Zeke launched himself at the pair of drachnids, instinctively adopting a zig-zag pattern when they began to hurl shards of bone-like carapace at him. The spikes were jagged to the point of serration, with wickedly sharp tips that tore into the rock walls of the ravine like they were made of paper.

“You didn’t say anything about them shooting spikes at us!” he bellowed.

“They’re probably poisoned, too!” came Abby’s reply. “So, try not to get hit.”

Zeke didn’t have time to growl his intended response, which would’ve included some variation of him sarcastically saying just how helpful that advice was. As if he intended to let himself be hit. But just as the thought crossed his mind, pain erupted in Zeke’s thigh when one of the spikes clipped him, slicing through the thick leather of his armored pants with ease. The wound was shallow – barely noticeable, if Zeke was being honest – but with it came fiery agony followed by the cold numbness of a paralytic. He stumbled, missing a step, but it only took the barest of seconds before his high vitality overwhelmed the toxin, restoring his body to what passed for his new normalcy.

He swore, narrowly dodging a handful of spikes as he continued to close ground. When he reached his target – the left-most drachnid – he was stunned to see that they were far less humanoid than he’d initially thought. Not only did they have the traits he’d observed the day before, but he also noted a host of differences that he hadn’t seen. For one, he couldn’t help but notice the spikes jutting from their forearms, especially when every swing of their arms sent at least a pair of those four-inch spikes careening toward him. In a macabre way, they reminded Zeke of the razor-like fins on the sides of Batman’s gauntlets, except they were detachable and organic.

In addition to those spikes, the drachnid’s resemblance to a human was further subverted by the sharp slivers of carapace slicing through otherwise unmarred skin. The most prominent of these were the ones at the apex of each cheekbone, but they were also present on the creature’s brow, jawline, and along a prominent ridge running the length of its forehead.

Finally, there were the eyes, which were probably the most alien part of an already-insane looking creature. Multi-faceted like a gemstone, they were cast in every color of the rainbow, each facet reflecting a different wavelength of color. Taken alone, those eyes would’ve been beautiful, almost mesmerizing. However, the fact that they were attached to a monster that was, at that very moment, intent on killing him, Zeke’s own eyes didn’t linger long on the phenomenon.

His mace, Voromir, whistled as it cut through the air in an overhand swing, and just before he was about to make contact, an arrow tore into the drachnid’s unprotected throat. It didn’t penetrate too deeply, though – a testament to the drachnid’s durability. Over the couple of weeks since they’d begun traveling together, Zeke had seen Abby’s arrows, propelled and guided by her control of the wind, punch through plenty of tough hides.

Voromir came soon after the arrow, crashing into the drachnid with monstrous force. At the last moment, the creature shifted slightly, which threw off Zeke’s aim by just enough that he didn’t hit his intended target. Instead, the head of the mace dug into the drachnid’s shoulder, collapsing it with a sickening crunch. But despite the obvious pain, the monster retained enough presence of mind to lash out with its claws, raking them across Zeke’s chest.

By reflex, Zeke recoiled as the claws bit deep into his flesh. Part of his reaction came from the sheer pain. The burning which, after only a moment, became freezing numbness, coupled with the more mundane agony of the wounds themselves. It was a chorus of anguish, the likes of which he had never felt before. It wasn’t the volume of the pain, but rather the novelty of it that prompted the reaction.

Zeke shoved his feelings deep down, squaring his shoulders to finish the job he’d started. He needn’t have worried, because Abby had used the short delay to pepper the monster with a half-dozen arrows, firing them with a rapidity reminiscent of a machine gun. Her hands were a blur as she summoned and loosed her silvery arrows in an impressive display that stunned Zeke, who’d begun to develop a deep sense of superiority. Abby dispelled that with her show of expert archery. No single arrow did the job, but Abby kept shooting until the damage finally passed the threshold where the monster couldn’t remain standing any longer. As it collapsed, Pudge pounced, raking his claws across the monster’s face and neck until it was little more than fleshy, bloody ribbons.

