains – metal ore.

“I shall accompany you, but I don’t think I can spare my spiders now, I need numbers to protect the scouts.”

He told the spiders to unload the cargo from their backs.

“I apologise, but you will have to carry this yourself.”

Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

“No problem, I understand-sss.”

The Lamia took three sacks each, it looked heavy but they also were much bigger than the spiders. He still felt bad making them do the heavy lifting, the trip was a long one after all. He donned his armour and took the newly crafted Apex Spear with him.

Before he left he spoke with the five lamias and told them to work with his scouts and explorers and protect them. They readily agreed to be on bodyguard duty, however, the friendly lamia seemed a bit sad he wasn’t staying in the village.

In other words, he trusted his spiders, especially his advisor, and the lamia to handle this in an appropriate way. He didn’t need to micromanage everything – the boon of having intelligent workers at hand.

…

Before he went to the Lamia Village he excused himself. The timing and the place were bad, if he didn’t have Convincing Aura he wouldn’t be able to pull it off, but he had to see Kobold's leader. Moreover, he couldn’t tell Lamia about the Kobolds because the two hated each other.

The reason him needing to see the Kobolds was simple: they were better diggers than Lamia, actually, lamia wasn't into digging at all. He needed ores and the kobolds could dig them.

In the end he was lucky to catch up with the trading expedition, the one he had seen going off before. Of course, Kobolds will still get their fruits but he didn’t want more emeralds.

Then he approached the camp kobolds ran to his spiders filling the cave with cheers. He didn’t know they liked TomGrape fruits so much. They were so distracted by looting the fruits from the sacks, yes looting was the right word, that they completely ignored him.

“Well, anyway, I am here to see the leader.” He tried to remember where the leader's burrow was.

He found it no problem and then gave a loud knock on the dirt wall. “Hello, It is I the Spider King.”

“Eek.” The kobold yelped in surprise.

There was rustling and shuffling, and even the sound of pots shattering but the kobold came.

“Yes, Spider King.” The Kobold dusted off its dirty tunic.

“I’m here to discuss our trade.”

“Yes?”

“Any way you can give me metal ores instead of emeralds?”

“Emeralds? Oh, shiny rocks! But shiny rocks are valuable and dull rocks useless. What for do you need dull rocks? There is plenty in the wall you can just take them.”

“No, I need ores, to melt them into metal ingots.”

“I know metal. You can’t smelt here, the smoke would kill, need to go deep in the mountain and use the Sea of Fire.”

“Well, I won’t be smelting in the caves. So can you dig it for me?”

The kobold shrugged. “Will we still get our fruits?”

“Yes, of course.”

“Then we dig dull rocks for you. Simple.”

Was it really that simple?

“Can you show me the metal ores, do you have any around?”

“I have some laying somewhere. They often get in our way then we dig tunnels.”

The leader led him all around the village collecting stray rocks noone wanted but still had for some reason.

“I think I have enough samples, thank you.”

“You sure you don’t want shiny rocks?”

“Positive.”

“Your weird!” the kobold accused.

“I know, I’m the King of Spiders.” He laughed it off. “Should I come back and collect the ores then you finish digging it?”

“No need, there is more pilled by the tunnels.”

“Can I just send my spiders to gather them?”

“You can take, it's trash anyway.” The kobold pointed in the distance. “Follow the tunnel you will find the pile midway.”

“Thanks!”

He sent his spiders to gather the ore in the sacks and then take it to the village.

What was left was visiting the Lamia Village. But he didn’t know the way! “What a blunder.” He cursed.

“Leader, Leader where are you?” he went back shouting through the village.

“What?” The kobold emerged his face stained with the TomGrape juice.

He turned his Aura on. “This is a weird request but can you take me to Lamia territory? Don’t ask why.”

“No, they will eat us!”

“Not too close, just point me in the right tunnel.”

“No.”

The aura must have failed.

“I will send you different kind of fruits, the ones which give you mana points.”

“MP? Okay!” The kobold did a 180. “Come, come.”

He followed the running kobold. He was surprisingly motivated by extra MP and so this meant that he knew about mana.

It was a good time to ask. “Hey, do you have access to the System?”

“System?” The kobold tilted it’s head.

“Yeah, like these messages filtering through your mind to tell you earned exp and perks.”

“Oh, the World Messages. I know of them why?”

“This is weird, but how do I access my status or the list of skills?”

“Say [Status]”

“[Status].” He said it but nothing happened. “I knew it, something is broken; It doesn’t work.”

“Weird. You’re weird.” Kobold gave a judging look. “Come, come this way.” He pointed at another tunnel.

“I didn’t expect you to lead me personally, but thanks. Let’s be careful from now on.”

“Yes, very smart. No more talk.”

Finally, they reached the point where the Kobold was no longer willing to go any further.

“Danger this way, don’t go.”

“Thanks but I must go.” He waved the kobold a goodbye. “I will be fine.”

The kobold just looked at him as if he was crazy but didn’t say anything.

He went deeper into the tunnel confident that he will find Lamia eventually. But just in case. “Hello, any lamias around? Hello!” His words echoed. There was no one to reply so he went even further in and repeated. “Hello?”

“Sss-stop.”

He turned to look at the voice coming from behind. The woman was obviously Lamia, and she had that hostile look on her face, her spear was pining at his neck. At this point he just triggered his Aura Projection by instinct, it was becoming second nature to him.

He smiled at the lamia. “I am the King of Spiders. I was invited to visit your village but had a small errand to do first.”

Lamia bowed deeply. “I have heard of you King of sss-Spiders. Follow.”

They went through maze-like tunnels. If not for Lamia he would be lost already. They exited the narrow tunnel into the larger cave. On the floor of the cave was covered by shoots of brown mushrooms, he had seen those before, the ones here weren’t just growing randomly, they were being cultivated.

Lamia servants, or should he call them lamia farmers, were pouring something looking like liquefied mulch on the mushrooms. There was quite a smell coming of it, but this was how farming was so he didn’t judge them.

“Those are hard workers.” He praised the Lamia.

“Sss-sh.” Lamia shushed him again. “Not so loud.”

Suddenly, the ground began to rumble, stray pebbles were falling from the ceiling. He saw the farmers looking up at the ceiling with their faces filled with anxiety.

“Run!” Lamia warrior shouted to everyone.

“Earthquake?” He looked back towards the lamia warrior for confirmation but she was already halfway towards a side tunnel.

He ran towards her, the shaking ground made him stumble and fall. It began shaking so much he couldn’t stand. He cursed his unsteady legs and wished for a thick serpentine tail. The lamia had left him behind.

The ceiling spat a chunk of rubble and from it a large mouth appeared. The mouth was filled with rows of hooked teeth, the teeth were half his length and just as thick. The mouth moved towards the ground, revealing the thick body of the worm.

“The Great Worm of Oberon!”

The monster was even larger than he had imagined. It had rough and pink flesh, the flesh was surrounded by tiny clawed arms. Hundreds and hundreds of tiny appendages were scattered all around its body, they were clawing at the rock helping the worm to dig and move. The Worm opened ad closed its humongous mouth, taking huge breaths of air.

Each time it breathed out, the stench of rot became stronger. [De-buff active: Miasma] ­­– This didn’t sound good, however, [Perk Minor Regeneration activated] this was the temporary perk his armour set gave to him. The shaking stopped, breathing the air hurt but at least he could walk.

The Worm moved towards the mushroom fields and began devouring them; soil and all.

‘It’s not interested in me, but for how long?’ He didn’t want to stay and find out.