Battlefield Reclaimer, Ch 40: Hellish Spiders (Patreon)

The scream was coming from just outside the entrance to the cavern. It rose to a high-pitched shriek of pain that was accompanied by the dull thud-clank of an armored body striking stone and falling to the ground.

The skittering sound of clicks and metal scraping against stone filled the tunnel and poured into Sam’s ears as he shot to his feet, throwing both amulets into his pouch. His spear leapt into his hand as he lunged towards the entrance, surrounded in a swirl of crystal flame. Krana was right behind him, her warhammer leading the way.

Before he could arrive, his father was already there, surrounded in the golden gleam of stamina as his eyes flared red. He ducked into the hallway, shouting as he grabbed for the two guards. He was planning to drag them back inside, but by the time he arrived, it was too late.

“Spiders!” he shouted over his shoulder as he pulled his hammers from his belt. “They’re taking the guard! To the right!”

The warning from the World Law was still resonating in Sam’s ears. Whatever was happening, it was clear that this attack was related to an Outsider invasion. He’d never seen spiders in the tunnels before.

Whatever these spiders were, he didn’t want to be labeled even more Defiant than he already was, which meant that they had to die. As for the guards, he’d save them if possible. Maybe it would change their minds about him.

His essence pool was only about 80% full, since he had been slowly infusing the amulet, but it would have to do. He had a handful of auras to combust, and perhaps these spiders would add some more. A surge of crystal flame soared out of his body, condensing into the battle spiral that was ready to split off into other forms. He rushed out into the hallway, following his father as he held his spear at the ready.

The edges of a nascent Essence Shield flickered around him, ready to take full form as he looked in both directions. His father was running to the right, heading towards one of the guards that was being dragged down the tunnel.

There was an oversized black and red-striped spider with its fangs locked around the guard’s leg, dragging him as it retreated backwards. Its body was as broad across as an adult human, but it was shaped like an angular, black teardrop. It was covered in abstract red stripes that ran along the back of its carapace and swirled down across its legs and stomach.

Thin ridges rose up from its back that gleamed with sharp light, preventing anything from grabbing onto it. Its wide legs were armored and protected by black, serrated spikes that ran along the sides. Every edge of it looked dangerous.

A moment later, a prompt formed, giving it a name.

Red-Striped Hell Spider (Outsider)

Warning: An Outsider Invasion Has Been Detected in Your Vicinity.

It also confirmed that the spider was an Outsider, which meant that it was the target he needed to eliminate.

The spider was enormous, easily larger than one of the giant rats. It came up to his waist and its legs were wide enough that it almost filled the tunnel. He didn’t know how it had managed to creep up on the guards unnoticed, but maybe it had some ability to blend into the shadows.

Or maybe the guards were just useless.

To his left, the other guard, Yeres, was thrashing around on the ground. It looked like he’d been stabbed in the stomach by something, maybe a leg or a fang. That meant Lesat was the one being dragged away. The spider must have ambushed them both and then taken one off for a meal.

Behind him, the others began to pour out of the cavern. Krana was at his shoulder and Ayala was right behind.

“I’ll take care of Yeres and guard here as a fallback!” Ayala shouted as she came to a stop behind him and scanned the area, her eyes hardening. Her old fear of him had disappeared as something in her personality shifted. Perhaps it was facing the Outsider threat that her father had told her about. Her eyes shot down the tunnel to where the spider was dragging off the other guard.

“Save Lesat if you can!”

Her hands glowed with an intense silver light as earthen walls began to rise from the ground around them. She was using her new class abilities for the first time.

There wasn’t time for Sam to reply as he sprinted after his father, but he agreed with her choice to stay behind. They didn’t know how many more spiders were out there, and she was a low level. Krana kept pace with him, her warhammer and eyes both shading silver.

The spider was backing up, its jaws locked around Lesat’s leg as it dragged him. The weight wasn’t slowing it down much.

“There are more of them ahead!” Krana shouted, warning his father too. Jeric was closing in on the spider now. “At least ten! Don’t rush into them!”

Kriissshh.

Four crystal flame arrows split off from Sam’s crystal flame spiral, sending a series of splintering sounds echoing down the tunnel as they shot toward the monster. They flickered past his father in an instant, homing in on the target.

The spider froze as it saw Jeric and the arrows approaching, crouching down as its jaws stayed locked around Lesat. Its chitin began to radiate with a flickering, red-streaked light that intensified.

The streaks lifted out of the spider’s body, brightening until they turned into a defensive shield all around it. The surface of the barrier flowed with black and red-striped flames, similar to the design on its carapace.

The first two arrows slammed into the shield in an explosion of blue and red, turning it into a cloud of a thousand swirling sparks. It bent inwards, curving back toward the spider, and then the third and fourth arrows hit, ripping through it with a hissing crackle as they slammed into the spider’s body. The impacts tore a six-inch hole through its carapace and blasted away one of its legs at the joint.

