{What are you doing?}
[Be quiet. I’m concentrating.]
It had been about ten hours since the breach, and [N] was watching the Mn go up with soul-crushingly slow speed.
Behind it, {A} was playing with the spider, which had created an almost invisible thread hanging from the ceiling. The spider was using it to swing around, trying to land on {A}’s surface. It looked like fun and, as a direct result, was likely inefficient.
Finally, the number flicked up to twenty and [N] triumphantly focused, the drain slamming into it as it employed its skill.
[N] successfully summoned a [Toxic Spider] Lv. 1! Toxic Spider has been perma-bound to [N]’s desires!
The small cloud of green dust collected into the shape of a spider, but it looked different from {A}’s. This one had a slight hint of green and was a little bulkier, with two gently dripping fangs. The liquid coming off of its fangs sizzled as it hit the ground.
[Now this is a spider!]
{A}’s spider seemed a little nervous about the new arrival, backing away slightly and hiding behind the sister core, taking its top hat off with a single delicate leg.
{Why does yours look so different?}
[I don’t know - you wanted something cute, I wanted something dangerous.]
The spider hissed quietly, then walked up the walls and began weaving a faint olive-colored web across the ceiling.
[See? He’s already planning a trap.]
{Or he’s making a house - he could still be really nice!}
[I’m not going for nice, I’m going for deadly.]
{A}’s spider put its hat back on and followed the other one cautiously, before making its own web underneath the green one.
Moving over to the back wall, the core floated there for a moment, clearly thinking.
[N] was curious in spite of itself. [What are you doing?]
{Deciding how we should use our SP to make the cave bigger. If we use all of it at once, then we can’t do anything with it later.}
Quickly checking the menu, [N] discovered that their SP had gone up to sixty.
[What are you planning?]
The blue core floated around, examining the edges of their cave. {Well, I think that the reason we used all of it earlier is that I pictured a smooth entry.}
It caught on to what the other was saying. [You think that if you put less detail in, the cave will fill in the cracks and cost less.]
{More or less. Do you think it’s a good idea?}
[It’s genius. Do you mind if I try?]
{Go ahead!}
Moving past the sister core, [N] focused on using the SP, and got a strange feeling. The only way to describe it was that it could sense the limits of the cave, of the whole size of it. They could make a crack an inch thick extending sixty feet back, or it could spread the space out more, increasing the overall size of the cave. It was a strange feeling.
Eventually, it decided to expand further back, widening the sides as it did so, and the SP dropped to nothing again. Their cave was now about fifteen feet wide and a little over twenty long, with the corners a little more defined, making it a rectangular shape.
Both of their spiders dropped from the ceiling as the walls pulled away, taking the already intricate network of webs with them. The green one rolled midair and landed squarely on its legs, making tiny indents with its feet, while the blue Snazzy Spider landed in a cartwheel, rolling into a neat bow. Hissing, the Toxic turned and went back up the wall, weaving a web in its obvious annoyance.
{I’m naming mine Petey. What are you going to call yours?}
[You’re giving it a name?]
Naming Snazzy Spider! Insufficient Mn available - All acquired Mn to be deducted over next 15 hrs!
The spider was infused with blue, slightly growing. His hat gained a cyan ribbon around the base, neatly tied with a bow, and the glow faded. A moment later, Petey was standing before them, waltzing proudly around the cave floor, a good three inches long.
[...Giving it a name makes it stronger? And we’re in debt? I didn’t know that’s how that worked!]
{But look at him! He looks so happy!}
A notification appeared, and [N] floated over to it.
Petey (Snazzy Spider) Lv. 1
End: 4
Str: 3
Ag: 6
Int: 9
Chr: 11
Skills: N/A
Traits: Fancy Dresser Lv. 1
Perks: N/A
[He gets his own abilities now? We have to name mine now.]
{I think we have to wait until our Mn: counter catches up, and that might be a while. What do you think all of that stuff means? The ‘end’, and the ‘str’ and all of that?}
The cores both thought about it for a few minutes.
{I think… that the ‘chr’ thing - that might be charm, or charisma or something. He’s just so cute, you know what I mean?}
[He doesn’t look very strong, though. It would make sense that the first two are endurance and strength, or at least that’s what I’m going to assume.]
{So the last two… intelligence, maybe?}
[That seems reasonable. Meaning the final one is agility? As in speed, or reacting and stuff like that?]
{Ooh, good one! So, until we can figure it out for sure, those are what we’re calling them?}
[Sure thing. Now what do we do?]
{I think you should go play with your spider. Get to know him a little better, you know?}
[N] sighed mentally. [Fine.]
As it floated away, {A} happily turned to Petey and discovered him chewing on something.
{What have you got there?}
A notice dinged, catching her attention.
