“GUYS! STAND UP!”

Drake was shouting at anyone who was still kneeling at the ground or looking dazed.

“I can’t move my body! I got inflicted with fear!” yelled one person who was holding his guitar tightly while kneeling on the ground

“Supports, go cast recovery on them quick!”

The Queen skitters on it’s web towards us.

'Big mama shows herself'

Did I mention my undying hate for spiders? Oh, I did?

“Tanks, try to keep her busy while the others recover! Anyone who can attack it at range, start firing!” a downpour of bullets, arrows and magic hit the spider queen.

I use Knife Sharpening and activated Butchers Instinct. Seeing red lines covering her body and legs,

'Too high'

I focus on the only part that I can reach, its legs.

The scouts, tanks and me, dash towards the base of the giant web, trying to hit the legs that are within our reach.

However, it moves up on the web and disappears, catching us off guard as it strikes from nowhere. Its legs were showing only when it’s about to strike.

"This got a lot harder real fast!' I was evading strike after strike by a thin margin

"Arghh! Help!"

Some were unlucky and were pierced by the invisible legs of death. Killing two scouts in the span of a few minutes.

“Fire a few feet above where the legs show!” Drake shouts his instructions to the ranged unit, while we danced with deaths cruel pet arachnid.

"Don't stop now! Keep on spamming!"

They succeeded at aiming where the Queen was, showering it with projectiles, making it visible again for everyone to see.

"Go now!"

We rush towards where its legs where, as it was the only thing we can reach when it’s still hanging on its web.

Unleashing two Juliennes at one of the middle legs, it made a small wound at where the red line was.

'Guess I need a better knife now. This thing just wont cut it anymore'

The Queen retaliates by using her front legs again, trying to pierce some of us. We dodge and weave, evading every single strike of it, cracking the floor whenever it misses its mark.

We danced around it for two whole minutes before the Queen moved up on its web, aiming the back end of its abdomen towards us. It sprayed the surroundings with sticky silk, slowing some of us at the front.

“Those who’s HPs are in the red, move back!"

It skitters on the webs at the front and starts using its sharp pointed legs, trying to pierce its silk covered prey. We couldn’t dodge every hit, but we evaded most of the fatal strikes directed on our bodies.

"Bedrock, use ‘Millennial Growth’. Anyone who can still move properly, try to distract it until Bedrocks ready!” Drake shouted, while giving orders to the others to heal the ones that came back from the front.

Bedrocks body began trembling, as the stones covering his entire body began to pulsate. Growing by an inch with each pulse, making his height right now at eight feet tall. The pulsating gets faster and faster, as each second pass, while the range units were distracting the Queen with a barrage of deadly projectiles.

Thirteen seconds later, Bedrocks body finally stopped pulsating.

"Hoh~" looking up at the new rock behemoth, with a height and width of almost eighteen and nine feet respectively. His bulky form is as intimidating as the giant spider

He began to walk slowly towards where the Queen was, making the earth tremble with each step.

“Stop firing and heal up! We probably have two minutes or so before his form starts to shatter” said Drake as he takes out a blue vial inside his inventory, chugging all of its contents within a few seconds.The others copied what he did, also taking out similar looking vials and consuming its contents.

‘Must be a recovery potion. We have healers so maybe for their MP or stamina?’ thinking of buying some when I have the money

We sat on the ground and tried to prepare with the short amount of time that’s been given to us. Some magician looking people and Shen started to meditate. While the archers adjusted their bows and took out arrows from their inventory, equipping it into their quivers.

Drake was taking out bullets and putting it into what appears to be a bullet pouch at his waist. Lupin took out a red flask and started spraying red liquid on his body, making his yellow eyes glow with a blood red tinge.

'What a weird quirk' observing the lycanthrope

While Sol was throwing seeds at the ground, near the other players while singing.

“What are you doing?” I asked the green haired maiden

She stops singing and looks at me with a face devoid of any emotion for a good five seconds before answering my question.

“Grow faster” looking down at the seeds on the ground. Roots sprouted out of them, digging their way into the earth.

