Edward stood groggily still shaken by the explosion. Though his aura armor was still active the shockwave had gotten through it. Armors were great at stopping cuts but less so at stopping blunt impacts. He gazed at the hole where the nest had been. Large swaths of webs lay dangling near a big hole that let appeared the sky. He noticed several spots of dark burned webs even outside the explosion perimeter.

Leyla really outdid herself. He blinked. To be fair, the explosion was probably this impressive because of all the gathered mana. Those webs are draining mana from kilometers around, considering the amount of energy involved it’s no wonder the explosion was this impressive.

Edward could see no more wasp spiders hanging from above, they too had been blown away by the explosions. They moved unsteadily on the ground, most had some of their legs broken. They are ripe for the taking. Within his reach and without wolf spiders to defend them, the wasp spiders were easy prey. Edward killed them one after the other, absorbing the blood essence of each one. Wasp spiders weren’t technically a threat but they were valuable to the spider colony, they were the ones who expanded and maintained their territory by continuously producing more webs. By piercing a hole big enough that it was significant at the forest scale, destroying one of the spiders’ nests, and removing the wasp spiders which were able to repair the webs, Edward was impacting the spider colony as a whole.

If the colony was smaller, this would have been enough to cripple it. But since the colony had covered the whole forest, they had more nests. This sector was cleared, but if Edward didn’t deal with the other nests, the spiders would just repair the damage and move on.

I can’t stay here. Reinforcement will come, and with this much of a disturbance, this place will be crowded with spiders before long. Edward felt the satisfaction of having completed a difficult task by destroying the nest, but this was mixed with exhaustion. He had to deal with several waves of wolf spiders and then had taken some damage with the explosion. I need a place to rest. Edward looked in what he thought was the direction of the mountain where he came from, even if he couldn’t see it due to all the webs. He hesitated before shaking his head. No, I can’t go back. I will have to head deeper inside the forest for the other nests, I can’t go back to the mountain every time. I need to find, or rather create, safe places while inside their domain.

Edward followed the threads’ alignment. Since they were converging on the nest he had just destroyed, he only had to go in the other direction to move away from it. He didn’t head deeper inside the spider domain, choosing to run on the side instead. If reinforcement were coming, he didn’t want to run into them.

Where can I hide in such a place? Edward looked around him but all he saw were webs and more webs. Webs covering the sky, webs covering the ground, and pillars of webs in between. Those webs are everywhere. I feel as if I’m in a spider cocoon rather than a forest. Edward continued to run away. Wait a minute. This was a forest, the trees are still there. I can dig a hideout inside one to hide. They may have covered the trees with webs but they haven’t removed them yet.

Edward approached a web pillar and cut a rectangle of two meters in height and one meter in width into it, extending his aura blade long enough to cut both through the webs and the tree bark directly. Then he carefully pulled on the webs from the piece he had cut from the pillar. The whole block of wood came with the webs and slid out from the pillar bit by bit. There were ten centimeters of webs in front of the tree before the tree began. Edward slid out the block until five centimeters of wood were out. Then he activated his aura blade again and cut the block, keeping the ten centimeters of webs and five centimeters of wood. He dropped it with caution on the ground, this would be the door to his temporary refuge. He then removed the rest of the wood from the tree trunk as a single block. He managed to dig a one and a half meters hideout inside the tree. The block of wood would have been hard to lift for a normal human, but Edward could lift it with one hand, using his aura to dig his fingers into the wood to improve his grip.

Now, where to ditch this?

Naturally, Edward couldn’t just leave this block of wood right next to the tree, it would only reveal his presence. He carefully kept in mind how this place looked and ran in a direction while carrying the block of wood. With everything covered with webs, it was easy to get lost. Edward ran for three minutes and grated the wood block into small pieces with his aura blades. The small wood crumbs covering the webs would look strange, but it would be hard to associate it with somebody having dug a hideout in a tree a hundred meters away.

