He saw that they were all ready as he rubbed BOB's back.
"Let's do this, I think Joe you should go first, take it slow. Then Sher, you take the light, keep it as high and as near to Joe as possible so it shines over his head. I will bring up the rear. And Joe, shout if you see anything strange or out of place."
Sher stepped up and took the lightstaff and Joe nodded.
"Ready."
They entered the now lit tunnel, immediately they noticed the spiderwebs.
"Just bloody great, spiders, it had to be spiders."
Joe chuckled. "What, the great Druid that is afraid of little spiders."
She shook her head. "When have you seen anything since the pulse that is little, and we are in a Dungeon with 5feet tall rinobeetles."
Joe stopped for a moment then proceed down the tunnel.
"True, and we already saw a drider Dark mage, all we have to do is run into. "
"Stop."
They stopped in their tracks. "Shit Joe, you know better than doing that shit, you don't go begging for trouble."
Joe looked crestfallen, "Man I keep on forgetting the rules."
"What am I missing."
"We will tell you when we take a rest, I nearly screwed up, but I will tell you later, Sher"
They started again.
Around the next corner, they found the first trouble. A small room not much bigger than the tunnel was crisscrossed, with thin strands of spider silk. Louie took a couple of steps back.
"I'm closing the back door." He reached up and a thin curtain of stone flowed from the roof and became solid when it touched the floor.
"It's thin so it won't stop anybody but it will give us a warning if somebody wants to sneak upon us."
They moved back to the room and Sher held the light up to better see. Joe spotted it first.
"There.," he pointed at what looks like an old access hatch.
Sher tried but she couldn't see what Joe saw. Louie took his mask out of his inventory and equipped it. "Hmm, Joe equip your mask."
Joe did as instructed and after a while, he just grunted. "Big bastard"
"What are you guys seeing?"
Joe pointed at the hatch. "It's a big spider, a trapdoor spider, it looks a lot like a tarantula."
Sher shivered. "Ugg I hate spiders."
They snickered.
Louie took a Rope and readied himself. "I'm going to try and lure it out. Be ready. Sher PowerShot if you can, aim to hit it between the eyes. Ok ready?"
They nodded and he threw the end of the rope across the room impacting one of the silk threads, it was like a trigger. Abruptly the spider was there, they didn't even see it exit the trapdoor.
It noticed that it was tricked and its prey was behind it, not where it was facing. It spun around and its face exploded and it went into convulsions as lightning ran over it.
"Damn you guys are making me feel unnecessary, Joe left legs."
Sher sniggered as they rushed to the spider and took off its left legs. It looked like a breeze ripple across what looked like the fur of the spider.
"Back! take cover!" Louie screamed as he let go of his mace and equipped his shield, diving in front of Sher.
There was a 'twang' and suddenly ten centimetres long needles rained all over the area.
"Everybody ok? Check your status page for afflictions. You might not feel the needles immediately, but it should show up on your status page." Louie rushed over and help Joe kill the spider.
They severed the rest of the legs and cut the joint between the two pieces of the abdomen. By now there was nothing left but the legless thorax of the spider. They stepped back and made sure that nobody got hit by the needle-like hair.
Louie started gathering the needles that he could see.
Joe was inspecting the burrow of the spider. "That thing is pretty big, how the hell did it fit into this burrow. There is no way that thing fit in here, this is about one and a half meter across and that spider abdomen is two meters across."
Sher walked to the barrow and shone the lightstaff down the burrow.
Joe reached out his hand and touched the silk lining the burrow. "It's not sticky."
Louie stepped up and also looked down at the burrow. "Keep an eye out I will be back shortly." He spun around and avoiding the silk treads he rushed back the way they came nearly forgetting the stone wall he raised.
Ten minutes later he was back with more lights. "Just went back to get us some more lights."
He handed one to Joe before he changed his mind and stuck it to his shield. going with a smile he said. "That will keep your hands free."
He took another light out of his inventory but this one he had stuck to an old crap ratkin helmet that he equipped, unequipping his own. "I'm going down to see what's there. You guys want to come with."
"Hell no, definitely Hell no!" Sher backed away from the burrow.
They grinned and Joe spoke up. "I will keep an eye out on this end." Still watching the twitching piece of the golem spider.
He went down the tunnel noticing that he didn't even make an impression on the silk strands.
As he entered the silk-lined chamber, the first thing he noticed was the dozens of spheres laying in one corner. Eggs?
He used
Immature spider eggs (unclassed)
To hatch, feed it regularly with mana.