“Oh, the seeds? What do they do?” I tried to keep the conversation going, even though it felt like she doesn’t want to anymore

'Endure it, socializing is good...'

“Help” she answers, but she doesn’t look my way. Still keeping a close eye on the now small plants, that’s been growing around.

I thought she had enough as she doesn't answer anymore of my questions and just kept staring on the ground.

“Okay, then...c'ya around I guess?”

I finish our awkward conversation while scratching the back of my head. Moving towards a rock that I could sit on, sighing at what just happened

‘It’s socializing when the other party doesn't want to...am I not that charming to talk with?’ I thought when I sat down

I looked at what the others were doing, but something else caught our attention.

A *crack* could be heard from in front. All of us looked towards where Bedrock and the Queen are fighting. With chunks of stone falling off Bedrocks body, chipped by the Queens legs. Almost like a jackhammer that’s constantly beating the stone pavement until it crumbles into tiny pieces.

Bedrock tries to stop the Queens legs by holding onto them. However, when he got a hold, the Queen latches onto his body and starts using her gigantic fangs to rip through his stone flesh.

“RAAAHHH!” he screams and starts punching the spider with both of his gigantic stone arms with the Queen still attached in front of him

“Drake, times running out! Get ready!” as he continues to pummel the overly attached arachnid

I used Knife Sharpening, before activating Butchers Instinct. The plants that grew from the ground wrapped around some of us. Forming loops around my chest and creating a dome around the group with holes all around it.

“Get ready! Fire when I give the signal and shoot in between the holes”

The giant form of Bedrock shatters, sending rocks flying everywhere. Hitting the Queen a few times and also our group, but the plant dome prevented anything big from hitting us directly.

"AHHH!"

Bedrocks previous six feet body fell below the Queen, while it was dazed from getting hit by the gigantic rocks

“Tanks, move forward now! Scouts, go fetch Bedrock and bring him back here”

We went forward and distracted the giant Queen arachnid, while the others pulled Bedrock back to safety.

Lupin ordered the people charging to move behind the spider, as the oncoming barrage from the rear hits it. We then started spamming our skills, concentrating on a few of it's legs rather than all of them.

"Move on to the other legs!"

Our group managed to chop off three of its legs before it realized what was happening.

“WRAAAHHH!!”

The Queen lets out a piercing cry, making our group fall onto our knees again. It made me drop my knife and unable to move, while drops of sweat fall down from my forehead. This time we were at a closer distance to it, and faraway from the group where the supports were.

It then goes up on the web using the remaining legs that it had and started to spin a web around itself. Encasing its gigantic body inside a silk like cocoon. When it finished what it was doing, it let out another piercing cry inside of it. The hundreds of eggs littered in every corner and web of the room started to shake and one by one, spiders of different kinds started to come out.

“Supports go cast recovery on them. We’ll pave a way for you!”

The range unit started firing at the spiders who were coming out of their eggs.

"I'll get you fixed up in a bit" a nun looking woman wearing a habit then comes over next to me and whispers words that I couldn’t understand.

My body glowed a bright yellow and I suddenly felt lighter, as if something’s been lifted from my shoulders. I was able to move my body again after the woman finished chanting.

"Nice" getting my knife on the ground

After I got up, the priestly woman rushed towards another person and doing the exact same thing she did a while ago.

"Done!"

After every one of us was able to move again, Drake shouts his next orders.

“Everybody come back into the group! Six tanks in front, while two of you go on each side! Sol, destroy the dome, it’ll only get in the way”

The tanks moved forward and to the side, a few meters in front of the main group while they get buffed by the supports, readying their shields and weapons. Banging on their shields, implicitly saying they’re ready to take on whatever is to come at them.

'That looks kinda cool' admiring the rhytmic beats of blade hitting their shields, while an uplifting music was being played from behind

Sol waves her hands and collapsing the plant dome, turning into dust.

