With mana coursing through its legs, the spider’s speed increased. Every time It pushed against the ground with its legs, a repulsive forcefield of sorts propelled it forward and imbued every attack with thunderous momentum.
For Janet, that only meant one thing. Her advantage over the bulky spider, her dexterity and agility, was now only half as effective.
Her every dodge had to be faster, more precise, and timed to perfection. When the spider twitched to attack, she needed to already be on the move if she did not want to be pulverized.
The maroon Rachne Rubel, named for its red coloration, reacted to her evasion by trying to stomp her into the ground or spear through her torso with its surprisingly bendy legs. She needed to either counter that with strength or use all her speed to evade.
[Mana Sight] detected the light in the Rachne’s legs intensify. As the principles of magehood demanded, Janet began calculating her options. She was standing a bit to the left of the spider’s maw. It could still see her through the eyes on the side of its head, but its orientation was not ideal for a frontal attack.
She deduced that it would try to spear through her body after flanking her.
Janet acted on her conclusion. She pumped mana into her legs, ready to dodge toward the right. She lowered her shoulder and pushed into the ground…
She'd been mistaken. The spider could turn, and a lot faster than her. The tell-tale sight of activated mana flashed in Janet’s eye. The spider activated force magic in the back legs on its far side, reorienting itself so its face was pointed directly at her.
Then, it lunged.
Janet’s body had been moving to attack the spider’s flank. With the spider’s action, she was now running directly into its face.
Without thinking, she threw a fist right into one of the spider’s central eyes.
The force generated by her legs flowed up her shoulder and into her fist, then right into the spider’s eye. Her movement came to a halt. The sheer momentum behind the spider flung her backward, flipping her twice in her flight and slamming her body into the hard, blood-colored rock.
A trickle of blood leaked out of her mouth. She quickly healed her internal injuries.
As she went to prop herself against the ground so she could stand, she noticed that her fist was covered with a film of goo. Her eyes immediately went toward the spider.
The giant seemed disoriented and in a great deal of pain. One of its larger eyes, the one she had targeted, was completely pulped. A thick, clear liquid was oozing out of it like a leaking barrel of honey.
It still had more eyes to see through, however, so she flicked off the goo and squared her shoulders, ready for the coming retaliation.
To make sure her punching hand was not broken, she threw a few practice punches.
The first few were clumsy and awkward. As the spider regained its bearings and focused its gaze on her, she turned to her side, setting one foot in front of the other, in an effort to make herself a smaller target.
The next fist she threw flowed as smoothly as water in a calm mountain stream.
Congratulations!
You have learned the Skill, [Punch] (Basic)
[Punch] – Strike at an opponent or object with a fist
The knowledge of how to properly execute a punch flowed into her mind, along with a Skill template. It was odd, seeing a pictographic representation of what could be summed up as a movement of her arms and legs, but skimming through it revealed her hubris and folly.
She was still pretty salty that Sylthis had used a mana suppression collar on her, a tool she knew was used to contain criminals, but the Skill showed her the logic behind it. According to what she could deduce, incorporating mana into every punch she threw was what had prevented her from acquiring the Skill.
A punch needed power behind it. Muscle power, supplied by the combined movement of her limbs and torso. Force flowed from her toes, her hips, all the way to the clenched fist itself.
When mana was added to the equation, a complication was introduced, similar to an extraneous ingredient in a soup. Although it resulted in an acceptable final product, the original intent was muddied.
The Skill template carried knowledge on how to move the mana in tandem with the power of the punch. Without doing that, most of the power was wasted due to conflicting flows of energy.
“See?” she heard Sylthis comment from her perch in mid-air. “I knew you’d get the gist of it.”
“Can’t you see I’m in the middle of a fight?” she snapped back. “Stop distracting me!”
As she glanced at the sky and the smug-sounding Cyclopean, the spider took its chance. It was in her face in a blink, with one of its front legs extended and glowing with force magic shaped into a spike.
The magic, Janet noted as her eyes widened in surprise, was almost an exact replica of a spell, [Force Spike]. There was no way she could defend against it with her scrambled mana.
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She brought her hands up to block it, but her reaction was an instant too late. The spider's leg tore right through her leather jacket and through her bicep.
Then, the mouthparts descended. She must have looked like a skewered insect to the spider in that moment.
Unfortunately for the hungry creature, she was no stranger to pain. Rather than pull back or wince with tears in her eyes, she planted her feet, pulled her free hand backward, and imitated the flow of mana illustrated in the Skill template.
[Punch]!
She had to admit, her execution could have been better. It was, however, just enough to dissuade the spider’s attack.
The descending head suddenly jerked backward as another eye popped like a balloon, spraying goo everywhere. As the spider reeled with pain like a rank amateur, Janet freed her skewered arm from its skewer and began supplying it with healing energies.
She didn’t stand back idle, however. The spider leg was in her grasp, and the huge beast was not in an attacking mood.
She quickly called up [Throw]’s Skill template and allowed the knowledge stored there to direct her next actions.