Will make a good pet
"Hell yea" Sher would love one.
He sniggered.
He took them all, after looking around and finding nothing else he took of the rat helmet and equipped his mask and started looking around again.
He saw a dark spot under where he found the eggs. Upon closer inspection, there was a very well hidden section of the floor and after struggling for a while he managed to lift the slab and found a silk bag full of mana stones.
He noticed a couple of loose strands of webbing and pulled on them, to his surprise the silk started to unravel. He took out one of the spears and started winding the thread around the haft.
He went to the tunnel. "Everything ok up there guys?"
"Yes."
"Ok, I need you guys down here, I need help with something." After much convincing, they managed to get Sher down in the chamber.
He handed each a spear and showed them what he has been doing.
"I heard that strand for strand spider silk is twice as strong as steel wire. So there are free mats that we might be able to use later. I can think of some uses for this. Just think silk underwear." They laughed as Sher shuddered.
An hour later they had nearly all the silk in the chamber wrapped around spear shafts.
"Ok let's get out of here, I just want all the needles in the next room also."
After they have gathered the core and loot and everything else they could find they got ready and started down the next tunnel.
Louie inventoried the light and replaced his helmet.
Two trapdoor spiders, twenty-five eggs and a lot of silk later Louie found the first trap in the floor by walking over it.
There was a loud thump and he found himself stuck to the roof of the chamber they were crossing. As the first spider rushed in it was bowled over by BOB who then grabbed it and used it as a toy, throwing it around the room as Joe squared off against another one.
Luckily one of Louie's arms was free and he brought a
"Just go carefully, the blade will cut through nearly anything."
Soon he was free and rushed the spider that BOB was throwing around, he smashed his mace into the carapace of the spider right between its eight eyes. Two hits later there was just a quivering smashed golem that BOB was still trying to drag around.
He looked around but found Joe standing over a chopped up spider with a hole where its eyes should have been.
"Thanks, Sher, keep the pen, Joe here take this one, you never know when you need a knife that will cut nearly everything."
They walked over to inspect the trap.
Louie concentrated and all the sticky webbing disappeared from his armour. Sher watched as it happened. "How did you do that? I saw you do the same thing with those spears that were in your leg and shoulder."
"I just inventory it, its a bit of show and tell so I will explain later. Let's first get to a safe zone, I think there should be another safe zone around here somewhere, it does not make sense to go back to the start every time. So keep a lookout."
They went back to studying the trap.
"It very simple but effective." Joe pointed out as he explained. "You step on the plate, a ball of compressed air shoots you into the air and another one covers you with webbing. Simple but effective."
He pointed to a small mana stone. "See it's already charging the next air burst but there are no webbing."
Immediately Louie thought of a dozen uses for the trap. "Can we take it with us and can you dismantle the next one if we find more?"
Joe nodded. "I can try. I always liked traps so I studied and imagined how I would place them and how it would work, this is just the first time I saw mana powered traps, but I think I can do this."
He carefully reached in and removed the mana stone on which the whole trap became inactive. He lifted the trap out of the cavity and stopped for a moment deep in thought before he handed it to Louie.
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"I just had a thought. Do you guys think there is a spider out there building these traps or are they system/dungeon generated."
"Damn I hope not, that would indicate a staggering level of intelligence for that spider."
"I vote for Dungeon build." They smiled at Sher.
"I hope so too."
They found another four traps of which one caught Joe in the chest as he removed the mana stone, throwing him across the room to stuck upside down against the wall.
Sher was there first and cut a small hole in the webbing covering the lower half of his mask preventing him from breathing.
Louie laughed as he helped cut him free. "What I wouldn't give for a camera right now." They laughed harder as Joe mumbled something in his mask.
They were much more cautious now that they know what to look out for and saw another trap when BOB was suddenly struck with webbing and two strange-looking spiders appeared behind them, Loo quickly blocked off the tunnel in front of Joe before turning around, they got their shields up just in time to catch the next set of sticky webbing that was spit at them.
"Ranged attackers, should have expected something like this."
The spiders walked on their four back legs and used their four front legs to manipulate the balls of webbing that they placed in their mouths and then spit at their targets. Sher took them out as Joe and Louie held their agro
4hours later they had fought another two trapdoor spiders three tarantulas and three spitters.
After the last spitter was done they entered the next tunnel wearily as they noticed that the whole tunnel was made from metal as if they were moving in an air duct.
"I got a very bad feeling about this." Joe had barely uttered the words when there was a whoosh and a roar as if somebody had just struck a match in a gas-filled room.
