Chapter 17 - Blood, Sweat, and Magic
I grabbed the hilt of Illuminator with my hand and waited as the spiders were getting closer and closer.
Once they were just a few meters away from me, I took a step forward with my right foot, pushing the ground away and creating tension all over my body. A deep breath braced my core. I slightly bent my knees and from there, with one fluid motion, I unseathed Illuminator and slashed horizontally. Left to right, slicing through both the air and the spiders.
The average sized ones had their bodies cut in half, while the taller ones lost their feet and fell on the ground, wiggling, but in the end, unable to move. Now I had to deal with the shorter ones my sword went barely over.
The immensely high contrast between the white of the blade and the complete blackness of the rest of my outfit made it look like the sword was indeed emitting light and illuminating the surrounding space.
Another, lower slash in the opposite direction and the shorter spiders were also annihilated. This cleared the whole wave of spiders and gave me enough time to wipe the blue spider blood off my face and sword before the next wave arrived.
I glanced at the rest of the team to check how they were doing.
Jack, as expected, was easily handling the spiders without breaking a sweat. In fact, he was doing such a good job that half of the spiders that were initially going forward, straight to him, started changing directions and choosing to attack through the flanks, where Sanor and I were, instead.
On the other side, Sanor was holding his ground fine up until that point, but it was obvious he was getting tired.
The spiders were easy to beat, even for Sanor and even if he had not consumed the [Spherule of Power], but he had no way to hit numerous spiders with one strike like I did with my sword, so he needed to kick and punch and knee each and every one of them individually and there were only so many strikes he could land before gassing out.
Tim noticed what was going on and, since I was managing to keep the spiders away one way or another, and Jack was far from struggling, he focused on helping Sanor, in the right flank, sending arrow after arrow in the spiders' direction, not missing his mark once. Piercing spider after spider. The vast majority of his arrows landing perfectly in the center of the head, right on the eyes. His left hand steady. His right hand constantly in motion. Loading the crossbow and from there reaching back to his quiver for his next arrow.
This worked for a bit, but the overwhelming amount of spiders proved to be too much for them, eventually. Some of them managed to slip past Sanor and head straight towards Tim, preparing their fangs for a nice, juicy bite.
I wanted to leave my position and rush to Tim. Make sure that nothing happens to him. But I did not have time to do that. If I supported the right flank, the left flank would be left wide open and the spiders would stroll to Tim and reduce him to pieces in seconds.
In my mind, the only way to make sure that Tim would remain intact would be for him to cross the bridge back to the other side and, from there exit the dungeon and head back to the starting room. Theoretically, spiders should not be able to access that room and he should be safe until the rest of us cleared the room.
They are closing in now.
They are right in front of him now.
It's too late now!
The ones closest to Tim were already opening their chelicera, ready to feast on the man's leg.
Suddenly, spikes made out of limestone came out of the ground in square groups, thrusting upwards and piercing through the spiders that were approaching Tim, only to hide themselves under the cave's floor and appear once more once more spiders walked over them again.
These unexpected spike traps saved Tim's life and got rid of any opponents that managed to pass through Sanor. Except for one quick little fellow that Tim had no trouble squishing with his foot. Everything turned out fine in the end.
The spiders were slowly reducing in numbers. Either there weren't any more of them here or they got too scared of us, watching what happened to their brethren.
I was getting tired. Illuminator's beautiful white color was now completely covered by the blue of the spiders' blood. But I was able to keep at it.
Until there were no more of them. But even if more came out, there was still way more fight left inside us. Especially Jack who seemed like this was not enough to even warm him up for the real battle.
I searched for something to wipe the blood off my sword. It was prettier when it was pure white and gold and the consistency of the blue liquid, along with the thought of where it came from, made me almost want to throw up.
This time it was too much blood to casually wipe it off with my cloak. It would become soaked and would uncomfortably stick to my arm. So, I decided to wipe it off on Wrel's cloak instead.
After confirming that no one else would lend me their cloak to wipe Illuminator, I was left with just one choice.
I went to the pond next to the bridge and submerged Illuminator's blade, getting rid of the nasty spider blood.
While doing that, I also took a chance and looked at my reflection on the pond's surface. It had been so many days since I spawned, and yet this was the first time I saw my face. It was... not too bad.
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After pulling it out, I was surprised to find out that I accidentally pierced through a small octopus, which remained stuck on my blade after I took it out of the water.
Defeated [Innocent Octopus - Lvl. 2]!
Experience is awarded for defeating an enemy!
This was the last notifications I received, but there were also myriads of them that came before it, waiting for me to open them.
Defeated [Spiderling - Lvl. 0]!
Minimal experience is awarded for defeating a zero level enemy!
Level 0, huh? That explained why they were so easy to beat and how none of us gained any levels after beating so many of them. Except for Sanor, who apparently was awfully close to leveling up before coming here.
Defeated [Spiderling - Lvl. 0]!
Minimal experience is awarded for defeating a zero level enemy!
Defeated [Spiderling - Lvl. 0]!
Minimal experience is awarded for defeating a zero level enemy!
Defeated [Spiderling - Lvl. 0]!
Minimal experience is awarded for defeating a zero level enemy!
Defeated [Spiderling - Lvl. 0]!
Minimal experience is awarded for defeating a zero level enemy!
.
.
.
Defeated [Spiderling - Lvl. 0]!
Minimal experience is awarded for defeating a zero level enemy!
