Charlotte

As soon as she got into her base, Alice frantically rushed to erect the barricade, pushing rocks and bones and spikes to strengthen it. Once finished, she stood immobile, still vibrating from the surge of adrenaline that had pushed her up the ladder two rungs at a time.

With her Enhanced Hearing skill pushed to the max, she waited for the telltale clicking sound of the spiders coming back to reclaim what was rightfully theirs.

Only once her legs started cramping up did she let herself fall down on the floor into a heap of shivering limbs, slowly crawling towards the pool and drinking large gulps of water, ignoring the nibbling fear in her mind, to simply revel in the knowledge that many more of her cells would soon change into something more.

Her thirst quenched, she sat down on her rocky seat and gazed ahead with hollow eyes. Almost unintentionally a murmur left her cracked lips.

“Did a spider just laugh at me?” another shiver ran down her spine as she remembered the clicking spider easily predicting her attacks, countering them as if it was playing with her.

“It was intelligent. Actually intelligent. Not like the other ones which just seemed to not be stupid, this one was fricking aware. What do I do?”

Alice ran a trembling hand through her clammy hair, trying to think of a way to come out on top. The issue was, she was alone.

She had survived all this time because the other creatures were not only blind, but also stupid; the salamander just kept rushing ahead, heedless of any possible danger; the screechlings swarmed at any sound, and their evolved brethren hadn’t lasted long enough to actually learn anything new. This was different.

That thing had a family, a large number of powerful creatures at its bidding. She had seen their work against the wasp, how they had brought down a foe many times their size. She would be even easier to overpower.

Trying to take her mind away from the thought, the young woman grabbed the bundle of silk she had managed to carry all the way there. She unwrapped the roll to reveal a slightly dirty length of woven silk, its edges fraying after being consumed by the water or snapped during her escape.

Alice slowly traced her fingers on the smooth surface, marveling at its perfection. It was obviously able to cover her completely, and as far as she was concerned, it wasn’t possible to cut it away by normal means.

“At least I’ll have a cloak. And a blanket. And a bag. My god I wish I had enough of it for a mattress” she chuckled to herself “let’s not get too ahead of ourselves here”.

Her stomach rumbled in the silence, but Alice ignored it. it definitely wasn’t time to go out and she was also completely exhausted.

Before heading to bed, Alice checked her weapons, noticing the pitiful state of her crayfish chelae but too tired to do anything about it. She wearily dragged the club and all the remaining metallic spikes into the alcove before squeezing herself in and curling up inside her new silk nest.

It didn’t take long for her to fall asleep and reach the silent dark room of her dreams. There, floating underneath the previous ones, lay a new shimmering phrase, its flaming letters burning themselves into her soul.

You have reached Level 11 in the Biomancer Class.

Your body has absorbed and broken down many different types of harmful substances. You have learned the skill Lesser Toxin Resistance. Your body will be able to resist the effects of weaker poisons and venoms while stronger toxins will be disposed quicker by your metabolism.

Pretty cool I guess. I’m fairly sure I’ll need it soon enough.

Also all these ‘Lesser’ skills must mean that they can be improved. Right? I wonder if it’s something that happens as I level or if I have to do something.

In any case, I’ll really need to enhance my symbiosis, it’s too useful not to. And I can even turn off the effect that makes me look like Irradiated Mr. Burns.

She kept floating there for a long time, relaxing in the void and playing with the flaming letters until she felt the usual pull that had come to signify the time to wake up.

Alice let herself slide into consciousness.

“It’s so strange this new way of sleeping. It’s like I’m just transported somewhere”

She yawned while stretching a bit as she walked around wrapped in her new favorite thing.

“this blanket is so waaarm. I love it. I’d forgotten how good was to sleep on something soft. I’ve really grown used to this state” she said.

Her long fingers, which had been so soft in the past, were filled with cuts and blisters, her nails cracked and dirtied. Her hand was calloused, her once pristine skin marred with a series of bruises and inflamed scars that stood out even more due to her paleness.

“Oh well. Scars are cool. I could get some muscles and start living my life as a biker girl”.

Her musings were interrupted once again by the loud rumble of her enraged stomach.

