Along with the system warning, the spiders let out a deafening screech. The closest enemy lunged itself at Crowfest, the two largest legs at the front up and ready to pounce. Oozing from between its massive fangs, vile, green venom dripped into the stone below, exposing its acidic property when it melted a hole in the ground.
She dashed to the side, her swift moment narrowly avoiding the mandible-like claws. The dark spears found themselves impaled deep into the rocks. And the momentary immobility left room for her to counterattack.
Though weak, her daggers sliced through the fleshy joints between one of the spider’s legs. With a little more force, her second cut managed to sever the leg completely from the body.
The spider let out a screech of pain, the boost of adrenaline allowing it to lift its limbs from the floor. It attempted to turn toward its attacker, but a sudden attack struck it dead in the eyes.
While the monster was disoriented, its friends finally found the chance to join in the fight. With Ruelle in the middle of the battlefield, the three other spiders stood in the way, blocking any potential exit.
Silas casted several more magic missiles, aiming them straight at the first spider’s face. The attacks crashed hard into it, each connected hit causing a minor explosion that dented the arachnid’s armor. It was now blinded.
With nowhere to go but back, Ruelle leaped onto the disabled spider. Feeling an unknown weight on its back, the monster shrieked and began to thrash. It did nothing to shake her off either, the more it moved, the further its allies stepped back to avoid crashing into one another.
“This isn’t a game,” Crowfest thought as a triumphant grin crept to her lips. Her daggers dug deep into the spider’s back, and she ignored its scream while she slowly crawled closer to the monster’s head. “As long as it kills you, this is a free-for-all.”
She found the gap in between the arachnid’s skeleton. It moved back and forth along with the spider’s thrashing head, exposing a hint of red under it. Freeing one of her knives, she drove the blade into the flesh beneath its armor, this time the monster’s screech was loud enough to shake the entire cave.
”Rez!”
“On it!” RetiZn casted two magic missiles, firing them into the spider’s face once more. It did not scream, only toppled forward and fell onto the cold, stone floor, green liquid oozing from its mouth and wounds.
But it was still alive. Ruelle dislodged both her knives before impaling them through the monster’s skull. An echoing ‘crack!’ bounced through the cave. The spider’s limbs twitched one last time, before going as still as the dead.
[Killed 1
[Detecting
[Due to the environment
[Greatest contributor is ‘Ruelle Peregrine’. EXP has been distributed.]
[‘Ruelle Peregrine’ has leveled up! LVL: 3]
[‘Silas Salvador’ has leveled up! LVL: 2]
Crowfest jumped off from the dead spider’s back, wiping the putrid green blood from her cheek with the back of her hand. The satisfied grin never left her face. “Well, there’s three of them left.”
“Distribute three stat points to Speed, and the rest into Strength.”
[Stat Distribution complete. Would you like to view your Status Window?]
“Save it. I’m sort of busy here.”
Unauthorized use of content: if you find this story on Amazon, report the violation.
The moment she finished her thoughts, one of the spiders rushed towards her with its mouth opened wide. Although, its monstrous screech got shut off by Silas’ magic missile. Its strength appeared to have increased, and it wasn’t difficult to guess what he’d spent his three stat points on.
“Nice assist,” Ruelle didn’t keep her attention off her enemies. With her daggers at the ready, she rushed towards the staggering spider, her newfound speed leaving no room for it to react. ”Careful of drawing the other ones’ attention.”
“Too late for that.” Silas carefully walked around the cave, his eyes trained on the two remaining spiders. Their mouths were slivilating with venom, and their gem-like eyes clearly had ‘food’ written within their unsettling shine.
But with the increase in his magic stat, he shouldn’t have a problem holding them off on his own while he waited for Ruelle to finish killing the other one.
The spiders eyeing Silas attempted to creep closer, though they were met with a magic missile to the face each. A singular attack was enough to make them lose their balance, the dent in their exoskeleton was deep enough for a piece of their broken armor to pierce into flesh.
