The others watched in horror as one of the massive spider monsters dropped down towards Kyle as he stepped out into the clearing but then a silvery barrier appeared above his head and the spider was blasted back up into the air.

Kyle had been surprised by one of the spiders dropping on his head and biting him when he and FI had first entered the forest and poisoning him. Fi, noticing that Kyle had been poisoned immediately used her Cleanse spell to cure him then blasted the spider off of him by borrowing Kyle’s Mana Blast spell with her Shared Spells Ability. The rest of the fight had gone much better and Kyle had even managed to obtain a couple of Soul Stones by using his Minor Soul Syphon on the spiked chain that he was manipulating but they had learned their lesson and FI now spent most of her time checking the branches above them so that they weren’t caught off guard. They had also figured out that using the monsters’ own ambush against them allowed them to catch them off guard instead which was what Kyle was doing right now.

As it turned out Counter Shield was excellent for this since one of the spider monsters falling on him registered as an attack to the spell but dealt less than 20 damage the shield didn’t break but did deal a small amount of damage to the monster while launching it up into the air where it would be unable to defend itself from an attack

Kyle’s spiked chain shot up and speared the spider though its head causing it to stiffen immediately and drop to the ground with a light thud as Kyle’s Soul Syphon spell drained its soul. The other spiders also dropped from their branches as Kyle spun towards them. One of his chains smashed into one of the monsters while it was still in mid-air sending it flying into one of the trees where it was struck by a bolt of shimmering white energy and a blob of darkness from Kyle and Fi.

Fervah and the others watched in silent awe as the second spider fell to the ground before trying to stand up. It was looking pretty badly damaged, but it was still alive. While they knew that a high Level Adventurer would’ve likely killed more of the monsters with the same ease that Kyle and Fi had killed the first one, Kyle’s Level wasn’t really any different to their own but it was pretty clear that he was considerably stronger than they were. Actually, Kyle had just gotten lucky that Counter Shield had done enough damage that he had been able to finish it off with his Viper Strike Skill, but he wasn’t going to complain.

“Right you lot,” Fervah said once she had recovered from her surprise. “Let’s go and help them out.”

The others nodded in agreement and they all went to work. Fervah and Carly started attacking from range with arrows and bolts of blue energy. Laurence darted in and out of combat with speed that impressed even Kyle as he slashed the spiders with his katana.

Kyle grinned as he saw the others beginning to take part in the fight. While he was confident that he and Fi would be able to defeat this group of monsters by themselves time was of the essence right now and he was quite impressed with how these rookie Adventurers were doing.

The four Adventurers quickly killed another 2 of the oversized spiders. Kyle crushing the one that he had badly wounded with a sudden Lash while enveloping another in shadows with his new Shadow Bind spell which was a rather horrifying thing to witness but Laurence ignored that and finished off the now defenceless monster with a quick stab.

As they were fighting Kyle realised that one of the spiders looked a bit different from the others just in time to see it spray a strange white liquid in Fervah’s direction causing her to yelp in surprise as it struck her. The white liquid solidified into a sticky mess that made it hard for her to move and one of the other spiders decided to capitalise on this and charged in her direction.

Fervah shrieked as the monstrous thing scuttled towards her and the others immediately turned in her direction and saw Kyle sprinting towards her as fast as he could while FI fired magical attacks. Carly added her own attacks to the barrage, but this spider was considerably larger than the other ones in this group and its exoskeleton was able to weather the rain of magical energy.

Kyle gritted his teeth. His Shadow Bind spell hadn’t come off cooldown yet, so he was forced to use Entangling Coils in an attempt to slow the giant spider down, but the thing leapt forwards at the last second. The monster which was about the size of a medium sized dog collided with Fervah with enough force to knock her to the ground and she started screaming once again as the needle like claws on the ends of its legs dug into her skin.

Kyle cursed again; he wasn’t confident that he would be able to kill the spider with a single attack and if he failed then he doubted that he would be able to save Fervah. Both Fi and Carly had both ceased their own attacks out of fear of accidentally hitting Fervah, so they were rapidly running out of options.

As much as Laurence deeply wanted to save his friend, he knew that keeping the attention of the other two spiders was more important because if one of them decided to attack Carly then things would get even worse than they already were. Activating his Taunt Skill Laurence shouted angrily before immediately dodging several stabbing attacks from both of the attacker’s forelimbs and then returning the favour with some quick slashes of his own that mostly only served to anger the monsters further which as far as Laurence was concerned was a good thing.