During this time, the remaining drachnid hadn’t been idle, though. Nor had Zeke forgotten it. They’d simply made the choice to focus their fire when possible. That plan turned out to be a mistake, because the drachnid, eschewing its ineffective spikes, scuttled forward like a cockroach to rake its claws at Abby. She reacted well, but she didn’t have Zeke’s agility. And judging by the deep gashes it inflicted upon her stomach, nor did she have anywhere close to his endurance. But to her credit, she didn’t cry out. Nor did she retreat. Instead, Abby dropped her bow, drawing her hatchet at the same time. Then, dodging past the drachnid’s next attack, she swung the small axe at the creature’s thorax in a backhanded blow. It bit deep, spewing rubbery flesh coated in some milky substance with the consistency of syrup. The drachnid tried to react, but surprise and pain mingled to slow it down just enough to let Abby pass.

Zeke felt the weaker version of his skill, [Leech Strike] activate, stealing vitality from the drachnid and knitting Abby’s wounds together. It had been something of a surprise when the [Mark of Companionship] had allowed for that, making it a far stronger skill than he’d anticipated. Even so, it wasn’t nearly as strong as his own version, but she’d put everything she had behind that strike. And as such, the proportional healing was strong enough to keep her guts from spilling out. That was enough, because Zeke had already closed the gap.

He swung his mace in a baseball swing. Powered by his considerable strength, guided by his equally impressive dexterity, and driven by decades of practice, his swing did precisely what it was intended to do. When it collided with the hard carapace of the drachnid’s torso, it only met with token resistance before the natural armor cracked, then shattered. The monster let out a horrible, high-pitched scream of mingled terror, pain, and disbelief as Zeke’s mace continued on its unerring path, biting into the monster’s flesh. It didn’t stop there, though. The mace tore through the flesh, and was quickly met by the drachnid’s squishy organs, which practically disintegrated under the blow. The mace didn’t even begin to slow its momentum until the monster’s spine was destroyed, its every organ liquified, but there was enough left for Voromir to erupt from the other side, completely bisecting the creature with the sheer force of his blow.

As a commensurate amount of vitality, yanked from the drachnid via his skill, mended the cuts in his chest and nullified the poison coursing through his blood, Zeke followed up with another thundering strike to the fallen creature’s head. Its life ended with a gurgle, but both sides of its body, though unconnected, continued to twitch.

“You are so overpowered,” Abby muttered, appearing at his shoulder. She quickly pushed past him and bent down, retrieving her knife from a sheath at her belt. However, instead of digging into the drachnid’s chest and retrieving its beast core, like he’d expected, she instead went for the monster’s eyes.

“What are you doing?” he asked, kneeling beside her.

“Drachnid eyes are valuable,” she said. “People make jewelry out of them because they’re really good channels for mana. I once saw a piece that was enchanted to enhance fire skills by almost twenty percent. Or that’s what the guy told me, at least. He might’ve just been bragging, though. You know how adventurers are.”

“Not really,” he said, though given Abby’s appearance, he could easily imagine a man trying to show off his wealth in order to get her attention. It probably wasn’t that different from the old world, where guys would buy fancy cars or expensive clothes in an effort to impress women.

“Well, every time you get a few of us together, everyone’s trying to show off,” she said. “Bragging about what they’ve killed, what kinds of missions they’ve completed – it’s kind of juvenile, to be honest. But when almost everyone gets stuck at the same level, your reputation’s all you’ve really got.”

“Yeah, I guess I see that,” Zeke muttered. Then, turning back to see that Pudge was still attacking a very dead drachnid, he said, “I’ll get the other one.”

As he strode toward the corpse, Abby added, “Don’t forget the teeth!”

Zeke grumbled a little as he bent down to unsavory task of yanking the creature’s teeth out, then retrieving the valuable portions of its body. For a second, he wondered about the morality of harvesting the creatures in such a callous way. However, he’d only managed to dig a single faceted eye out of its socket before he an alert flashed across his vision.

