Walking out of the blacksmiths Lilly started to wander towards the forest where Navir had claimed the spiders lived. Spider silk was a very strong yet flexible silk created by a magical spider beast, the silk itself was not rare and quite easy to find its was the getting the silk away from the spiders which made it such a challenge.

Vicious spiders guarded the silk and they would not let it be taken for anything so unless a person was strong enough or clever enough they had no chance at gaining the silk. Luckily Lilly was both, several minutes of walking later and Lilly had reached the center of the forest upon which she saw a large opening into a dark cave.

Smiling at the fact she had arrived at her destination Lilly thought back on the advice she had gained from Navir once she told him her plan to procure a weapon after rescuing him "the spiders are viscous however they reside in the darkness and are strongly afraid of light which is why the Asura flame is so helpful when dealing with them, the only way to cut spider silk is with the claw of a magical beast making procuring the silk even harder unless you're string enough to hint beasts or rich enough to buy materials."

Lilly sighed as she thought this over and quickly came to a conclusion, she had no choice but to hunt magical beasts to find a suitable material to cut the silk. Walking throughout the forest it would seem luck favoured her as she soon came across a lone wolf that lay bleeding out on the ground, the huge creature had obviously been in a fight with another beast and had clearly not come out on top.

Approaching wordlessly Lilly drew her dagger and slit the creatures throat, she was an assassin she wasn't here to fight but rather to silently kill and take what she needed. Smiling slightly at her fortune Lilly looked at the wolf's corpse with a suddenly sad smile "thank you." she whispered softly as she carefully removed the wolf's claws "I'll use them well."

Hiding her daggers amongst her cloths Lilly gripped the claws in her hands and moved back towards the cave. Standing in the entrance of the cave Lilly slowly let her eyes adjust to the gloom. The cave was large and almost as black as night with several indistinct passages leading off into what looked like various caverns.

The passages themselves were filled with spider silk however there was none to be found within the first cave, this forced those looking for spider silk to enter the passageways into the spiders home ground giving the spiders an advantage. Smiling at the well put together trap Lilly walked into the cave and near the passage, staring at the silk lined passage Lilly came to a decision.

In a typical fantasy world the hero of the story would stereotypically charge forward with sword in hand and stubbornly fight the spiders in a desperate struggle and eventually emerge victorious, Lilly was not that sort of hero. In the first place her charging at highly dangerous spiders with average fighting abilities and recently discovered magic was an incredibly stupid idea, and say what you will about Lilly she was not stupid.

Carefully forming a plan Lilly quickly used the wolf's claw to chop off a huge sheet of spider silk, sensing the vibrations tens of spiders swarmed to her location from within the passageway, expecting an easy prey. Of course Lilly could just turn around and run the way she came but Navir had already explained how spiders were much faster than she would be, and besides she had a plan.

Although the spiders would attack if Lilly gave them the chance they didn't get that chance as Lilly held her small, barely controlled Asura flame towards the remaining spider silk and then ran. The silk itself wasn't very flammable however the Asura flame was the strongest in the world and for such creatures who had never dealt with flames before the fire would be especially effective in stopping them, not to mention there aversion to light.

Running as quickly as she could out of the cave Lilly collapsed the ground as she stared at the smoke rising above the trees where the cave was. Feeling happy Lilly stared down at the large quantities of spider silk in her hand "perfect." taking the acquired silk Lilly quickly made her way back into Alysa's shop.

Entering the shop Lilly called out "Alysa, Alysa are you here?" it was a good minute later before the older woman appeared "Oh that was quick, less than an hour I might add. Did you find the silk?" Lilly grinned and held up the silk "will this be enough?" Alysa grinned but looked slightly confused "this is great, only it's too much the excess silk would be worth triple the amount you'd owe me."

Lilly nodded "I know, I was hoping I could commission you to make two fans, there should still be enough material for the excess payment." Alysa nodded "Ok that's fine, come back tomorrow morning and I'll give them too you." Lilly smiled "Thanks a lot." quickly walking back home Lilly made a plan of action for the rest of the day.

"Navir?" she called as soon as she entered the house "yes?" replied Navir from upstairs "come down here a second I've decided on our next plan," Navir quickly came down the stairs and was soon face to face with Lilly "What's the plan?" Lilly nodded "Ok, so I suggest we leave in two days because I commissioned a weapon that will only be ready tomorrow morning, during that time I want you to take as many requests at the adventurers guild as possible, as high ranking as you can."

Navir looked at her curious "any reason why?" Lilly nodded "because while we're crossing the border we need to be as inconspicuous as possible and a high ranking adventurer and his sister, going to check on family on the edge of the country seem a lot more inconspicuous then two travellers who suddenly decide they want to visit one of the most dangerous areas in the world in the middle of the war."

Navir silently considerd this then nodded "Ok, what are you going to be doing?" Lilly paused for a moment considering how much she should tell him "information gathering for the project I asked the princess to look into." Navir nodded "Right, well then I'll head out now." Lilly smiled "see you later."

As soon as Navir left Lilly quickly took off towards the castle, it was time to check the princess's story, even if the princess seemed honest it was quite possible she was lying or being unknowingly manipulated into giving Lilly false information so it was only common sense to talk to the servants to see what they knew.

Walking round the castle in the stolen maid outfit she talked to as many of the servants as she could mentioning each time she had heard the princess liked someone and asked if they knew who it was, though in much subtler terms. The answer she got was consistent throughout the entire castle.

"It's true she has someone she likes, everyone knows that, the only problem is no one knows who she likes though there's a rumor that it's someone she knew since childhood." pleased with the conformation although still holding a light disbelief Lilly left the castle and quickly changed clothes into a typical messenger outfit she had stolen on the way there.

Walking out inti the streets in the stolen uniform Lilly walked towards a street vendor "Excuse me sir, I'm new here and I'm meant to be delivering a message to the army barracks. I don't suppose you could point me in the right direction?" the street vendor laughed "sure thing kid it's down the street to the right, then you take the first left and it's straight in front of you."

Lilly smiled sweetly "Thanks alot, you're a lifesaver." walking off into the direction the man had indicated Lilly soon arrived at a large marble building that looked as if it had never seen a war in its life. Snorting Lilly quickly entered the building, it was time to steal some information.

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Author's note

Sorry for the short chapter in truth the chapter wad to big to be one chapter so split it into two so I'll try to finish of the second part by the end of the weekend hope you enjoyed the chapter