Meanwhile Kyle came to the conclusion that he really only had the one option and when the spider’s fangs which were longer than his finger sunk into Fervah’s flesh and began pumping venom into her he decided to go with it. Activating his Leap Skill, he hurtled through the air, unfortunately Fervah was actually further away than he could usually travel with this Skill, so he’d had to come up with something to increase its range.

Fervah screamed as what felt like molten lead flow through her veins from where the spider monster was biting her. Fi quickly cast Cleanse on her but it didn’t seem to have much of an effect making the companion curse loudly.

“Shit!” she snarled as Fervah’s eyes rolled back in her head from the pain. “Carly do you have a spell that can cure poison?”

“Uh, yes!” Carly replied as she waved her staff in Fervah’s direction causing clear water to flow up over her and sink into her body.

While this was happening, Kyle was hurtling through the air. As soon as he started falling back towards the ground, he tossed one of his chains out and wrapped it around one of the branches of the tree above Fervah and the spider with his Chain Manipulation Skill before using it to pull himself further than he would be able to if he was just using his Leap Skill.

As soon as he landed, he started hammering the spider monster with his fists which he had wrapped with his chains while he had been flying through the air, so the Enchantments actually still took effect. This also meant that they were hurting Fervah, but it wasn’t like he really had any better methods of helping her with his Skill set.

Seeing what was happened Fi and Carly both started casting healing spells on Fervah who was now looking considerably worse for wear. As soon as the chain the Kyle had used to swing off of the branch of the tree overhead unwrapped itself the sharp weight on the end buried itself in the spider’s body. It was this attack that finally got the monster to release her from its clutches as it unwrapped its body to hiss at Kyle who just smirked at it before Fi shot in and knocked it completely off Fervah with a Mana Blast.

While it was flying backwards through the air Kyle fired a handful of Mana Darts and a Light Arrow at the monster. All of the projectiles except one struck the monster in its softer underside causing it to spin out of control and crash into another tree. Kyle started running towards it before it even hit the ground and the spiked chain shot ahead of him and pinned the monster to the tree so that he could hit it with his chains without having to worry about it being able to attack him. Eventually the monster expired and after quickly checking in with Fi to see ow Fervah was doing he started running back over towards Laurence who was still holding off both of the remaining monsters.

He was actually doing very well considering that his Stats weren’t anywhere near as high as Kyle’s were as well as his lack of any form of magic of his own. He did have some help from Carly, but she had mostly been focussing on keeping Fervah alive. As Kyle watched he realised that the young man’s skill with his weapon was much, much higher than Kyle’s own. He also seemed to be very talented at dodging attacks by the skin of his teeth and performing counter attacks that dealt far more damage than the spiders had dealt to him. Both of the spiders had large rents torn in the tough chitin that covered their bodies and one of them as even missing one of its front legs.

Laurence was looking much better off as he danced around the thrusting attacks and occasional attempts of the spiders to pounce on him, but his clothes were now in tatters and Kyle could see that the skin underneath was also covered in shallow scratches. Kyle could also tell that Laurence’s endurance was also failing. At the start of the fight he had been using a strange type of Footwork Skill that improved his ability to dodge attacks to the point that it almost seemed to be unnatural but now he was only using it in short bursts which unfortunately also meant that it was harder for him to land a decent hit on his opponents.

Seeing this Kyle activated his Dash Skill and shot towards his new ally as quickly as he could. Dash was slower than the combination of Leap and Chain Manipulation that he had used before, but the situation that Laurence was in wasn’t anywhere near as bad as the one Fervah had been in. As he ran, he used Pain Spike on one of the spiders that was about to hit Laurence who spun around and slashed it across one of its eyes before stepping away just in time to dodge the attack that had been momentarily interrupted by Kyle’s attack.

Fi cast her Cleanse and Restore spells every single time that they came off cooldown but even with both of these spells the best she could do was keep Fervah’s condition from deteriorating further. Carly was still sprinting over as fast as she could and casting her own debuff clearing spells as she ran but Fervah still wasn’t really improving. Coming to a halt by her friend’s side she cast her poison curing spell once more nut all that did was slow down the spread of the poison again.