Congratulations! You have managed to alter the nature of your bond with The Crimson Tower. Merely touch a monster’s corpse, and you will be given an option to retrieve all valuable materials and store them in your spatial storage.

“Seriously?” he breathed. Then, while touching the drachnid’s corpse, he harvested it with a thought. Instantly, its eyes, teeth, and the tips of its spider-like appendages disappeared. Casting his perception into his spatial storage, Zeke was shocked to see that it had grown more expansive. More, in addition to the small pile of items he typically stored within the space, there was a neatly arranged stack of items in the corner. He recognized the eyes, the best core, and the claws. In addition, there were a pair of fleshy and deflated bladders joining the other harvested pieces.

“What?” asked Abby, having heard the tone of his disbelief.

Zeke stood, wiping his bloody hands on his leather armor; it didn’t really help, but it was a reflexive action. “Umm…I think looting just got a whole lot easier,” he said. Then, he proceeded to tell Abby about his new ability. While he did so, he demonstrated the ability on the corpse she had begun to harvest.

“You’re just a walking cheat, aren’t you?” she said, shaking her head as she looked at the now-looted corpse. “I’ve never heard about a skill evolving like that. Usually, if people want to evolve a skill, they have to use one of their skill choices on it.”

“It’s not a skill, though,” he said. But was that even true? Sure, it didn’t show up in the skill sub-menu, but it certainly acted like a skill. Did the fact that he hadn’t chosen it like his other skills really matter? “And wait – you can evolve skills?”

“Yeah,” she said. “You can only do it after you hit level fifteen, though. There are two schools of thought there. Some people think you should choose different skills and become more versatile. Others believe you should just focus on your bread-and-butter skill, making it as powerful as you can. Not that most people ever get the chance to level past fifteen, of course. The materials that can spark a racial evolution are too rare for that.”

“But not for us,” Zeke said, nodding along.

“Hopefully,” Abby said, pushing past him. He could tell that she was still skeptical about whether they could accomplish their goal or not. However, she’d been pushed into a corner, and she didn’t have a choice in the matter. If she wanted to keep progressing, she had to take some chances.

Zeke hurried to catch up. “How big is this place, anyway?” he asked.

“You ever visit the Grand Canyon back in the old world?” was her responding answer. Zeke said that he hadn’t, and she continued, “Well, this is about half that size.”

“Oh,” he said, glancing up at the webs draped across the top of the ravine. Here, it was only forty yards wide, but according to Abby, the space between the sides would reach a width of at least a mile. And that wasn’t even considering the various off-shoots of smaller, shallower ravines. Finally grasping the enormity of their task, he said, “I guess we’ve got our work cut out for us, huh?”

Abby laughed, the sound hearty and robust – not the soft, feminine giggle Zeke was used to. “Tried to tell you,” she said. “The problem was never whether or not we’d have enough targets. It was a question of whether we could kill five-hundred of them without drawing the ire of the rest of the hive. Imagine ten thousand of these things all coming at you at once. Individually, they probably wouldn’t be that strong, but…”

She let the implication hang in the air. When an individual warrior had the power of a superhero, numbers didn’t mean as much as they once might have. However, they still mattered. Even Zeke, with his massive advantage in stats, could still be overwhelmed. Certainly, he’d fought his way to the top of that spiraling cavern in the troll caves, wading his way through a thousand trolls to fight the warlord. But that had been a special circumstance. Not only had most of them been much weaker than the two drachnids they’d just faced, if only because they didn’t use any real abilities while the drachnids had poison on their side, but the ramps had been narrow enough that the numerical advantage hadn’t really counted for as much as it should have. Once the ravine widened, though, that wouldn’t be the case.

That didn’t mean Zeke wanted to back down, however. So long as they were careful, they could avoid being overwhelmed. And besides, he wasn’t alone, now. He had Abby. And Pudge.

Hopefully, that would make all the difference he needed. So, without further thought on the matter, he hurried to follow Abby deeper into Nightweb Ravine.