The elves were dead and for the most part, all of our forces were unharmed. I looked at the slashes on the tanks and added my saliva to stop the bleeding on tank 2. He was eager to get put on the front lines again, but I sent him to the rest area to sleep it off and brought tank 3 up to the front. I had the poison spiders finish off the bodies which promoted each of them to rank 2.

“At rank 2, the poison spider's poison becomes more potent with increased range and volume.” Daisy’s response to my asking made me curious. I called the poison spiders and looked closer at them. They had grown in size a little bit, although it could have been my imagination. The biggest change I could see was the tubes above their fangs where they could squirt out poison. At first, they resembled more holes, but now they looked like thin tubes that were easier to control and direct the poison. Other than that there was no change to them.

“Not exciting, but I guess you can't expect much just from an increase in a single rank.” I patted both of them on their heads smiling. “You did really well. I'm proud of you.” They clicked excitedly and ran off leaving behind a feeling of pride and satisfaction.

I leaned back on my throne and closed my eyes. Everything looked fine from the eyes of the surveillance spiders. The timer in the corner of my eyes was down to 5 days. With any luck, they wouldn't send anyone else through during that time.

“I still need to decide if we are going to go through the portal or not once the break happens.” I groaned, slumping down as much as I could. I had been able to put it off some more but with only 5 days remaining I needed to make a choice. “I guess the best option would be to send a surveillance spider out first to check and make a choice from there.” It still seemed like a copout but I was going to argue since I at least made a choice.

Over the next 5 days, nothing happened with the portal, which was good and bad. Good because we didn't have to have any more loss of life, but bad because there was a chance they were simply preparing for the dungeon break and would have a massive force on the other side waiting for us.

As the clock counted down to zero I called everyone to the forest room. As the clock hit zero the entire dungeon shook for a second before stopping.

“Anticlimactic but alright. Go see what's on the other side.” the surveillance spider answered by running up to the portal and slipping through with a flicker. He was small enough that I was hoping he would not be noticed on the other side.

I held my breath with my eyes closed waiting for the spider to pop out on the other side. The footage came in as it made it to the other side of the portal. The area directly around the portal looked to be located in a small underdeveloped village. The walls were all made of pieces of wood and the ground was a simple dirt path. It looked like they had uprooted a few houses directly around the portal leaving it standing out in the open. As I feared, there were at least 5 archers that I could see and probably more hidden.

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“What should I do?” I hissed. I sat there arguing with myself until I felt a nudge to my left. I looked at the poison spider who clicked looking from me to the portal. “So you want to risk it?” The spider nodded. I signed, looking at everyone behind me. “And all of you?” I got an echo of clicks that reverberated around me. Fuck it, no risk no reward right? I picked up my shield and placed it in front of me preparing to go through the portal. Tanks 1 and 3 had poison spiders on their backs with the trap spider in the rear. I pushed forward stepping through the portal.

I readied my Shield as I emerged on the other side. Protecting my head was important with the arrows that were sure to come flying. Bracing for impact I hardened my stance and waited. I waited some more. I peeked over my shield looking at the clearing before me. No arrows came flying, no charge of warriors, nothing. A light breeze blew a leaf across the clearing reminding me of an old western. Okay, what the fuck is going on? The other spiders filled in behind me as I stepped forward.

I blinked a few times and sent the two surveillance spiders running to the slides making a loop around the clearing. They ran around the buildings at breakneck speed revealing absolutely nothing. As they came to the front of the clearing one approached the archers. As it got closer without being noticed I blinked confused. I knew elves aged slowly, but this archer looked like he was about 12 years old. Not only that, but he was also shaking with his eyes locked forward, aimed at me. The other spider showed me a similar site on the other side.

This doesn't make any sense. What is this? They clearly knew there was going to be a dungeon break but was this all they could do to prepare? I could easily send my spiders out and wipe this pitiful force in seconds.

“Hey, Daisy, you there.”

“Yes.” The sound was muffled but I could hear the voice. “

What would happen if they ate the archers?”

“At their current power, they would not add much energy to the warriors.” I sighed at the words and turned around. There was no reason to even be here. I sent everyone back through the portal and started to make my way through. An arrow shot past me sticking into the ground a few feet away. I looked through the camera footage at the first young boy sitting there, absolute horror trembling even more.

“It seems that the shot was an accident” Daisy’s voice confirmed what I thought. However, I needed to let them know that something like this would not be accepted. I stopped before the portal and turned back to the archers. I took a deep breath in and bellowed at them.

I figured that my scream was going to be enough to scare them but what I didn't expect was just how monstrous it sounded. Instead of a scream, a horrible screeching sound exploded from my throat sending a chill down even my spine. The archers all fell from their perches in fear. From what I could tell it looked like a few of them had pissed themselves. Oops. I turned and headed back into my dungeon. This should be enough to stop them from sending more into the dungeon.