“Why won’t it work!” She exclaimed as tears started running down her face. “What was that thing?”

“A Variant of Daggerleg Spider called a Daggerleg Scourge,” Fi replied. “It’s basically a more powerful version of a weaker Variant called a Webber which has much more powerful Venom that could probably even take out someone at Level 20 if they didn’t have access to something like an antidote.”

“Wait how is something that powerful here?” Carly squawked. Fi nodded slowly as she realised Carly’s confusion was due to the fact that she didn’t have the same level of education that Fi and Kyle had and began to explain what was going on. Most ordinary monsters evolved to a Variant of their base form once they reached a certain Level, but some were born as Variants making them much stronger than normal for their Level. As such these ‘lucky’ monsters that were born Variants then evolve to a more powerful Variant when a normal monster would normally evolve into a Variant. These ‘natural born’ Variants were usually quite rare, only once in every few hundreds of births but for things like Daggerleg Spiders which laid an egg sac that produced hundreds of young that meant that there was at least one in every brood.

“Never mind that now!” Carly snapped once FI had finished talking. “Our spells aren’t powerful enough to cure that thing’s venom. What can we do!?”

“Do you have an antidote on you?” Fi asked.

“No,” Carly replied worriedly before suddenly realising something. “But Laurence and Fervah both grabbed a couple of antidotes from the dispensary in case of emergency.”

“Well than goodness for that,” Fi muttered as Carly quickly flipped her friend over and started rummaging around in the small pouch on the back of Fervah’s belt. The dispensary was a place where Adventurers could pick up things like potions and arrows if they had to be somewhere in a hurry. The best thing about it was that you could wait until after you finished whatever Quest you thought you might need the items for to pay and you could even give them back if you didn’t end up using them. Like most of the things on sale in the Adventurer’s Guild building everything for sale at the dispensary was made on site by Adventurers who had Crafting Skills or by Crafters who specifically made them to supply Adventurers who needed them.

“Here they are!” Carly exclaimed as she pulled two small vials out of the small pouch and rolled Fervah back over so that she could pour them into her mouth.

“Wait!” Fi said quickly as she Identified the contents of the vial. “Those are Low Quality Antidotes so they’re probably not any more powerful than our spells.

“So, what do we do then?” Carly asked in an obvious panic.

“On my signal we cast our spells and give her the antidotes at the same time,” Fi told her confidently. “That should be more than enough to cure her.”

“And if it’s not?”

“It will be,” Fi replied firmly. To be honest she wasn’t sure that this would work either, but it was the best chance that Fervah had. It really was unfortunate that the monster that had bitten her had been so much stronger than she was and that it had been able to pump so much of its venom into her before Kyle had been able to save her. “On my mark; one, two, three, now!”

As soon as Fi said the word now Carly poured both of the antidotes into her friend’s mouth and cast her Purification spell while Fi cast her Cleanse spell on Fervah. As the spells and potions took effect Fervah’s entire body started to convulse so Carly quickly rolled her onto her side just in time for her to puke up a stream of black foul-smelling sludge.

“Oh, thank the gods,” Carly sighed in relief. The black sludge was the poison that her spell had been absorbing being ejected from Fervah’s body and was a sure sign of her beginning to recover.

“Keep casting that status clearing spell and healing her until she stops puking,” Fi told Carly who nodded in agreement. “I’m going to go and help the other two.”

Meanwhile Kyle was just finishing off one of the injured spiders that Laurence had been fighting. These Daggerleg Spiders were quite a bit stronger than the ones that he had been fighting up until now. He and Fi probably still could’ve defeated them on their own. Well unless the same thing that had happened to Fervah happened to him. He was willing to bet that his Constitution was higher than hers which meant that things like venom wouldn’t affect him as much but even if that was the case, he doubted he would survive the experience. However, Kyle and Fi weren’t fighting alone and he was grateful for that.

Kyle turned around just in time to see Laurence shear another one of his opponent’s legs off causing it to hiss in pain and activated his Lash Skill, slamming the weighted end of the chain in his right hand into the top of the things hand with enough force that it just collapsed. Seeing this both of the young men nodded and Kyle’s spiked chain and Laurence’s blade both plunged into different parts of the monster’s body killing it.