“Remember what we did earlier. Focus on the venom crawlers and cripplers first and let the scouts kill off those who lose agro on the tanks” Drake said

A wave of arachnid terror then descends upon our group, as we try to kill every single one of them. With mammoth spiders and foot soldiers rushing forward, trying to penetrate the defensive line with no care for their wellbeing. Venom crawlers and cripplers then started skittering on the webs on the walls and ceilings, falling on our group. Some were surprised, as arachnids kept on raining from above the ceiling.

I jump on one of them and started swinging my knife with reckless abandon, slashing at any none human being that gets caught in my line of sight.

“AHAHAHA! COME HERE YOU FUCKS! I’LL GIVE YOU ALL THE LOVE AND ATTENTION THAT YOU WANT!” as I move from one spider to the other, laughing maniacally while I swing my knife from side to side

'This feels so good~' killing another spider

“ARGGHHH!”

A scream came out from behind me. I look towards where the scream was coming from and saw a magician being swarmed by spiders who caught him off guard. With the supports and others busy trying to keep the tanks alive and detoxifying the others. He fell on the floor, as poison after poison stacked up on him. Chewing and tearing the flesh off his body, while being covered by digestive fluids before dying a painful death.

“Shit, were getting over run! Lupin, how much blood do you still have?” asking Lupin, while he reloads his revolver

“Hrmm, I still got five flasks left. I need to use one to keep my ‘Blood Thirst’ going though” as he takes out four red bottles from his inventory

“Give it here, quick. Cover me for a moment” reaching out to take all four of the red flasks, removing the lid from each one.

*Glug glug glug*

Drinking all the contents of the four flasks. His body then started to spasm, while he looked towards the horde of spiders.

I look at him and see that his eyes started glowing with a red-violet tint. Small cuts started to appear on his body, as mist and blood came out of them.

'Self-mutilation?'

A few seconds later, his entire body was covered by mist, as blood started to pool around where he was standing.

The blood pool expanding, painting the floor of the room red in a matter of seconds.

“Cover your ears for a few seconds!” a voice shouted from inside the mist

Everyone did as they were told and covered their ears, as something came out of the pool of blood and mist. Loud screeching sounds could be heard even when I plugged my ears with my hands. Looking towards the mist, hundreds of bats came out of it, making irritating sounds as they flew all over the place.

After the last bat came out of the mist, they immediately went after the spiders that were near our group and started attacking them. While this was going on, skeleton hands came out of the pool of blood, holding the spider’s legs, making them rooted in place.

“Kill as many as you can before they recover!” said Drake from inside the mist

‘Yep, I really want to change my race after this’ I thought, while I was attacking a nearby spider.

Giggling, as I chop its rooted legs off its body with my knife.

'Now I understand why everyone plays. This game is hella fun!'

I then move towards my next prey and did the same thing, swinging my knife each time, chopping off the limbs and slashing the bodies of every single one of them.

“Concentrate on the crawlers and cripplers first! Leave the mammoths and foot soldiers for the tanks and scouts to handle!”

A one sided fight then began, as dozens of spider carcasses littered the floor every second.

A minute later, the pool of blood disappeared and so did the bats. The mist surrounding Drake slowly disappeared also, showing Drake lying flat on the floor, no visible cuts can be seen on his body. With only a few spiders left, we finished them off.

“You okay there?” asked a young man towards Drake who was still lying on the floor

“Yeah, I just need to rest a little. My heads still buzzing” as he gets his body up and sits down on the floor.

“That drained more HP than I thought it would” he mumbles

Sol tosses a seed next to him. Covering him with a plant like armor around his body.

“Do we charge at the Queen, while it’s still inside that thing?” said Lupin, while looking at the silk cocoon.

“We should heal up first before we do anything else” Bedrock interjected.

“Let the supports take care of the tanks first, then give me a report on how many died” ordering the others to keep the tanks in good health

After a minute of looking at their windows, Sol asked Bedrock and Lupin for their party’s status.

