18 Chapter 18 Tis A Spiders World?
After killing three of the eight remaining spiders the rest of the party got excited and decided that they won't be beaten by a newcomer, let alone a goblin. They rushed forward attacking the remaining five spiders with vigor. The spiders weren't able to defend against eighteen dwarven axes falling upon them. They all died one by one, being cut to pieces by the relentless onslaught of the dwarves.
In only a few short minutes all the spiders had been killed. Seeing the ease in which it took them to dispatch the spiders the adventure guild members gained a false sense of strength, thinking that the spiders were all weaker than them and that they didn't have anything to worry about.
"All right everyone, let's take a break and regain our stamina from fighting these spiders", the guild master says while looking at the spiders they killed and the spiders I killed.
Before I rejoin the group, I collect the six E rank cores from the spiders I just killed and add them to the six I got earlier. Since we are taking a break I decide to begin absorbing them so I take six and my clone takes six and we proceed to absorb them while sitting down with our backs against the bridge.
After about an hour of resting my clone and I manage to absorb all twelve cores, I say to myself as I check my status as I distribute some of my free points.
Status:
Race - Goblin
Title - Nephelium's Successor
Soul Rank - Mortal (progressive)
E Rank
Strength - 100 (20)
Intelligence - 200
Stamina - 100 (25)
Dexterity - 95 (15)
Vitality - 95 (20)
Agility - 100 (25)
Magic - Infinite
Luck - Blessing of Fortuna
Available Attribute Points - 1
Skills:
Awareness Rank E
Slash Rank E
Appraisal Rank E
Sneak Rank E
Craftsman Rank E
Aegis Rank E
Hallowed Ground Rank E
Magic Bullet Rank E
Innate Skills:
Creation (Active) Divine Rank
Blessing of Fortuna (Passive) Divine Rank
Genesis (Active) Divine Rank
Unique Skill:
Lux Artis (Passive)
After using all but one point I begin to walk back towards the group just as they all begin to get up to continue across the bridge.
"Guild master, what do you want to do next? Do we keep progressing towards the city or should we head back to camp and rest for the night and come back tomorrow? I ask as I reach the group.
All the guild members start saying that they should keep going since they've only seen the twelve spider and after killing five of them, they think they can kill any that come their way.
"Well since these fools want to keep going and I don't want to listen to their complaints, we will continue forward for now," the guild master decides.
"That's fine with me, I'm getting stronger and stronger the more spiders I kill," I say casually.
"Is that so, well let's continue forward, lead the way and keep informing us when there are spiders like you've been, if you don't mind," the guild master says.
"Sure thing," I say as we start walking towards the city. My clone no longer in sight everyone thinks I canceled the skill to save mana, little did they know I won't ever run out so there's no reason for me to cancel the skill.
While I was talking to the group my clone was making its way into the city to scout out the area. He made sure to not be noticed by any of the spiders, so he was using his sneak skill to move through the shadows while venturing into the cities depths.
As he made his way into the city through the man gate, he sees nothing but webs covering every house and building along the main road. The streetlights were all still working properly and surprisingly they weren't all covered in webs to diminish their light. It's almost as if they're left uncovered so anyone that enters will be able to see where they're walking.
Moving further into the city, keeping to the shadows, my clone makes it to the city square and sees an enormous hole in the center of the square. It resembles a cave of sorts or a burrow that leads down under the city. After carefully observing his surrounding with his awareness noting where the few spiders are, he makes his way to the entrance to the hole and looks inside of it.
The hole itself is roughly forty feet in diameter and it slopes down under the city at a gradually angle, it slopes just enough for someone to walk down without too much trouble. It's lined with webbing covering the entire surface of the hole as it goes down, making it appear more ominous than one would originally think about a hole in the ground.
Keeping his awareness on high, he makes his way into the hole slowly due to the lack of places he can hide now. As he follows the hole it seems to go on for hundreds of feet, due to it being made by something other than the dwarves, there aren't any light sources, so my clone has to rely on his inherent night vision to see his surroundings.
After several minutes the ground starts to flatten out and he arrives at the bottom of the hole that seems to be a ledge of some sort. Walking onto the ledge he sees a massive cavern in front of him, and he's utterly in shock. The cavern is monstrous, it looks to be big enough to fit the entire Marbelium Mountain inside of it and still have room. All around the cavern there are giant webs covering the entire cavern. It looks to be an entire forest made of webs, there are stalagmite and stalactite columns that have webs connecting them together making it look like there are bridges made of webs throughout the nature cavern.
In this cavern if one were to describe it, the only thing that would be an accurate description, would be that this cavern is a spiders world, there have to be thousands upon thousands of spiders living down here. As my clone looks out over the spider city, he notices that towards the back of the cavern is a large web made of thousands of smaller webs with an enormous Scarlet Death Spider resting upon in. The web is thousands of feet away from him but even still this spider is clearly visible.
That must be the queen, he thinks to himself. If he can see her from this far away and she still looks enormous from here, he can't even imagine how big she is when you're right in front of her, she has to be at least sixty feet tall. He doesn't think this expedition is going to be able to kill her let alone kill every single spider here. He has got to let the guild master know what he's seen so we can decide what to do from here on out.
My clone disappears after having seen the cavern and sharing all the information with my original self. As my clone is observing everything I can also see everything my clone can and is shocked by the sight.
Seeing his reaction, the guild master is quite concerned to see the look on his face. "What's wrong? Why do you look so shocked?" The guild master asks me.
"Follow me," I say to Damian and the guild master.
After walking several feet away with the two of them following him, I begin to tell them what my clone has discovered. Going through all the details of what he saw throughout the city and about the cavern underneath it, their expressions go from shocked to terrified.
"If what you're saying is true, we don't stand a chance against the queen. Let alone trying to kill thousands of spiders," the guild master says eventually.
"I don't understand how there can be so many of them and we never noticed. Also how did they end up in that underground cavern in the first place? From what you've described it seems like they dug up into the city from this cavern. If that's the case then they may have been under the city the whole time without our ancestors knowing about it and they have started to expand their territory to accommodate their massive population," the guild master says out loud as he's thinking over all the information.
"We'll have to inform the rest of the expedition members and see what we need to do moving forward. I highly doubt we can clear the nest, but we might be able to thin out the population enough that it'll take them several decades to gain enough numbers again. We might even have to make this a regular event where we come and thin them out," the guild master mutters to himself deep in thought.
Soon after, the trio went over everything about the city and the cavern amongst themselves, they went back over to the rest of the members of the expedition to discuss it with them and see what their thoughts on the matter are. Since they would be the ones risking their lives to fight the spiders it's only fair that they get to decide whether or not they want to. Even though he is the guild master he can't force his members to lay down their lives when it isn't necessary.