Hisss. Cccliickkk.

That wasn’t enough to stop the spider as it crouched down. A clattering sound came from its jaws as it released its hold on Lesat and backed up a few more steps. The shield around it began to reappear, flickering in and out. Its fangs widened as a sphere of black-streaked flame began to form between them.

At the same moment, Jeric arrived, surging forward as his hammers slammed down. A bright yellow Earthen Shield surrounded him, pushing aside the spider’s reforming defensive barrier as he swung for its head.

His hammers struck one after the other, thudding into the spider’s skull with dull, echoing cracks as he broke through the chitin and left gaping holes behind.

The spider twitched, trying to rear up on its back legs to get away, but Jeric was too persistent. He stayed in close as he advanced and swung again. At the same time, the spider’s front legs stabbed toward him, their serrated edges gleaming.

Krissshhh.

A new flight of crystal flame arrows flew past Jeric and blew apart both legs as they continued into the spider’s body, the impacts exploding through its head, mouth, and carapace. Sections of its body tore outwards, splattering across the tunnel behind it.

The spider froze, its body somehow still intact despite the gaping holes. It wobbled there, its legs splaying outwards. Then, slowly, fluids began to ooze from inside and pour out from its chitin, coating the floor, as it slumped to the ground.

Jeric’s hammers slammed down again, striking it a few more times for good measure to make sure it was dead as Sam raced up by his side.

Clickkk..Ting...

Click...

“There’s more!” Krana shouted, drawing their attention farther down the tunnel to where a wave of the spiders was racing forward. There were five of them this time, and they weren’t distracted by having to carry their prey.

Instead of staring at the injured guard on the floor, these spiders’ eyes were all fixed directly on Sam as a sense of hunger radiated from them. A frisson of warning ran down his skin, almost like a ripple of tiny spikes, as an urge to destroy them surged through his blood. His Aura of Crystal Flames flared in response, raging all around him.

It was a strange feeling, one that he’d never encountered before. It felt like an instinct, as if the spiders were his natural enemy. It had to be related to his transformation. He only had a moment to shove it to the back of his mind as the crystal flame spiral around him condensed.

The flame arrows hadn’t done enough damage. They had only ripped holes through the spiders rather than blowing them apart, which meant that he needed to go bigger. The spiders were too durable for point attacks. They had to be torn apart.

An Essence Blade began to condense in front of him, its diamond-like, translucent edges radiating crystal flames all around it. With his aura and Flame Strike at Advanced, his spell formation was fast, but there wasn’t much time before they reached him. More than half of his remaining essence poured into it, leaving him with 14.

“Hold on!” He shouted to his father and Krana, sprinting ahead of them as he released the spell.

KRRiiiisshHHH.

The Essence Blade blasted forward, ripping a path down the tunnel as it filled it with cerulean light. A rippling wave of energy flared all around it, like an aurora in the darkness, as the edges cut across the walls and left melted lines behind.

The spiders saw it coming, crouching down as their strange defensive shields rippled off from their chitin. It looked like the surface of their bodies came alive and poured into the air, turning into a barrier.

All five of them clumped together in the center of the tunnel, their serrated legs gleaming and clicking against the stone floor as they braced themselves.

This time, their defense and durability didn’t matter.

The Essence Blade sheared through their combined shield in an explosion of scintillating sparks that flared in red, blue, and purple starbursts. Then it blasted farther inwards and ripped through the clump of carapaces. Serrated legs exploded outwards, chitin ruptured, and chunks of dark carapace went flying through the air as half of the pile disintegrated in a wave.

Then the entire clump was picked up from the tunnel floor and flung backwards, their angular bodies stuck together as their legs and spikes became tangled. Scattered shrieks of anger and rage chittered out from the pile as it slammed into the curve of the wall forty feet farther down the tunnel.

The ball of spiders began to shudder, ripples crossing the surface as they started to extract themselves, but Jeric raced toward them, following up before they could regroup. Krana was right beside him.

Sam ran with them, hanging back for just an instant as grabbed the one intensified aura he had from his storage and combusted it. 16 points of essence flowed into him, bringing him back to 30.

There were still five regular auras in his storage, but he didn’t want to waste them if he didn’t have to. Now that he could intensify them, they could hold several times as much. He just needed to find the time to charge them.

His father and Krana were wading into the tangle of spider limbs by the time he arrived, their hammers swinging as they crunched things viciously on every side. Jeric was surrounded by the glow of his Earthen Shield that deflected flailing, serrated limbs and Krana had her own type of bright yellow shield that accomplished the same thing.

Most of the spiders were already dead or dying by the time they slammed into the wall, but a couple were still able to move, their legs stabbing outward like spears. The tips ended in a sharp, wedge-shaped spike. They moved so quickly that they were only a blur, the serrations hissing through the air.