They looked at each other and screamed. "RUN!"
They ran with all their might as the giant fireball came roaring down the metal corridor chasing them.
As they stumbled into the chamber a door slammed shut behind them, Louie immediately knew they were in trouble.
The spider that sat in the middle of the room was big, like jack and the beanstalk big. the words R145 Big Foot could clearly still be seen on its abdomen, somehow an excavator had turned into the giant Queen spider, around her was two tarantulas and two spitters plus something was lurking in the back that they couldn't make out.
Before they could react Sher took out one of the spitters.
She and BOB started moving around the edge of the room dodging the webs that the other spitter shot at them.
The queen seemed quite slow but made up for it in power her two front legs looked like they had once housed attachments but luckily not anymore. But it was still able to dent the metal floor of the room.
Joe took out the two tarantulas with well-placed marsh lights and Louie ran around and smashed their legs till they were helpless on the ground.
Their speed might just be the thing that will win this fight but it seemed that they had forgotten about the mysterious spider in the shadows.
Suddenly a runic circle appeared under Louie and with a blast, he was hurled against the roof where he was stuck with webbing.
From this view, he could clearly see the mystery spider.
"Sher, Joe, It's another fucking Drider!"
Louie was struggling to get loose but he was stuck tight, although his hands were free he couldn't move them at all.
"Shit!"
He screamed as Sher took out the drider with a well placed shot to the throat severing its head, she stood still for a moment to take the next Powershot that punched a hole right through its chest. It cost her though.
Joe was still going crazy on the queen but he was running out of mana he kept out of her reach and dash in to slash at legs together with BOB who would take bite-size chunks out of a leg and jump away to move on to the next one.
The Queen was moving slower but still fast enough to sideswipe Sher as she was concentrating on finishing the drider, she flew across the room and connect the wall with a bone-shattering impact.
Louie raged at the fact that he was stuck, he couldn't move and Sher was hurt, maybe dying.
Joe was fast running out of steam and he was just hanging around.
Suddenly Louie felt the fog clear from his mind as
He noticed that the queen was right below him, looking through his inventory, he found what he was looking for.
He screamed for Joe to grab BOB and run before he dropped that boulder that took up nearly 60sq in his inventory
Spider meets boot, stomp.
Louie was laughing hysterically as he struggled to get free. He calmed down as he felt Joe's hand on his chest.
"It's ok Louie, Sher is ok. I got to her in time she is healing."
Louie just hang there as Joe started cutting him loose.
"I fucked up again Joe. It nearly cost Sher her life." He took a deep breath and only then noticed that Joe stood on the rock that he dropped on the queen.
Big ass rock.
When he got down of the roof he used
They hurried over to Sher where she was laying against the wall. BOB sat next to her guarding her against the sneaky spiders, after making sure that Sher was ok they went around and dismantled the spiders except for the drider, they smashed its chest in and severed its body.
Louie inventoried the whole drider body only using the chest piece to harvest the core and loot the drider.
They waited for Sher to wake up before they moved to the queen.
Louie stored the rock and moved in on the twitching queen.
Joe hand Sher his axe and told her to go look for the core. It took her a while to find the core but it was worth it as
Elemental spider core
This core belonged to a Queen Spider
It has all affinities
It can be used as a material in crafting.
Their loot from the Queen fight was.
Spider Queen loot
40S halves 9G rounds
Spider pendant + 50%relations with spiders
2x Dark steel bars
4x Spider golem pieces =
1x spider claw with 30m spider silk rope
1x spider silk cloak
1x spider claw and spider fang in the shape of daggers
Queen's Consort (Drider) loot 20S halves 6G rounds
Named Staff of the elements = (Stervus Accidit)
2x stainless steel bars
2x spider golem pieces = twin poison fang daggers
2x Tarantula loot 20S halves 6G rounds
4x steel bars
4x spider golem pieces = 2x fangs 2x front limbs
2x Scyto loot 20S halves 6G rounds
4x steel bars
4x spider golem pieces, 2x fangs with poison sacs 2x spinnerets with web sac
“Hey guys, the spitters are known as Scyto spiders.”
They had all levelled up after the fight with the Queen but decided to wait before doing their stats and going over the loot.
They were so tired that they decided to only give the room a quick search and then move on to see if they could find a safe zone.
They have tried the door that slammed shut behind them but it was stuck with no doorknob on this side.
Louie even went so far as to try and cut through the door with his pen mana blade but it seemed that it was more a block of metal than a door that slammed from the roof, he could cut through it but it will take at least a couple of hours.
