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Envoy only made an appearance once every second or third day to keep things unexpected. But for the next week, I added in some other surprises.

The two lady adventures came to a stop at the sight of the web-filled room. Ten spiders had worked throughout the night as I dismissed and resummoned them with full loads of spider web silk.

Iris narrowed her eyes and glared out into the room. “What the heck are you up to now Tark.”

As Kelvin began to run down with a note, Molly reached out with her racket and began to try to clear some of the webs out of their way. Only to shriek and dance back, frantically waving her racket around in the air while trying to dislodge the spider crawling around on it.

"Ew, ew, ew, ew, ew. Get it off!" Then she dropped it to the ground and ran up three steps. Kelvin nudged her leg to try to hand her the note, causing her to scream and jump away. The old woman reached past her, to take the note from my champion and read it out loud.

"Just adding a new element to keep things interesting."

Iris snorted and picked up the racket, glanced at it, and pinched the spider off of it between her fingers. Then she crushed it between her finger before wiping the remains on the wall. “Doesn't look poisonous, but it’s better to be safe.”

She retreated upstairs and then returned with a cane covered in blue fabric, before pushing up on part of it causing it to unfold into a small parasol. Walking into the room she began pushing through the web with the parasol in one hand and a brick in the other.

Besides clearing out spider webs, it also proved to be a deterrent to leaping squirrels. They saw it as a blind spot and kept trying to leap through it. Only to hit it and slide off, where they then got kicked or bricked. Or they clung on and just got dumped to the ground underneath the parasol where they proceeded to get stomped to death.

By the second day, they had their strategy by the tune. More importantly, Molly wasn’t freaking out even when the spiders dropped down on a strand instead of waiting in the webs.

On day five Envoy stole a bottle of dish soap. Hid it in the greenery on top of a branch and rushed out to squeeze it between its arms and its body. Squirting a blue stream of liquid soap into the middle of a five on three fight.

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It turned out not to matter much to squirrels and the cat, but it very annoying to an older woman and a younger one who wore riding boots in a dungeon.

Which is why I had arranged for him to do it. Start thinking about your footing young lady.

Molly screamed as she got nailed with the blue steam and backed away from it, while the old lady turned and put her foot into it. Iris didn't go down, but her leg shot out so far I could tell that she had strained her inner thigh as she struggled to keep her balance. "Dam it! It's the little green bugger again, isn't it? I'm going to kick him so hard… Next week." She added as she struggled to turn in place on her now injured leg to keep an eye on the remaining squirrels.

Envoy threw the half empty bottle at her. She caught it and threw it back at the amazed creature, knocking it clear of the branch it was standing on to the ground where Molly finished him off.

Later Molly ended up using the rather crudely made looking shower in the basement to wash off her armor and left it downstairs overnight to dry off. Why thank you young lady.

[ New material, Kevlar, discovered. ]

The new suit I made for her was the exact same size and a little shinier. Which she did notice the next week. Iris picked up four new replacements for what I had learned was called an umbrella. The old one had been squirreled to pieces over the last week.

During that week they received a bolt of nine yards of blueish near white cloth made of spider silk. Which neither of them knew what to do with, so it ended up on a shelf.

The next week featured a raccoon as the base creature with two squirrels for each adventurer. The masked creature wasn’t as nimble or quick. But it could take a few more hits. Molly added some small screws which she threaded through her racket frame to make it do a bit more damage when she used the edge as a club. She also added a smaller umbrella that collapsed into something she could fit into a case on her belt.

They got a hat similar to the squirrel skin hat. This one sporting a raccoon tail on the back and a label which identified it as being able to reduce damage from blunt attacks by five percent. Molly claimed it with a broad grin. "I got a magic item. I shouldn't wear it since it's fur. But..." She waved her hands up at the furry hat on her head. "Magic!"

The next week I swapped the Raccoon for four blue jays and Molly's racket proved its worth. The birds still got a few vicious pecks in which made the two women add some thin cloth cut from the spider silk bolt to their gear which fitted under their hats to shield their ears and the back of their necks from lighter attacks.

On the second day, they got a weird little thing made from a bird skull, some feathers, and bone beads. After both of them examined the creepy little thing it got set up on a shelf with the remaining spider silk and the enameled skull.

Honestly I had no clue what it was supposed to do.

Along with the squirrel and raccoon pelts and claws gathered up in various boxes and jars, the pennies went into a gray metal box that had a lock built into it. Iris had come up with it out of an older paper box. "I'm not even sure why my brother had this, but it came with his stuff. I'm hoping that there might be something special about these coins, and it's not like I got any tearing need to spend them."

On day three Envoy rushed out from behind a stone club resting in an alcove. He had covered himself in a mix of flour and ketchup that matched the floors, wall, and tree bark fairly well. With the spear he had made from a green plastic handled knife from Molly's bag, he was able to give Iris a long but shallow cut along the skin over the tendon on the back of her ankle. "Mother...! Where did you get a scalpel?"

Envoy grinned at her, taking the time to lick her blood off the end with a big grin instead of doing something sensible like running away or trying to dodge. I think I’m going to let him take a week off. Dying every week by an old woman's foot might be making him a bit off balanced in his head.

That weekend, the one hundred and thirty second rat granted me Dungeon, Copper rank two.