She turned her back towards the enemy while gripping the leg over her shoulder firmly in both her hands. Then, she dipped the knee closest to the spider dipped as mana poured in to reinforce it.
Before the spider could register the advantage that she’d presented, the dipped leg pushed against the ground. The generated momentum flowed through her torso and to her shoulders at which point she pulled at the leg with all her strength.
There was a ripping sound as every shred of Janet’s physical power was exerted on one joint, but it was sturdy enough and held together as [Throw] was activated with all the power Janet could muster.
Slam!
A forceful breeze blew Janet’s hair back. The spider’s legs twitched, while the one in Janet’s hands went limp.
She was nowhere near done, however. While the spider tried futilely to right itself, she descended upon it like a demented silverback. [Punch] after [Punch] landed on its underside, focusing primarily on the slightly flat cephalothorax.
Every time the spider tried to attack with its legs, she simply punched them and continued her rampage.
Her torn bicep opened up before it could heal. The tough hairs on the spider’s body also tore into her fists, but she didn’t care.
There was a lot of anger to work through. She was angry at herself for missing such a simple path to advance her power, angry that she’d been so proud of a Basic Skill, and angry that she’d allowed herself to struggle so much against a mere spider.
At the center of it all was the simmering cauldron of rage at the fact that it had taken Sylthis literally disabling her magic for her to even look at Warrior Skills as a feasible source of power.
She had opponents who could disable her mana. The cult, whatever churches decided her situation with Gaia was untenable, whoever Amurag next chose to pit her against, the damned demons…
All were smart enough to counter her magic. Yet, she had been content to throw a dagger around simply because…
Why had she been so confident in her magic?
Ding!
You have slain Rachne Rubella LV 24
Experience acquired.
The spider’s twitching legs went limp. Its soul, a medium-sized glowing orb ringed by two brown bands, began to dissipate. Her soul-maw quickly drew it in with the suction that had intensified due to her building injuries.
Looking down, she was appalled by the sight. She had punched a depression of shattered carapace and minced flesh into the spider’s chest. Her efforts had covered her clothes with stinking spider blood and pulverized spider flesh.
Her hands were also covered with lacerations and the force of her blows had driven the spider’s hairs deep into her flesh.
Luckily that was the extent of the damage. The energies coursing through her body went to work to clear the injuries. The hairs were pushed out and together with her bicep, her bloody knuckles were restored within seconds.
“Would you look at that,” Sylthis whispered. Janet jumped in fright. She had not sensed the warrior’s approach.
She turned to the spot in the air where Sylthis should have been, but only Aurelia was levitating there, a crystal tightly clutched between her hands. The girl looked a little worse for wear. She was trembling as though she’d seen a ghost.
Janet waved her bloody but fully healed arm at her friend. The wave went unanswered.
“Mind letting me see your Status?”
Janet hesitated for a second. She was still miffed about the collar, the fight, and herself… mostly at herself.
She inhaled deeply and then exhaled slowly to let go of the emotion, but the acrid stench of the pulverized spider drilled into her nostrils, making her cough. Behind her, Sylthis chuckled.
“Oh, you got [Punch]! That’s a good one for your skill level,” the Warrior praised, genuine joy at her achievement shining through her wide smile. “I thought you’d surely got [Slam] or at least [Body Blow] from the way you manhandled the spider at the end there, though.”
“That was [Throw],” she replied and then smiled when Sylthis’ brow went up with amazement.
“Wow. Did you advance the Skill?” she asked, then went back to peruse through the Status. “That’s a shame.”
Sylthis then bent down and collected the spider carcass. “Gotta keep the combat arena clear.”
Before Janet could register what she meant, Sylthis shoved a sword into her palm. It was a plain steel sword that glinted in the afternoon sun. Its crossguard was made of bone and its pommel was a steel ball that was even more reflective than the blade itself.
“The other spiders are nearly here,” Sylthis stated simply as she jumped towards Aurelia. She seemed to have overshot, but on her descent, an outreached hand landed on the redhead’s shoulder, which transferred the [Flight] spell’s effect to her as well.
“Why the sword?” she asked as she stared into the blade. Her face, still covered with blood, was reflected there. “I thought...”
“You might be able to handle the maroon and marble spiders with fists alone, but the obsidian ones will require something more.”
Multiple clinking sounds rang from the bottom of the hill. Looking down, Janet saw why Aurelia had looked so scared a moment ago. Five spiders were approaching. Four were larger than the maroon one she’d just taken down, but the one in an obsidian carapace was smaller.
Somehow, though, its polished black carapace gave her the greatest sense of danger.
“Try to get an evasion Skill this time, and please ensure you at least get [Swordsmanship]. Otherwise, we’ll have to do this again tomorrow.”
The message reminded her that they had come to Rainbow Ridge not to get her acquainted with Warrior techniques, but instead to get her an Earth [Talent].
If she remembered correctly, Phase spiders were among the most formidable spider species. If she couldn’t get through the mooks in front of her, killing a Phase Spider would be impossible.
Ten giant eyes stared at her, assessing. In her, they saw food and perhaps something more. Janet gazed back, seeing only tools to grow her prowess and increase her power.