1.9

Harold felt inexplicably stronger when he woke up. The aching in his arms had not gone away, like the strain of a workout the next day when you forget to stretch. They still hurt like hell, but they were alive. And for the moment, that was good enough.

The room was small, as he had noted before. But he hadn’t noticed how small until he had awoken from his exhaustion induced slumber. He and Amber were pressed against each other tightly, the confines of the cave little more than cold surfaces that would leech their body heat.

The non-ideal nature of the room notwithstanding, Harold felt better rested than he ever had in his life. Perhaps it was due to the fact that he had never been this tired before? But he felt like that kind of explanation didn’t really answer anything.

He shrugged, more as an instinct than as a gesture to someone. ‘Well, with no way of really checking, guess there’s better things to do than sit around and wonder.’

Rousing Amber, Harold elicited a small “five more minutes pleeeease-” as she turned over, but he eventually got her to wake up.

Conversely, Rocky didn’t seem like he needed sleep. Though being a rock, that was hardly surprising. He just sat there, watching the door. Harold hoped he was just watching for possible enemies, though it was probably impossible to tell.

The motley group crossed the passage after a group of fang spiderlings had skittered past. Walking into the storeroom, they stocked up on any food and water they needed. The room was interesting to Harold, because it never seemed to want for supplies. The foodstuffs, arms, and armor had restocked overnight (or his best approximation of ‘night’ in the tunnels). Like a dungeon awaiting new conquerors, the leather armor that Harold had on, had been replaced by an identical set of leather.

It didn’t look as if the brood mother was keen on giving them another escort, especially after what had happened to their previous allies. As they entered the cavern leading to the unconquered tunnel from the day before, they found a spiderling gesturing at the same tunnel they had taken last time. When no other guidance or support materialized, Harold shrugged, and led his party into the passageway.

#####

Harold had yet to run from an encounter. Doubtless this new world had many terrors for unwary travellers, dangers beyond count. But in this cave system, where enemies could be funneled into his hammer and shield one by one, he had never had cause to turn tail and run.

That changed when five sets of red eyes opened in the darkness before him, forty in all.

[Lvl 9 Black Widow Spiderling]

[Lvl 10 Black Widow Spiderling]

[Lvl 10 Black Widow Spiderling]

[Lvl 8 Black Widow Spiderling]

[Lvl 10 Black Widow Spiderling]

Five black widows, each one level 8 or higher. They had never fought a monster with a level in the double digits before. Sure, they had witnessed one, the Fang’s brood mother, but he had never even thought about confronting her, much less fighting her.

Yet here before them were no less than three level ten foes, with two other strong monsters backing them up. In the relatively spacious corridor in which they now found themselves, without support, it was tantamount to a death sentence.

Besides, even if their levels were on par to deal with such a threat. How would they? They couldn’t fight here, the corridor was too wide to funnel the black widows one by one, but was too narrow for Amber to get a good angle

It only took three seconds before Amber had seemingly come to the same conclusion as him. Standing as defiantly as he could, careful not to show weakness before his superior foe, he quietly whispered for Amber to get a head start. “Go, now.”

She shook her head, whispering. “We go together, or not at all.”

“Fine,” he hissed, not taking his eyes off the spiderlings before. “Slowly start backing away, then take off when they come at us. I’ll be right behind you.”

She nodded this time, slowly taking a step backwards. Then another. Then another.

All the while, Harold kept the black widows transfixed on his location, lightly banging his shield and green crystalline hammer together to create small flashes of light. Not enough to blind, but enough to distract the monsters. They seemed intelligent, apparently unwilling to be the first to rush this armored human, if only for fear of dying first.

It was only when Amber was already several steps away from him did the first spider begin trying to edge its way around him. He boxed it out, edging his shield around to make sure it couldn’t pass him. However, doing so left his left side slightly less unguarded, and one of the level 10 spiderlings looked ready to lunge.

With his feet no longer firmly in place, and with Amber far enough away to potentially escape, he took one step back with his left, then his right, then left.

At that point, the spiders looked like they were raring to go, and soon as Harold turned his back to run, two of the spiderlings were already jumping in his direction.

“GO! GO GO GO!” He shouted to Amber, who began to run as quickly as she could down the hall. She would be of little use in a fight anyway, Harold had reasoned, risking potential friendly fire with every bolt she fired.

He broke into a full sprint as well, dashing down the corridor towards Amber, who had made it a fairly good distance away in the few seconds he had afforded her.

Running after her, Harold was chased by the five spiderlings, who had at once dropped their inhibitions of rushing him, and were now taking turns scuttling after him, each one lunging over the others in an eagerness to secure the kill.

Harold abruptly turned, bringing his hammer to bear against a spiderling currently mid lunge, and in one blow cracking its carapace open while it was still in mid air. With any luck, its brain would have the consistency of putty when it hit the floor.

He kept going, one foot ahead of the other, legs pumping, muscles burning. Still he forged forwards.

Periodically, at random intervals, with no discernable pattern even to himself, he would turn back, swinging his mace, and forcing the spiderlings back, before once again racing away.