One stood back up after a bit of a struggle, while the other laid on the ground, letting out tiny pained shrieks. It would’ve looked pitiful if it weren’t trying to kill him just a moment ago.
“C’mon now, what’s taking you so long?” He glanced at Ruelle, feeling his grip tightening against the Sapphire Staff. While it may look like he’s perfectly fine, he was already using more mana than he should. “You need to have two mana-usage skills to see the mana gauge…I don’t even know if I have anymore left to use.”
[Killed 1
[Detecting
[Due to the environment
[Greatest contributor is ‘Ruelle Peregrine’. EXP has been distributed.]
Luckily, it didn’t take long for the second spider to go down. Ruelle leaped from the dead monster’s head and put herself between Silas and the remaining enemies. “Did you run out of mana already?”
“Probably.” It was the only thing he could say. He didn’t notice before, but it was getting harder and harder for him to stand straight. Most of his weight leaned towards the Sapphire Staff. “From the looks of it, I landed a critical hit, one of them isn’t getting up.”
“Then that guy’s dying first,” Ruelle rushed forward, her focus fixed on the immobiled spider. It had only one eye left, with half of its face already blown away by Silas’ critical magic missile.
But the other arachnid suddenly put itself in front of its fallen comrade. It let out a broken cry before launching at Ruelle. “How noble.” She didn’t have time to stop or change directions. “If you want to die first, so be it.”
She leaped directly into the enemy, letting her heels dig deep into the cracks between its armor. Using the rest of her momentum, she uses one dagger as an anchor, pulling her foot from the monster’s face before flipping onto its back. With her eyes now locked onto the spider’s weak spot, the daggers in her green-soaked grip swiftly ended the battle.
[Killed 1
[Detecting
[Due to the environment
[Greatest contributor is ‘Ruelle Peregrine’. EXP has been distributed.]
[‘Ruelle Peregrine’ has leveled up! LVL: 5]
[‘Silas Salvador’ has leveled up! LVL: 3]
[
”Ooh, I leveled up twice!” Ruelle slipped down to the ground just as Silas walked over to her.
They shared a glance at each other, but upon seeing the stupefied look on RetiZn’s face, Crowfest frowned. “…What’s wrong?”
“No, just—How did you do that?” He pointed towards the dead spider next to her. “I thought you were just fighting randomly before, but that just now…That doesn’t look like the moves of an amateur.”
“Oh,” Crow unsummoned her daggers, placing one hand behind her back. There was a slight blush on her face. “I forgot to tell you, but I took lessons in real life.”
“Martial arts lessons?”
“My dad’s a retired boxer, and my grandmother owns a dojo,” She shrugged. “My mom didn’t want me to learn how to fight, she was afraid I might grow up to be violent, though dad convinced her that it was for…self-defense.”
”…It didn’t look like it ended at just that.” Rez walked over to the last remaining spider.
”No,” A mischievous smile gave her eyes an unsettling gleam. “The real reason dad wanted to train me was because he wanted me to do parkour with him. I get to learn how to fight and how to run away.”
“Your dad’s very extreme…”
“Couldn’t have said it better. He’s really into extreme sport…” Rez faced her just in time to see her expression dropped. “…But he’s not here anymore though.”
“Ah…I’m sorry.” It was the first personal thing he’d learned about Crowfest. During their time quarreling and playing together online, they were only close enough to talk casually with each other.
“It’s been years, so it’s fine. I still miss him sometimes though,” Ruelle’s smile returned to her face. Her attention shifted to the last spider. “You can have that one, I’ve been getting all the last hits…and think of it as a thank you for listening to my story.”
“It was hardly long enough to be called a story though.” Silas could tell that it was a minor jest. With his given greenlight, he slammed the end of his staff down on the spider’s head, ridding it of its last few remaining hitpoints.
[Killed 1
[Due to the environment
[‘Silas Salvador’ has leveled up! LVL: 4]
[The