“Three scouts and one magician died from this fight” she reports, still wearing a deadpan expression

“Hmm…so thirteen died since we first started. I thought we’d be able to finish this with only a few casualties at most” scratching his head

With nothing left to do but sharpen my knife further, I walked over to Shen. Seeing him in a crossed legged position while sitting, like a monk who was finding enlightenment.

'He must really like doing that if he does it while a fight's about to happen' looking at him

“It’s called meditating if that’s what you wanted to ask” he opens his eyes to look up towards me

I sat next to him

“Oh? Is that your hobby?” I asked

“Of course not. What? Do I look like a person who meditates for my own personal enjoyment?” as he gives me an incredulous look

“It helps me regenerate MP faster when I do this. It’s also a way to help me level up this passive skill to boost my damage, so I do this often when I have nothing to do” after he said that, he goes back into a meditative state

“We’ll talk later, this time, I really need to concentrate. Otherwise, I may not be that much of a help later on when I run out of MP”

“Okay then, good luck uhmm…finding enlightenment, kamatsura and what not. Just don’t float away when you do find it” he snorts as I laugh while watching him

Three minutes of silence later, the cocoon started to vibrate and make tearing noises inside of it.

"Get ready!"

A few seconds later a tear appeared, revealing a leg from the spider Queen. Everyone gets up and starts readying their weapons and shields.

“Okay everybody. You remember the drill right? Let’s finish this once and for all!” Drake shouts and we give a nod of confirmation.

Another tear appears on the cocoon, followed by another one, until a big enough tear ripped open in front of it. With the Queen coming out, fully recovered, showing her eight giant legs all there in their glory.

“WRAAAHH!” she wails again, inflicting confusion and fear onto some people. The supports where ready this time and we recovered quick.

The tanks moved forward with the scouts and me following from behind. The Queen goes invisible on its web again, but this time it didn’t attack.

"Stay alert!"

A few seconds of watching and waiting later, what came out of nowhere were eggs.

"Not again!" someone screamed from our group

Hundreds of eggs where appearing all around the room again. Bewildered with what was happening around the room, we stare in shock at another arachnid invasion.

Unbeknownst to us, the Queen was preparing a surprise attack. It caught us off guard and managed to injure one tank. It wasn’t fatal though, as two scouts dragged him back near the healers.

“Kill the eggs first! Don’t let any of it hatch!” desperately trying to shoot and smash the eggs in the room

The Queen didn’t let this chance pass, turning invisible again and striking with her legs. Focusing at one of the tanks, as he tried to block and deflect the fast striking legs.

“Guys, I need help!” shouted the man, while deflecting a strike to the right

Two other tanks went to assist him, readying their shield and weapons.

When I looked around, about thirty eggs weren’t destroyed and managed to hatch. Half of them were foot soldiers and a mix between the other three kinds for the other half.

“Those in front pull back. Keep firing at where the Queen’s legs are. We’ll clear the mobs first, after we regroup”

Everyone started to gather as a group again.

The Queen, who was still invisible, strikes at the retreating players. Killing two scouts and a tank in the process.

“Keep firing!”

A small wave of arachnids move towards our group. The Queen skittering on the center web, watching the fight as it gets ready to shoot out another sticky silk mess towards us.

We finished off the mobs before the Queen shoots out, hitting most of our members in front with it.

“Can you cast recovery on them to remove it?” asked Drake towards a nearby support

The priestly woman shakes her head

“It won’t work. It only removes burn, confusion, fear and poison” she said

“Then we just have to make do. Tanks try to keep it busy, while the scouts circle behind her. I need three supports to go in front, just to make sure that if it wails again, those in front will be able to recover”

We ran towards it with very noticeable slower steps, while those from the back kept firing. Making the Queen visible again. Circling behind the monster, I activate Butchers Instinct and slashed at one of its back legs. We did the same tactic that we used earlier, by focusing on one of its legs first. Cutting one off her before she started to release a piercing wail again.

Two of the supports that came with us, helped the others to recover, while one of them was staring at the ground looking dazed. With the two supports being slow at noticing that one of them got confused, the Queen capitalized and impaled him with its legs, spilling blood on the floor where he stood. His body turning into particles and disappearing into thin air.