The first spiderling that he hit didn’t seem to be following him any longer, hopefully, that meant it was dead. But the other four black widows were still chasing, and none of his attempts to turn and fight had borne results. They had simply tired him out, or tired him out faster than if he had simply kept running.

Yet it was a necessary sacrifice that he continually doubled back. His had forced the pursuers to grow more cautious, and they no longer lunged towards him at every possible moment, with the lower level black widows now content to let the two remaining level ten spiders head the chase.

He needed a trick, to thin the herd before they reached the end of the tunnel, where he might be forced to turn and fight. There was no terrain around to be manipulated, no special traps he had set. All he knew was that the spiders were scurrying along the ground, trying to get in range…

Idea! He turned around. The spiders had already been on his heels, having no opportunity to jump at him. Harold slammed his shield downwards, colliding with the nearest pursuing spiderling. The pointed bottom of his heater shield buried itself into the dirt, doing so through the neck of one of his assailants. The spider’s body went limp, and it fell over, dead.

This had given the spiderlings a chance too, however. One ran around him, biting him in the back of his leg, an area notably lacking the leather armor that covered his chest and front. He howled in pain, swinging the hammer with his underhand, bowling the offending spiderling into the wall. Stunned, perhaps. But he knew how durable they could be. It would be coming back.

It was one against three, but he was wounded and without support-

A mana bolt whizzed by him, and then a strange sense of calm determination washed over his very being. Amber had doubled back upon seeing him turn to fight. The bolt slammed against the spiderling he had wounded, hitting it in the side. The impact sent spiderling guts flying into the nearest wall.

The two that remained were levels eight and ten, and though Harold would have liked to press their advantage, he could feel the venom doing its work in his leg. Death, then, was only a matter of time.

But before the spiders could kill him, and even before Amber charged a second bolt, a golem rose from the ground, frightening both the black widow spiders and the humans. It stood at about the same height as the spiders, about two feet in all, but the very look of the golem evoked curiosity.

[Level 2 Stone Golem]

There was nary a single smooth surface on it. Formed from jagged rocks, the golem had only one perfectly geometric feature: the square feet that Rocky also currently possessed. Now that made Harold turn. ‘Was this golem the product of one of Rocky’s skills?’ Yet there was evidence against such a conclusion. The golem’s right hand was a hammer, not dissimilar to the one Harold wielded, rather than the stump Rocky wielded, while the left hand was a crude imitation of a human’s hand, with five fingers connected to a palm, but without the joints that allowed humans their deft and precise actions.

The spiderlings were the first to break out of their stupor, hissing and beginning to retreat down the tunnel. They were closely followed by Amber. The only ranged combatant, she fired a bolt past Harold. It resulted in a glancing hit on one of the spiderlings. Not enough to kill, but would be painful nonetheless.

With the first spider slowed, the other fell victim to the stone golem rising out of the ground. The golem grabbed the as of yet unharmed spiderling, taking hold of the two closest legs, unwilling to let go.

Lifting it off the ground, the spiderling’s legs could still be seen skittering about, desperately trying to get away from the golem.

In the meantime, Harold limped forwards, bringing his hammer down on the wounded spiderling that was still on the ground, still trying to flee. It took five strikes before the monster finally stopped moving.

He turned back just in time to see the golem take the legs of the spider into its left hand, and with its right, it brought its hammer-shaped limb into the unprotected underbelly of the spider, splattering its remains onto nearby walls, and dropping the carcass onto the cavern floor.

Harold almost gagged, it was not a fun sight. But turning its sights to more pressing matters, he took a look first at the golem, which stood unmoving in the corridor.

Then turning to Rocky, he saw that the rock had somehow changed its body. No longer the ball of stone with four long rocks for limbs, Rocky had become shaped. The little rock had hands! Crude hands, sure, but hands! Still small, Rocky could still be held, though with a little difficulty, in the palm of Harold’s hand, though he found it a bit more difficult than the last time he had picked up the little guy.

Rocky jumped from his hand, landing with a ‘crack’ on the hard stone floor of the passage, slowly making his way to the golem. Once there, he stretched his arms out, as if he were a child asking for a lift up.

The golem obliged, picking the rock up with his left, hand shaped arm, and setting the little rock down on its shoulder.

Harold couldn’t help but laugh at the absurdity of the situation. “Guess that answers that question, huh?” He patted Rocky’s head, and looked to Amber.

All things considered, they had come out of the fight worse for wear, but were much better than he had originally feared.

Harold stumbled. “Oh God, are you alright? You look injured!” Now that the fight was over, Amber had noticed his limp. “You’re pale. There-there’s probably medicine back in the storage shed. Let’s get you back there.” Tossing his right arm over her shoulder, she helped prop up his unmoving right leg.

“I got bit by one of the spiders before, I think it was venom.” He stumbled a bit. “Not sure if it’s deadly or just paralytic, but I can’t feel my right leg right now.”

Together, they began the slow process of moving back to the nearest fang spider cavern, and to the relative safety of their small cave.