I went through more than half of them, opening the notification and immediately closing it again, just to make it stop glowing and distracting me, until I realized there was a button at the bottom right that said 'Mark All as Read.'
Fuck.
That's why everyone was done so quickly with theirs. I wished I had seen it earlier.
We all sat down to catch our breaths, heal any small wounds that we had and recover until we were ready to move on.
Most of us were fine, except for Sanor, who was heavily panting still, from all this cardio he had to do. He pulled out of his pouch a piece of stale bread, just like the one Jack gave me earlier today, and popped it into his mouth, making his exhaustion vanish.
Jack and Wrel were particularly fine. They were significantly higher level than all of us, after all, and Wrel did not really move all that much during the whole fight.
"Wow, those spike traps really saved us there," I said, relieved, mostly to break the silence. "Does anyone want any octopus, by the way? I've heard it tastes like chicken."
No one was up for the offer. Maybe because the octopus was still a bit raw and dirty. I decided to attach it on my lower traps, and keep it for later.
"Yeah, the traps were really cool, weren't they?" said Wrel with sparkles in her eyes. As an Assassin, she probably really liked traps and tricks.
Everyone agreed, except Tim, who was still shocked by the traps' proximity, as with one wrong step he would be the one skewered by the spikes.
"We were really lucky to have them work for us like that. I can't believe we managed to somehow dodge all of them," I said.
Jack and Wrel gave me a weird look after saying that.
"They didn't-o—"
"This was not luck," said Wrel, interrupting Jack. "This was me. I created the traps with my magic; they weren't there before, that's why we did not step on them. You really thought that I would just stay in the middle and do nothing while watching my guildmates—and a scoundrel—fight?" she chuckled.
That was exactly what I thought she was going to do.
I laughed awkwardly.
"Of course not... haha... octopus?"
"It's hard for me, as an Assassin, to fight in a crowd like that; what am I going to do? Sneak behind every single spider and cut their throat? I would be even more disadvantaged than Sanor was in this fight. That is why I learned to create and use traps; mostly for cases like this and when I need to run away from someone," she explained.
I was definitely glad to hear that. Not just because having an [Ability] like that was really valuable and would me of much help for the team—already was actually—but also because I was not sure about how much I could get along with a person that has a "You guys do the work, I'll oversee you" attitude.
This was such a cool [Ability] I was almost jealous. I wondered if I could somehow use it too. It would be really helpful in future expeditions, especially if travelling alone. But she said she did it by using her magic to create it. I did not know how to use mine. I did not know what magic even was at that point.
"Can everyone use magic to create traps, just like you?" I asked, full of curiosity.
"You tell me," she said playfully. "Have you seen a lot of people doing something like that?"
I had not seen a lot of people in general so far, but I had a feeling that even if I had, maybe just a handful of them would be able to pull off something like this. I shook my head. "No."
"I am a [Conjurer]. That is my [Affinity]. It means that it's easier for me to do things like that. To create things out of magic energy. I don't know what your affinity is, but if it's the same as mine, you might be able to do this, too."
[Affinity]. I remembered this word. That's right, it's that thing in my profile screen. I never paid much attention to it, since it always said "None" next to it. I opened the screen to check once again, but unfortunately nothing had changed.
Affinity: None
"I don't have an [Affinity]," I sighed, disappointed.
"You don't?" Wrel said, surprised. "That's really unfortunate."
"Jinden-o has-o not-o evolved-o yet-o," Jack joined the conversation.
"Oh, okay; it's fine then," she replied. "With the way he fought, I thought he already did."
"Evolved?" I asked, more confused than ever. I was unable to follow the conversation anymore, but it did seem to me like I had just received a compliment, which I happily accepted.
"Evolved-o is-o a person-o who has-o received-o a class-o. You would-o have yours-o by now if-o we were not-o in-o a hurry to reach-o this-o dungeon-o. Getting-o you a class-o will-o be the first-o thing-o we will-o do after-o we return-o. Some show signs-o of-o their-o [Affinity] even-o before they get-o evolved-o, but-o, most-o people get-o their-o [Affinity] truly revealed-o once they do go through-o the process-o of-o evolution-o. Some get-o their-o [Affinity] later-o. Some never-o."
The fact that I could still get an [Affinity] in the future was great news. On the other hand, hearing there was still a possibility I would never get one, was not really great news.
I was eager to learn more, but that was not the right time for it. For now, we had to go deeper into the dungeon. Everyone was well-rested now and staying there for longer would only be a waste of time, so we all got up, packed any stuff we had brought out of our pouches, I placed my octopus back on my traps, and went our merry way to slay more arachnoids.
I was not sure if that was indeed the case or not, but ever since I started wielding Illuminator, I felt like I was stronger and my movement was almost dancelike.
I checked my stats and figured out that this was not just a feeling after all.
[Available Stat Points: 0]
[Vitality]: 15
[Strength]: 20 (+3) (=23)
[Endurance]: 15 (-1) (=14)
[Wisdom]: 16
[Agility]: 21 (+2) (=23)
[Perception]: 16
Illuminator gave and Illuminator took. But it was a really positive net effect; a trade I was happy to make.
We finally all stood up and continued walking. We found just a few more spiders and we had Jack deal with them, because being the leader comes with certain responsibilities, and then we reached another hole that was conveniently shaped like a door.
The moment we passed through the door, we immediately stopped and looked up at that thing in front of us.
"It's not like the spiders we fought earlier were small or anything, but what the fuck is this shit?"