The two melee didn’t give them any time to recover, their hammers slamming down repeatedly everywhere they could reach. Krana’s eyes were pure silver as she spun and hammered into one spot after another, aiming for something that only she could see.

Click. Ttiinnggg.

That was....

He looked down the tunnel only to see another pack of spiders charging toward them. This time, they were far enough away that he had a moment to think, but it was dwarfed by the realization that these spiders had their mouths open....

Five spheres of tumbling red-streaked black flame shot down the hall towards them.

Sam dropped his spear as his hands slammed together in front of his body and then pressed outward. His crystal flame followed, condensing as it changed into an Essence Shield in front of him. He poured his essence into it, strengthening the defense as it formed in a grid, like hexagons locking together. One area hardened after another, spreading in an instant as he created a half-dome across the tunnel.

Half a second later, the five balls of spider flame slammed into it.

The impacts shuddered through the barrier as coruscating layers of dark fire roiled on the other side. Sam felt his feet sliding across the floor as he leaned into the pressure, pushing back against it. A sharp heat reached him, radiating around the edges where the shield stopped. The stone ceiling and walls began to melt, dripping as they ran.

The heat washed across his body, but as it touched him, it only felt like a bright radiance that warmed his muscles. The dangerous part was trapped on the other side and this was just the ambient residue. It was threatening and comfortable at the same time, even as he felt the shield in front of him bending.

His essence dropped by ten points in an instant, and then by another four as he reinforced the shield, pushing it back down the tunnel as the flames on the other side stuck to it. The flames didn’t fade as he’d expected. Instead, they stuck to his shield like tar, slowly hardening into some type of substance that looked like stone.

Whatever these spiders were, they were spitting the content of their guts at him. It only looked like flame until it cooled. That same urge to destroy them surged back through his blood, demanding that he kill them. His expression turned hard.

He had no idea where the feeling was coming from, but he definitely agreed with it. He maintained the barrier as he reached into his storage and pulled out four essences, leaving only one behind. He combusted them all at once, splitting them between mana and aura.  It put him back to 31 essence.

A new spiral of crystal flame began to gather around him as his aura surged. His father and Krana finished off the pile of spiders and came up beside him, looking down the tunnel at the new attackers.

The spiders had bunched together again after throwing the fire and were slowly backing up, waving their front legs in a threatening posture.

“Whatever these are, I doubt they can throw that fire again so quickly,” Krana offered, her face set into hard lines. “Thanks for the shield.”

“One more big blast, son,” Jeric growled as he stared at them. His muscles were covered in a sheen of sweat and his breath was coming like a bellow. Golden-yellow energy was spiraling along his body, from some combination of his Stamina and Earth mana. “I’ll take care of the rest.”

“There should be at least a few more,” Krana added, her eyes still silver as she looked down the tunnel. “We need to finish them all off, so that the World Law can heal over whatever hole they created to come here.”

She frowned, taking advantage of the spiders’ temporary retreat to add the information she knew.

“I don’t know how this happened, but this fits with the legends of invasions I’ve heard about before. They start small and increase over time. Usually, there’s only one type of monster, unless the hole stays open for too long.... It’s good that we don’t see anything here smarter than this, or that looks like a demon.” She glanced towards Sam as she said that, but her voice was firm. It was just a fact.

“These are between Level 15 and 25..., probably scavengers that found a gap in the world barrier.”

Sam nodded in response. He was also glad there was no demon here. If there were, they’d probably all be dead by now.

He wasn’t sure how all of this worked, but it was obvious that this was the type of thing Ayala’s father dealt with. It was also what the Guardian had told him to stop if he wanted to save his family.

From the way Krana was speaking, she clearly knew more about it than he did, which raised a lot of questions. How often did this happen?

He’d thought it would be rare, but apparently it wasn’t. It sounded like the world was constantly under the threat of invasion from Outsiders.

It almost made sense. How else would there have been an Outsider ruin in the first place? Then there was the way the World Law had suddenly focused its attention on him when he transformed and again when he threatened it. It was watching for that sort of thing.

The state of the world was becoming clear. He might not have heard about this type of thing in his village, but the legends had to come from somewhere. It also made sense now why authorities wouldn’t like someone who was marked as Defiant.

If you stood by and let these monsters do what they wanted.... You were a threat to the entire world.

He didn’t know how these spiders had invaded, or why they had suddenly appeared so close to him, but there was no way he was going to allow them to retreat and regroup. The World Law wouldn’t allow him to stop right now anyway, not until they were all dead.

Somewhere behind them, the second guard was still lying on the floor, and Ayala had probably finished fortifying the entrance to the cave. That would help if there were more of them than expected.

Anger filled him as he stared down the tunnel, combining with the urge to kill the spiders. His eyes blazed like crystal blue suns as another Essence Blade began to form in front of him.

He’d just wanted to make an amulet.