Petey has gained 2 Exp from Small Bug! Petey leveled up! Ag: increased by 1 point! Int: increased by 1 point! Chr: increased by 2 points!
[N] zipped back over. [Level up? How did he level up from such a tiny amount - is this ‘exp’ stuff worth a lot, or is Petey just a low level? I need to know more about this!]
{We can worry about that later! Look how happy he is!}
Indeed, the spider was dancing around happily, flicking his hat between his legs before flipping it back onto his head, bowing deeply. The green spider on the ceiling rolled all eight of its eyes and started making a thicker web, wondering if it could strangle anything with it.
Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.
Cooing quietly, {A} talked to Petey in a low voice, and [N] floated up to her summon. [We’re going to name you,] she told it conversationally, and in a darker tone, [and we’re going to level the heck out of you when that happens.]
The spider’s mandibles perked up slightly. It liked the sound of that.
-----------------------------
{There’s one over here - come on, Petey!}
The spider leaped over, firing a thread at the ceiling and acrobatically twisting through the air before landing neatly.
{It’s getting away!}
Reminded of his purpose, Petey lunged downwards and bit down.
Petey has gained 2 Exp from Small Bug! Petey leveled up! All stats improved by 1 point! Perk acquired!
The blue core happily whizzed around the Snazzy Spider, and it danced in its excitement. In the corner, irritably staring at the menu while waiting for the Mn to go back up, [N] sighed. The sister core had been hunting down bugs and feeding them to Petey for hours at this point, and they’d quickly discovered that the bugs really didn’t grant very much of the Exp. More to the point, it wasn’t a good idea to get attached to whatever they summoned since it was probably going to die at some point. Regardless, it decided to check on the spider’s stats.
Petey (Snazzy Spider) Lv. 5
End: 5
Str: 4
Ag: 10
Int: 13
Chr: 18
Skills: N/A
Traits: Fancy Dresser Lv. 1
Perks: Showman Lv. 1
[N]’s attention was grabbed by the new addition. What was a perk? Was it an alternate method of gaining strength? Could the cores get any? She hadn’t remembered seeing anything along those lines.
Floating over to the entrance, she checked on the Toxic Spider, who was skillfully weaving webs all over the entrance.
[Try putting a tripwire right… here.] She was hovering about three inches from the ground, and focused, using some of their valuable SP to make a pair of hooks on each side of the tunnel. The spider practically grinned, rapidly looping several lines of web around the hooks before securing it, drawing it taut. Staring at the effective trap, [N] was pleased, but not quite done. Shoving the ground down, she raised the center until a sharp spike formed. All in all, it cost a full six SP out of their current reserves of thirty-eight. It was worth it as far as the core was concerned - now, whatever tripped on the wire would hopefully get impaled.
{[N]! The SP just went down! I promise I didn’t - what’s that?}
With Petey riding it, the sister core wove into view and saw the spike.
[It’s a trap. Whatever shows up will die for sure!]
{We can’t kill stuff - that’d be mean!}
[You’ve fed every bug in this cave to Petey over the past six hours. How is this different? I’m just feeding us.]
{How do you know that would work? You might have just killed something for no reason!}
[We killed the spiders earlier and got their formats. If something dies in here, we get to keep it.]
{Well-}
The other core was clearly having a difficult time getting around its logic, before coming to the same conclusion somewhat hesitantly. {I guess you’re right. But no babies, bug or otherwise.}
[I don’t have a problem with that.]
[N] didn’t want any of her formats to be kids anyway. They wouldn’t be able to defend themselves very well, and it’d have to raise them, which would likely cost valuable time and resources. Aside from that, the smaller creatures likely wouldn’t give very much in the way of Exp.
A skittering sound distracted both of them, and a strange feeling crossed them as if someone had poked their souls. It was an extraordinarily uncomfortable sensation, like an unscratchable itch.
{What is that?}
[We need to get rid of it!]
Floating to the entrance, the two cores saw the source of their trouble. It was a tiny gray mouse, curiously investigating the flawlessly circular hole in the ground.
{...Okay, that’s cute, but it needs to go. I can’t stand that weird feeling!}
[Kill it!]
{Well, that might be a little excessive - couldn’t we scare it off?}
The mouse hopped in, its tail flopping all over the place. It apparently didn’t notice the webs decorating the ceiling and walked forward skittishly, pausing to clean its whiskers. It moved straight underneath the tripwire and didn’t even see the spike.
Above it, both of their spiders watched carefully, Petey messing with his hat anxiously.
As it crawled towards the core room (the only room, really) the itch intensified until it was unbearable.
{Okay, that thing needs to go!}
[Agreed! Though its death would be nice too!]
Dropping from the ceiling, Petey fell into a strange-looking cartwheel and ended up in front of the startled mouse, bowing with his top-hat forward.