They equipped their masks again and slowly went through the room finding two hidden troves of mana stones and more eggs, the eggs they managed to hide from Sher.
They picked up their lights from where it fell as they tumbled into the room, and moved to the now open arch behind the raised area where the Queen was sitting when they entered.
Then they were back in the main tunnel, to their right there was a rough wall that looked more like the road was pushed up to meet the roof and between the cracks, they could see what looked like a fire burning.
Louie concentrated on the top right of his hud and a translucent minimap appeared in front of his eyes.
"Shit, after all those hours in that spider tunnel we have only travelled a hundred meters down the tunnel?"
They shook their heads. "I have thought there was something strange about that section of the tunnel, like it was an add-on or something, why a whole section with golem spiders, and have you noticed, there was no bag of tricks with the spider loot."
Sher leaned tiredly against the wall. "I think I might have figured that one out. What do all cars have in common?"
After a couple of moments, they shrugged.
"Cubbyholes, I think all those odds and ends are what we're in the cubbyholes of the trucks and cars, we should go through them, there might be interesting stuff in there.”
Joe coughed and when he had their attention he indicated the three-car parking spot on the other side of the road was marked with a yellow danger line, there was a bigger door than at the other restroom but it looked the same.
They warily crossed the road, but the moment they stepped over the line they knew they have entered a safe zone and they relaxed.
They crossed to the door that looked big enough to drive a car through.
"Pretty big door, Joe went through the door first and saw the two bathroom doors on the left and a door marked with what they now knew meant bed, but the biggest surprise was the big door at the end marked with a hammer.
They walked to the door.
"I bet it is a workshop." As they pushed the door open before them was a big room with a couple of workstations against the walls and a big table in the middle.
"Jip, Workshop, nice but I want a bed." Joe turned around and entered the bedrooms.
"Wow!." Sher stood at the door and looked at the restroom.
It was big, if the first rest space was a one-star hotel then this one was a three-star, there were three separate bedrooms with a full lounge and separate open plan kitchen, opposite to the kitchen was an alcove with the Vendor, which was also different, it had what appeared to be a full-length mirror on its front and it also looked bigger than the other.
Louie sat down in one of the loungers.
"Damn, I can sleep in this thing.” He got up before he fell asleep and moved to the kitchen, he made a beeline to the coffee maker that was next to the stove.
Who would prepare meals if they can get food from the vendor?
He saw that the coffee machine was in perfect order. He made himself a big cup of coffee, he noticed that it is a brand of machine that he has never seen before and he love coffee and coffee machines. It has a slot where a small mana stone could fit but he didn't see any place to put a coffee capsule or coffee grounds.
The coffee was heavenly and Joe also took a cup, but Sher was nearly lynched by blaspheming as she proudly announced that she doesn't like or drink coffee.
After joking around for a couple of minutes they decided to check out the Vendor, the first thing they noticed was the image that appeared on what they thought was a mirror, it looked like a giant robotic ant.
"Greetings gentle beings, how can this vendor assist you?"
"Wow, an upgrade to the vendor shop, nice. Hi Vendor, have you got any seed and plants that I can buy?"
Louie looked enquiring at Sher and whispered, 'plants?'
She nodded. "There is a greenhouse behind a door in the workshop, I want to try and work on my Druid skills."
"Yes gentle being, we have a whole section on farming and horticulture, I would also like to point you to the books on Druidic rites and practises in our information section. . . . Gentle beings I would like to advise you to sync the VendorTablets that I sense in your possession to any Vendor you come in contact with, this will automatically tell you which Vendor you are closest to and what is in their catalogue."
They took their Tablets out and held them to the vendor. They received a sync request, which they accepted.
"Thank you, Vendor."
They went to sit at the table as Sher got into dealing with the Vendor.
After a while Louie went to check the rooms, he was surprised to aee that each had its own ensuite and as he stepped back into the room he noticed a big dog bed for BOB next to the bed. Hmm, this place changes to accommodate the delvers.
Louie laid down on his bed and did his stats he decided to put his two free points in Charisma and Luck because his luck seemed to be kicking his butt and he could use more charisma when they get out of the Dungeon.
Statistics Health points (HP): 380 Mana Points (MP): 230 Stamina (SP): 460 Critical Hit Chance: 4%
Attributes Strength: 19 Agility: 15 Constitution: 19 Perception: 18 Intelligence: 11 Willpower: 12 Charisma: 7 Luck: 5