When everybody recovered, we started cutting off its legs again.

Five minutes of intense fighting and dodging later, we managed to cut off four more of its legs, but losing three tanks, and two scouts in the process. The Queen spilling blue blood on the floor, while using its three remaining legs to climb up the web, trying to encase itself in a silk cocoon again.

“Don’t stop firing now, it’s about to go down. Focus on its legs! Everyone at the front, try to climb the web and stop her!”

Someone suddenly grabbed my hand. I look to the side and saw Bedrock clasping both of my hands, as if he was about to confess to his highschool crush.

"Oh my, I’m not ready for this. It’s too sudden, I just don't know how to react. Although, we only just met a few hours ago and I don’t swing that way"

I watched too much romcom to know what was supposed to happen next. Rejeting him and starting a new scene in the story a few years later, about me owning a flower shop and a sudden reunion with him again. Ain't gonna happen.

He looks at me confused at the words I was spewing out of my mouth

“What’s the matte-“I couldn’t finish my sentence as I was thrown towards the Queen. With the other scouts following me from behind screaming.

“AHAHAHAHAHA!” grinning as the adrenaline from suddenly being tossed forty feet in the air kicked in, I started to get high, as I laughed maniacally, while grabbing onto the Queens abdomen.

After getting a good hold on it, I then started slashing towards her front leg, blue blood splashing towards my face. The other scouts, who went flying with me, grabbed on to her and started doing the same thing. Chopping away its two legs, with one of them left.

“Ahahahaha, let’s see you climb when you don’t have any legs left!” as I chop away its last remaining leg, making it fall into the floor.

I grabbed on to the web, so I won’t fall with it.

'Now, I need to climb down from here...' looking down below

After it fell, everyone began circling the Queen and started spamming any offensive skill or attacking it without restraint.

“WARHHHHHH….” It wailed once more before dying in a pool of blue blood

’Raneirra: The Weeping Mother’ has been slain! Dungeon ’Arachnid Queens Nest’ has been cleared! 100,000 Experience’s been awarded to each member still alive All participants has been given ‘Royal Silk’ x3 Dungeon Cooldown: 5 Days 23 Hours 59 Minutes 54 Seconds'

““”YEAHHH!””” everyone cheered as the windows appeared

“Okay everyone, good job. Let’s get the loots and get out of here”

Everyone started to dismantle the Queen’s corpse. I got a ‘Queen’s Fangs’ x1 and ‘Spider Meat’ x50 from the Queen and surrounding spiders.

Thirty minutes of walking later, we entered Lome. We walked through the streets with every other player still looking at our worn out band of hunters.

'At least most of us made it back' looking at how many of us were left walking down the street

Gathering more and more attention than what we were comfortable with, we walked faster to enter the guild building.

Looking around the lounge, I see the ones who died earlier, sitting on the sofas chatting with each other. They were asking what things they got from the boss and what not.

Drake then told us to wait here, while he and his party proceeded to the fourth floor to report on the completion of the request.

“Pretty solid run right?”

Shen walks over next to me, holding his cane like staff on his shoulders.

“It was fun” I smiled, thinking of the things that happened a few hours ago

“Well…it was something I guess, but I wouldn’t call it fun for those who died though”

We look over towards the others who died during the expedition. Some were dispirited for not getting the 100k exp and the loots from the boss and monsters from the final floor.

“Meh, they’ll get over it sometime later” shrugging my shoulders to dismiss the matter

“So, what are you going to do next? More hunting?”

“I don’t know…maybe level up more? Oh, there’s still some business that I left down in the sewers that I needed to take care of” while I think of the cloaked malignant spirit.

As I was thinking of how to kill it, Drake and his party comes down towards the lounge.

“I already submitted the report, just line up on the counters in the front desk to get your individual rewards” pointing towards the female and male clerks

“And one last thing, I didn’t expect so many casualties from this expedition. It was our lack of information that led to the deaths of some of you, so I would like to apologize for that” bowing his head towards the people sitting on the sofas.

