When he woke up, he was surprised to discover he was not in the cave with Elena anymore. Instead of the rocky walls and hard ground, he was sitting on soft earth, in the middle of a clearing surrounded by trees.

His expression changed from that of surprise to shock when he noticed the two pair of eyes peering at him from the border of the clearing, and then again to terror as the shapes of the two Wyverns walking towards him became more defined.

He scrambled to his feet and started to run the opposite way, but the sudden motion seemed to spur the Wyverns to act because they charged at him. He couldn't even cross half the distance to the edge of the forest that he was thrown to the ground by the monsters.

Biting and ripping, his flesh was torn apart and his limbs detached from his body, as the two Wyverns now covered in gore, feasted on his meat and blood.

He woke up, covered in sweat. Immediately, he sat up and tried to spot the monsters that attacked him, only to discover that he was back in the cave. It was only a dream. But for how long?

He stood up, wiping the sweat from his face using the hem of his shirt, and looked around, only to find that Elena was in the same predicament he had been in before.

She was writhing on the ground, trashing and half-mumbling something incomprehensible. She was also drenched in sweat, which made her dress stuck on her skin, accentuating her forms... he had to shake his head to clear it from his thoughts, and then he looked the other way.

Elena's minion was still guarding the entrance to the Titans nest, though it seemed they had yet to retaliate. In the center of the cave where they were resting, the King sat unmoving, almost as if it was dead, though sometimes you could see it's abdomen rise slowly and other parts of its body were twitching.

He laid his gaze upon Elena once more, to find that she was still suffering from her own nightmares. Elia felt a pang of pity in his heart at the sight.

She had told him what happened to her family, although the explanation was broken into pieces and put into different sentences. It wasn't something she was very willing to speak about.

Elia decided to lay one of his and on top of Elena's forehead and cast a simple Cleansing Spell.

Though it was usually used to cure poisoning, illnesses and curses, the soothing warmth of the blessing could sooth the heart and calm the spirit, bringing peace to the one it was used on.

Sure enough, Elena stopped moving and her breath slowed down, as she entered a peaceful sleep.

Elena woke up feeling lighter and more rested than usual. She felt unusually positive, which made her frown slightly.

But then she put her worries aside and concentrated on more important matters: breakfast.

After a light meal, Elena and Elia walked towards the last nest of spiders remaining, and she spurred her undead into motion, ordering them to enter the cave.

As soon as they felt intruders coming further into their territory, a couple of patrolling Titan Spiders attacked them, but they were quickly put down by Elena's new forces.

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Indeed, she had added five new Titan Spiders Skeletons using the mana she had recovered during the night, and they were a force to be recognized.

Each of them was slightly stronger than the normal living counterpart, and the five of them together packed quite a punch, making the procedure of clearing the caves ant tunnels faster and easier.

That and the fact that this was a much shorter cave system than the previous made the assault last only an hour scarce in total.

As usual, at the end of the nest a pillar made of stone was waiting for them, only this time a wooden staff leaned on the side of it.

After recovering it and putting it in her inventory, discovering it was a Dukk Heartwood Staff (+2 Intelligence), she handed it over to Elia.

When he just looked at her raising an eyebrow, she said: "We should split the gains". At that, Elia just nodded and took the Staff, also feeling the slight change in statistics, the increased intelligence making things easier to remember and enlarging his mana pool.

As soon as they came out of the Titans nest, the ground started to tremble slightly. Worried, they started to look around, only to find the source of the rumbling was that the entity in the middle of the cave was moving. The King was awake.

// BOSS ENTITY DETECTED. FIGHT!

It didn't take long for the massive spider to notice them, and as soon as it did it spat a giant web at them. Elena, Elia and most of the undead dodge to the side, scuttling and rolling and diving in every safe direction, but some got stuck into the webbing and were rendered unable to move.

Then, the King charged at the spread out forces of undead and impaled one of the Stone Centipedes using one of its long appendages like a spear, killing it on the spot.

Elena ordered most of her monster to group up together with Ro and Rao and distract the King, while she, Elia and another handful of hers circled around it looking for weak spots.

While the King engaged the biggest group of her undead, Elena and the others managed to get near one of its back legs. Then, she jumped on top of the only Titan Spiders in the group and made it climp up the leg of the King, followed by the rest of the group.

Seeing this, Elia decided to grab one of the Poison Spiders, which didn't even flinch as it started to climb the gigantic leg. Sometimes, he was really grateful for being so light and scrawny.

As soon as the Titan Spider reached the King's back, Elena jumped on top of it and started to hack at the white exoskeleton using her knife.

Unfortunately, the shell was too hard to succumb to her slashes and piercing attacks, so even with the help of the undead that came with her, she wasn't able to penetrate it using only a knife.

But then, she had an idea. She put the knife back into the inventory ring and from it, she took out one of the pickaxes in the best conditions, raise it high into the sky... and then brought it down.

The King stopped its attack towards the larger group of undead on the ground and shrieked. Then, he started to shrug its body, trying to throw down whatever was on top of its back.

Elena grabbed hard at the pickaxe and managed to stay on top of the King, but the other members of the assault party weren't so lucky, and they fell to the ground one after the other, though they didn't receive threatening injuries.

Elia also fell, but his fall was cushioned by the spider he was riding, so he was just a little dizzy.

Thinking it had gotten rid of all its attackers, the King stopped shrugging and got back on attacking the other threatening group. Unfortunately for it, it was wrong.

Elena took out the pickaxe from where she struck before, making the King shriek once again, and ran for its head.

Then, when she was almost there, she raised the pickaxe in the air while she was running, and dived into its head, piercing it.

Alas, the King was still alive, it wasn't enough to kill it, and this time when it started to struggle, it tore Elena down and threw her into the ground quite hard.

Then, the King raised one of its legs, and brought it down on her abdomen, piercing it and tearing flesh and bones apart.

For Elena, it was the end, and darkness flooded her being.