Tip tap tap tap tip, tip tap tap tap tip, tip tap tap tap tip. The sounds of the mechanical spider almost sent shivers down Fia’s spine. The sound was much, much quieter than it should be for its size, and the needle-like points on the ends of its legs contacting the stone of the cave was likely one of the few times it ever made sound. On wood, soil, or carpet, it would be imperceptible to even those wth high senses. Looking at it, she expected whirring and whizzing and clinking and clanging. However, it was much simpler and elegant than it actually appeared. Each of its individual legs were made of a few thin pieces of metal, with metal wires acting as muscle to manipulate the appendages. Its ‘shell’ was also a few pieces of metal, but more like a frame, with huge open holes that showed its mechanical insides. In place of its abdomen was a reel like on a fishing rod, spun with razor-sharp wire. It was covered in a thin layer of leather in places, and the metal looked to be a mix of copper, brass, and bronze, other than the steel wire. Its cephalothorax was where most of the moving parts were, well-oiled pistons, hair-thin gears and gyroscopes, and more metal wires pulling and pushing things. All things considered, she expected it to be a noisy cacophony of metallic sounds, and yet it was nearly entirely silent.
It definitely seemed more insect-like than the other creatures she had. The palm-sized web weavers seemed to move with more intelligence and purpose than this small-dog-sized-construct. Its legs would slowly prod and poke the air, feeling its way around, even though it obviously had a sense of sight somehow. For certain, it looked and acted like a spider.
She doubted she’d ever understand how it worked, even if she spent years just analyzing it. Despite not being a living thing, it understood and reacted to her commands. Come here, go there, string up a web, ect. It obeyed them all. Obviously, magic was involved. She didn’t know much about golems, but she figured she’d just treat it like an undead. Simple-minded, but not inanimate.
The most important thing about the Clockwork Spider Thief to her was its webs, or rather, wires. It had the ability to make two different kinds of wires. One was a very, very, very thin metal wire, as thin as a single strand of Fia’s own silky hair. It was deceptively strong, however, and trying to pull at it with a bare hand, or maybe even with gloves, would cause it to immediately slice through to the bone. Assuming one’s Health barrier didn’t soak up the damage. Its second wire type was much thicker razor-wire, with barbs and burs twisted into the wire at regular intervals. In between them, the wire was too thick to cut someone and could be safely handled, but running your hand across it would definitely hurt. She suspected that the first type of wire would be easily cut through by tools such as knives, swords, and shears, though not without also damaging the tool. The second type of wire, being much thicker, was not likely to be cut by a bladed weapon, and would require special tools, or something enchanted. Of course, this was assuming low-leveled adventurers or unawakened. Higher-leveled people would be able to swing with the force and speed to cut through metal and stone, especially if they had a weapon that could hold up to their stats. Plus, the wire was just steel, and wouldn’t hold up to stronger metals like scarletite, mithril, orichalcum, or, gods-forbid, adamantine.
Finally, after observing it with her own eyes for a while, she took a look at what the System had to say about it.
[Clockwork Spider Thief]
Level 50
Spider Construct Monster
Clockwork Spider Thieves are a machine-like construct made from now-unknown means long ago. Under normal circumstances, they only recognize their creator and anyone designated by their creator as a master to follow orders from. Powered using only mana as fuel, they are not technically clockwork, though their aesthetics can be described as such. The heavily enchanted mystarite crystals in their core make them act more akin to simple drones, without any artificial intelligence. They have no soul or living biological material in their makeup, and most spells that do not target constructs specifically will fail to recognize them as a creature. In combination with a skill called [Immutable Form], this makes them immune to most all spells that would change their form, such as [Polymorph]-like spells. A masterless Clockwork Spider Thief will not attack anyone unprovoked, but will defend itself to the death. One with a master will follow any orders it is able, even leading to its own destruction, without care. They are able to effortlessly climb walls, cross gaps, and ensnare items and victims with their wires. They are very popular for the odd thief or thieves guild that can get their hands on one they are able to give commands to.
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Like the ettercaps, they got a longer description than the weaker creatures under her control. She didn’t understand half of the jargon the system threw at her, suspecting it might be in better hands under an [Artificer] or such, but she got most of it that mattered. It would be useful.
Immediately, she set it to work, telling it to leave razor wires of both types randomly throughout [The Webbed Halls]. She did stop it from doing so in the cave proper, however, for a few reasons. In the future, she would want some amount of people braving her dungeon, but she didn’t want all of them to immediately die. Adventurers who made it out alive would attract more adventurers of their level to her dungeon. If no one ever did, the only people who came would be stronger ones, and that would be dangerous for her. Don’t throw all of your traps at the entrance. Let it become progressively stronger deeper down. It was a common thing most all dungeons did, with a few exceptions, and it was for a good reason. Sure, she could turn her dungeon into an impassable deathtrap-filled fortress. Until it pissed off the right gold ranker who would sweep through and destroy her core. For now, she’d have the spider thieves just have the odd razor wire through [The Webbed Halls], making up roughly 10% of the webs criss-crossing through the halls, for ease of navigation for herself and her monsters, and to slow down and make adventurers more wary of the halls. The truly defended place would be the [Loot Room], which now contained her core. That room would be a death-pit aimed at slicing heads and limbs off with the razor wires, for those who couldn’t tell the difference between wire and web.
Over the course of the next few days, Fia had the ettercaps get back to work excavating new tunnels, but the more she thought about that, the less she liked that idea. Originally, her plan had been to expand the webbed halls more and more, creating a sort of maze. But her gut told her making new floors would be a better idea. Maybe future skills depended on a deeper rather than wider philosophy. It wasn’t anything definitive or obvious, more of just a guess than instinct, but she decided to listen to it. The half-way finished halls would remain that way for the time being, and instead, the ettercaps would start a staircase down to a new floor of the dungeon.
Her dungeon would be gaining Floor 2 soon enough.
The webbed halls, the second half of floor one, would be a loot area for weak, crappy loot in the future. Small coin purses, unmaintained swords, random tools. Once floor two was in better shape, she would move the bulk of her monsters, and her core and loot room, down to that floor. Floor one would just have web weavers and common spiders. Enough for adventurers to come take a look around, fight ‘trash mobs,’ get cut on the random razor web and get caught in regular webs, activate primitive traps, but otherwise it would not be a deadly or dangerous floor at all. It would just give them a taste of the dungeon.
That was her current plan. Create new floors, always have the core on the lowest floor, always have the lowest floor be the strongest and most dangerous floor, then as new floors were created and everything was moved down, the old lowest floor, now second lowest, would be left weaker than before, but more powerful than the floors above. Hopefully with time it would create a gradient of danger, and make her dungeon attractive to keep around, and not attractive to destroy. Another important thing of note was that floor 1 had no doors, no chests, no furniture, nothing of the sort. Loot was held in web sacks and rooms were separated by curtains. She’d change that, too.
Things would come along, slowly.