Edward retraced his steps, picked up the door of his hideout, climbed inside the tree, and close the entry. It was a small place, Edward could only stand still or cross-legged but he didn’t have the space to lie down or to stretch his legs. It’s not the best but this will do. The most important is safety. Edward sat crossed-legged and closed his eyes, he used his overwatch meditation, keeping his aura in the tree and the immediate surroundings. Due to the webs disturbing his aura, he was only able to monitor five meters around the tree but that was enough.

Later, Edward opened his eyes, he wasn’t sure how long he had stayed in meditation but he felt rested and the bruises caused by the explosion had disappeared. Inspecting his condition, Edward thought, Good. It’s time to go back to work. Let’s destroy another nest before they have the time to repair this one.

Edward went out and put back the wood cover on his hideout. Even though he probably wouldn’t use this place anymore there was no need to show the spiders that he had a hideout in this place, nor that digging into the tree was his way of hiding.

He had barely moved for two hundred meters when he felt that something was wrong. He didn’t know how to explain it, but he felt as if the atmosphere had changed, a tension was hanging in the air. Edward shifted awkwardly. It looks like the explosion infuriated them. They are taking me seriously now.

Edward was keeping an eye on the webbed forming an artificial ceiling, looking for the web alignment. He had just left the area of the previous nest and the alignment of the threads was now showing the direction of another nest. Curiously he hadn’t encountered any spiders for now, but he wasn’t about to complain about it.

As he was running a portal suddenly opened under him, before he had the time to react two hairy spider legs longer than he was tall emerged from the portal soon followed by the rest of the spider. Two fangs the same size as his daggers glinted with aura and pierced through his armor as if it was wet paper. Edward felt a sharp pain, he attempted to teleport away but the teleportation failed, the spider still had its fangs inside of him. The bear-size tarantula dragged Edward through the portal which closed after his passage.

Edward tried to take his daggers to push back the spider but he realized with dread that he was unable to move. His injury didn’t pain anymore, all he could feel was numbness in his whole body. Poison. Edward understood with mounting horror that the spider’s poison had completely paralyzed him. He couldn’t teleport and couldn’t move either, he was defenseless and literally under the fangs of this monster.

The giant tarantula dragged him further inside its lair. He was inside a round tunnel with the sides covered in webs, the tunnel was rather large, the same size as the spider, roughly three meters in diameter. Edward could only watch helplessly as the monster carry him with its fangs. The tunnel widened to form a room where the spider dropped him before turning away. The spider’s abdomen hovered above Edward, two arm-length protrusions flapped in front of his face, and from it, a thick layer of silk was produced. Edward opened his eyes wide as the webs covered his face, all he could see was darkness and he felt his body being rotated and wrapped in webs.

Cold sweat dripped from his back as he realized that this could be the end. He understood that removing the spiders from the forest was a dangerous endeavor but he never considered that he could die attempting it. He always thought his teleportation would be enough to escape from danger. In his mind, at worst, he would have to flee and come back with a different approach.

Being unable to do anything while at the mercy of a giant tarantula made him revise his mindset. His mind was paralyzed by terror, he didn’t want to die, and certainly not like that. Everything seemed to be doing well until now. He had difficulty processing the reversal of the situation. Think. THINK. THINK.

He heard the spider move away, leaving him stranded in the room. This finally made him calm down a little. It’s leaving. I’m not dead yet. He tried to breathe slowly but the webs in front of his face made it an uneasy exercise. It’s probably leaving me aside as a food snack. I have to escape before it comes back. Edward mentally made an inventory of the situation. He was wrapped in webs and his body was paralyzed. He was in the lair of a bear-size tarantula, which could apparently open portals to ambush its prey. That meant he didn’t know where he was in the forest anymore. He didn’t know the whereabouts of the spider either, and he had an injury on his flank where the spiders had bitten him through his armor.

Edward exhaled slowly. What do I know? I at least have information about what this monster is capable of. It can open portals, can use aura, and has paralyzing poison. I don’t know how long this paralyzing poison will last but the spider can come back at any time. I can’t wait for the poison to dissipate. Besides, even if the poison dissipates, I would still be wrapped in webs. What can I do? Without being able to move I can only rely on my aura.

Edward checked and discovered that he could still use his aura freely. A wave of relief coursed through his body, he wasn’t completely out of options.