The mouse blinked, clearly curious, while [N]’s spider silently spun its way down. As Petey placed his hat back on his head, the mouse sat back on its haunches.
{Well, that’s not so-}
Lunging forward suddenly, the mouse bit down on Petey, and {A} screamed.
[KILL IT!]
{SAVE PETEY!}
The Toxic Spider snapped its own web and landed directly on top of the mouse, biting it in the back of the neck. Shocked, the mouse dropped Petey, who curled up into a ball, legs twitching, and jumped back towards the rock wall, trying to crush it. With surprising reflexes, the larger spider moved around and bit it again, poison dripping from its fangs.
Rolling over rapidly, the mouse squeaked in panic, trying to attack, but its movements were already getting weaker. A small stick-like object fell out of its mouth, and it took the cores a moment to realize it was Petey’s severed leg.
{A} yelled in rage, startling the other core. {Kill it! [N], tell your spider to kill it now!]
[But we could examine-]
{NOW!}
The core decided that no amount of research was worth the fury that its sister was currently under and became quiet.
The Toxic Spider began wrapping the mouse in strands of web, and it began twitching as it slowly died. As it succumbed to another bite, it became still.
Toxic Spider has gained 18 Exp from Gray Mouse! Toxic Spider leveled up twice! All stats improved by 1 point!
The itch disappeared, and {A} instantly went to check on Petey. The spider didn’t look too good, and his top hat had rolled away. The bite had entirely and, for the most part, cleanly taken his rearmost left leg off.
While {A} hovered around the tiny spider, [N] hovered back, unsure of what to do. As far as it was concerned, Petey was a special spider due to its name and hat but wasn’t especially valuable in the long run. It was unlikely that any of their original creations would survive very long, if at all, and Petey was just an example of that.
A ding distracted both of them.
Your first natural enemy has been defeated on the first attempt! One level has been distributed! All debts cleared!
A strange rush of energy swept the room, and the cores began to glow brighter and grew a little bit larger. The Toxic Spider’s hairs stood on end, and it began hoisting the mouse’s corpse up to the ceiling. Petey uncurled slightly.
[We got a level up? Like your spider?]
{Maybe there’s something we can use to help him!}
It floated over to the menu in its fixed position and examined their abilities.
Name: [N]
Name: {A}
Race: Dungeon
Race: Dungeon
Class: Basic Core Lv. 2
Class: Basic Core Lv. 2
Mn: 0 (2/h)
Mn: 0 (2/h)
Esnc: 1
Esnc: 1
SP: 33 (0.2/m)
SP: 33 (0.2/m)
Skills: Innate Mana Control Lv. 1
Basic Summoning Lv. 1
Skills: Innate Mana Control Lv. 1
Basic Summoning Lv. 1
Blu: 1
Blu: 1
Population: (1) Toxic Spider Lv. 3
Population: (1) Petey Lv. 5
{A} sighed in disappointment. {There’s nothing here about healing Petey!}
The sister core considered what it was going to say before asking cautiously, [What if my spider eats him?]
A shocking wave of fury hit the core and physically pushed it away, sending small eddies of air through the cave. {A} answered coldly. {No one hurts Petey.}
[N] wisely decided not to push it and went to go check on its spider. It didn’t understand {A}’s desire to keep its spider alive - missing any limbs was a huge detriment to anything, although it supposed the condition wasn’t quite as serious for a spider. It already had plenty of legs to spare. Regardless, it was highly inefficient to care so much about such an insignificant creature that wouldn’t survive for very long, especially not when injured.
At any rate, their debt had been cleared. Time to start a new one - it was going to give its Toxic Spider a name.
{A} floated over. {What are you doing?}
[Giving it a name.]
{Ooh, can I help?}
[N] snorted. [Of course not. You’d end up naming it Britney or something.]
Naming Toxic Spider! Insufficient Mn available - All acquired Mn to be deducted over next 15 hrs!
It was stunned. [Wait, I didn’t mean to -]
A swirl of green picked the spider off the ground, and the cores could literally see it changing before their eyes. A moment later, the spider - Britney, apparently - landed on the ground. It was noticeably larger than Petey, around five inches long, and looked quite a bit stronger.
Previous levels noted! Allocating stats accordingly… complete!
[N] groaned in frustration. It’d wanted to call it something threatening, though it hadn’t had anything specific in mind. Now it just had a Toxic Spider named Britney. It decided to check her stats and see if they made her feel better.
Britney (Toxic Spider) Lv. 3
End: 11
Str: 9
Ag: 5
Int: 7
Chr: 3
Skills: Poisonous Bite
Traits: Threatening Lv. 1
Perks: N/A
It did indeed make her feel better.