“Don’t worry about it, it’s not like we expected for every one of us to live at the end of the day” said a tall tanned man with a sword hanging on his back

“Yeah, that’s just how it is. No need to fret yourself over it~” someone added, while strumming his guitar chords

“I just want to say that every one of you did a good job. If I do host another raid, you’re all welcome to join in”

He waves one last time and says farewell

“Then, until we meet again” as he and his party leave the guild building.

We lined up one by one on the front desks and received the rewards, 10 gold and 100k exp. That’s a lot for just individual rewards, for a party size of forty-eight people. Happy at the rewards, I left the counter and went to one of the sofas where Shen was sitting at.

“Nice, I leveled up three times from this whole run” he was happily fiddling with his stat window

'Must be distributing his stat points’ I thought

I also opened my own, and checked what changed.

Status Level 31(3165/85600)

Name RedGender Male

Class CookSubclass N/A

Affiliation Grand Crimson EmpireRaceHuman[/td4]

State Mutatio’s Savior: Vit+20%, Str+20%, Dex+10%, Agi+10%

Physical attack 58Magical attack 13

Physical def 18Magical def 1

Evasion 0%Critical 2%, +41% added to damage

Resist None

Status Points60

Str 37+7Vit49+10

Agi 71+7Con18

Dex 53+5Luk 6

Wis 1Int 44

Skills Basic Human Necessity( First Aid, Disassemble, Camp, Inventory, Improvised Cooking), Mixed Cooking, Butchers Instinct lvl15, Knife Sharpening, Knife Finesse lvl25, Culinary Expertise, Poison Treatment, Julienne lvl17, Insatiable Hunger

‘I leveled up 6 times this time. I didn’t even notice it or even heard a *ding*’ looking at my stats

‘I should probably concentrate on having more damage, since I don’t have anyone with me now'

Grumbling at the fact that I didn't have my friends or anyone to party with.

"Julienne deals 82% of my base attack for five attacks each, and If I use Knife sharpening and Butchers Instinct while hitting the red lines, it’ll deal x1.51 more. So around 600% of my base attack I guess?’ calculating how much damage I would do

‘Going for more crit damage would be the way to go then, let’s see how much I’d get for each point of luk’ as I put one point at a time on luk

After ten points into it, it added 2% crit chance and 2% crit damage.

‘That’s such a small increase. It’ll take a lot more points to get going…’ scratching the back of my head

‘Maybe I should aim for equipment that increases my crit damage too. Agi is also nice, along with vit. Str is secondary as my main damage comes from Butchers Instinct crits. But I also need int and dex for my cooking...'

I was having second thoughts on where to put my stats, since I mostly need everything to survive and do everything alone.

'Ah, fuck it. I need to survive first and foremost'

'Then agi and vit first. Then int, str, dex and luk comes second’ as I finished planning my build

Putting the leftover points into five str, fifteen agi, fifteen vit, five int, five dex, and five more to luk.

Smiling while I look at my HP, MP, and Stamina bars, I had a total of 810 HP, 394 MP, and 480 Stamina.

“Yep, looking good there” I say to myself

“I look good?” Shen looks at me weirdly, eyebrows raised

“Nothing, haha. So what are you up to now?” changing the topic abruptly

He thought for a few seconds

“I think I'm going to the next city south from here. Dorias might be good for finding new equipment for my level. Since its popular for having the most ore mines In the empire. Blacksmiths and merchants flock there also so that they can get ores for half the price and sell them twice or thrice somewhere else, they can also show off their wares too”

'Equipment huh'

“Oh, then maybe I’d go there later after I finish my things here"

I still remembered that phantom, and I'm out to get my revenge.

"See you later then, just pm me when you get there" openning a window in front of him

A window then pops up in front of me, asking if I wish to add Shenhazad to be my friend

"Sure" I clicked yes

As he was about to go out of the building, I stopped him, remembering something again.

"Hey, Shen! Wait! Tell me where I can change my race again”