Without so much as taking a moment to breath both young men turned towards the others and ran over. F landed on Kyle’s shoulders as he ran, she was quite relieved that the fighting was over for now because her MP was basically all gone, and she could tell that Kyle’s MP and SP were both running on empty as well.

“Is Fervah alright?” Laurence asked as he knelt down next to the young woman and gently took her hand. Seeing the tender look on his face Kyle realised that he was in love with Fervah and glanced at Carly who shook her head subtly at him before responding to Laurence’s question.

“She’s going to be fine she’s just tired,” Carly replied as she gave Laurence a comforting smile. “Now, how about you guys go and loot what you can from the monsters that you killed.”

Fervah was the member of their group who had both the Butchering and Skinning Skills since she was trying to become a Ranger and both of those Skills were Class Skills for a Ranger so made it easier for her to unlock the Ranger Class when she reached Level 25.

“Carly is right,” Kyle said as he placed a hand on Laurence’s shoulder. “We have to wait until Fervah wakes up but that doesn’t mean that our Quest is any less urgent.”

“You’re right,” Laurence nodded as he stood back up. “Let’s get to it then.”

So, the two young men started to take what they could from the corpses of the Daggerleg Spiders. This was mostly things like poison glands and the claws on the tips of the monster’s legs and once they were done Fi sucked them all inside her Inventory while Laurence watched with a bemused look on his face.

“By the way, I’ve been meaning to ask,” Kyle mentioned. “Why don’t you guys have a party member with a Companion?”

“We honestly just haven’t found anyone who would be a good permanent addition to our party,” Laurence replied with a shrug. “We have worked with a couple of people over the past week but most of them weren’t all that interested.”

“Well that might change after we complete this Quest,” Kyle replied. Laurence hesitated slightly before nodding in agreement. He had been hoping that Kyle might be interested in joining his party but the look on the other young man’s face told him that was unlikely and if Laurence pushed him then he would definitely refuse.

Once they were done Kyle sat down at the base of a nearby tree and started going over his Skill increases with Fi. Fervah was still unconscious so there wasn’t much else they could do until she woke up and the others also sat down and started going over what they had gained from the fight as well.

“We must have a reasonable amount to go over since we got interrupted last time,” Kyle sighed and Fi nodded in agreement.

A decent amount,” she said as she brought up the information.

Skills Increased!

Chain Manipulation increased to Level 12- 15% to next Proficiency Level

Increases damage dealt with Chain Weapons by 17%

Increases accuracy with Chain Weapons by 12%

Increases the damage dealt by manipulated chains by 7%

Medium Armour increased to Level 13 -7% to next Proficiency Level

Increases Physical Defence provided by Medium Armour by 13%

Acrobatics increased to Level 10- 3%

Increases dodge chance by 15%

New Bonus available to Unlock

Blunt Weapons increased to Level 11- 23% to next Proficiency Level

Increases Blunt damage by 11%

Footwork increased to Level 3- 29% to next Proficiency Level

Increases movement speed by 7%

“Well that’s pretty good progress,” Fi said once they had finished reading through the Skill increases. “You have 19 Skill Points now by the way.”

“Alright anything else I should know?” Kyle asked.

“Nope you have a couple of other Skills that nearly Levelled Up but none of your spells are even remotely close to being Mastered,” Fi replied.

“Okay,” Kyle nodded as he stood back up and looked around at the others who were all making strange gestures as they dealt with their own Skill Increases. Seeing this was still odd to him but before he could dwell on that Fervah started coughing and everyone quickly rushed over to her side as her eyes fluttered open.

“Hey,” she croaked as she looked up at the worried faces of her friends before turning to look at Kyle. “Thanks for saving me.”

“We’re a team now, you don’t have to thank me for that,” Kyle replied. “How are you feeling.”

“Not great,” she replied as Carly helped her sit up. “But we don’t have time for me to be sitting, around do we?”

“No,” Kyle agreed ignoring the glare that Laurence shot at him. “But we can take things a bit slower until you feel better.”

“Alright but I don’t think that I can scout out a path for us in my current state,” Fervah pointed out.

“Leave that to me,” Fi said before turning to Carly. “Keep healing her as you move, even if her HP is at its maximum. I’m getting the distinct impression that we’ll need her at her best pretty soon.”

Having said this the serpentine familiar took to the air and flew off. Laurence helped Fervah to her feet and they continued deeper into the forest.