“You’ve gotten too spoiled by the crawfish. Back in my days we only ate once every three days” she sternly said while looking at her tummy.

Her stomach replied with an even louder roar.

“Ahhh. You win. But. First I need to get a new hand, or sword, or claw. Whatever”.

She grabbed the new crayfish chelae she had kept for the occasion and started adjusting it to her requirements, smoothing the entrance for her stump and removing the chitinous tip to give space for a sturdier and sharper metal spike. A few hours later, Alice’s right forearm sported the new Sword Claw 2.0 ‘Revenge of the Glowing Pool edition’ and the girl was ready to get out once again.

Alice moved away all the stalagmites and debris she had covered the entrance with and, while already flaring her light, started climbing out of her home. She was about to get up on her feet when something white on the ground attracted her eye.

She stopped, paralyzed at the sight of her slightly cracked bone knife, meticulously placed in front of the entrance to her home.

A faint clicking echoed in front of her as the spider cautiously stepped into the halo of light she projected, stopping just a few meters away.

A panicked scream erupted from the girl’s throat as she frantically retreated in the cave and started once again reconstructing the barricade.

The spider didn’t come. She heard the plinking echo of its legs slowly disappear from the antechamber.

Nonetheless, she didn’t know what to do. It had found her. Her only protection was void now that she could be swarmed at any time.

Staying barricaded inside of her base would also simply prolong her suffering since she didn’t have a stockpile of food or a secondary exit.

The clicking echoed again in the passages, together with the sound of something being dragged on the floor.

She heard a thump, then a wrapped-up cocoon the size of a watermelon slammed against her palisade, sending pebbles flying everywhere.

She crouched; her weapons ready to strike at the tiniest hint of movement. After a bit, she picked up a rock, throwing it against the cocoon which moved slightly at the impact.

Ever so slowly, Alice got closer to the silky wrap and lunged with her sword, the metal tip easily passing through the woven fabric and digging deep inside the creature inside which started clicking and squirming in response. From the tiny hole she had ripped, Alice could see the chitinous shell of a millipede, its many limbs trying to find purchase and rip through the though silk.

What the hell. Why did it do that? Does it want to feed me now? Or is it some kind of strange trap?

She finished off the millipede, proceeding to use a tiny amount of the glowing water to cleanly cut through the silk while trying to keep it as intact as possible.

The cloth was stained by the ichor of the armored insect, but she was happy to have even more of it at her disposal.

Alice left the carcass near the pool, deciding to wait before getting rid of it, and instead moved back towards the entrance. There, she carefully shined the light in the antechamber, once again revealing the horrid shape of the spider lying in wait near the tunnel that lead to the main cave, staring straight at her with its bulbous black eyes.

She suppressed a shiver as she stood completely immobile, her sword at the ready, waiting for a move of her foe.

A few tense minutes passed before the spider stirred, clicking with its mandibles and moving lightly in place.

“What the hell do you want?” she angrily asked to the waiting arachnid which simply clicked more with its mandibles in response.

“Go away!”.

Alice threw another one of the bone spikes she had obtained from the ribs of the salamander, the dart easily avoided by the nimble spider.

It ambled around a few seconds before it went after the object, clumsily pushing it clattering towards her with its limb.

“What the frick. Can you understand me? raise the front leg if you understand me”

The spider moved around, skittering from a side to the other as it continuously chittered with its many mouth parts.

“Never that easy uh?”.

Alice pointed her finger towards her face, making sure the spider followed her movements.

“Alice”.

Then, she slowly pointed her finger towards it, slowly enunciating the next word.

“Spider”.

The spider stilled, before slowly raising one of its limbs and pointing it at her while clicking a few times.

“Okay. It understands… it understands what I say. What the hell and why a spider of all things?”

She retreated back in her home, coming back out a minute later while carrying the dead millipede.

After placing the carcass on the ground, she pointed at it until the spider did the same.

“Is this food?”.

She asked while miming eating with her hand, whereupon, after a while the spider happily clicked its mandibles multiple times.

“Not food”.

Alice stated firmly, pushing the dead insect away from her with the prosthesis while shaking her head. The spider looked at a loss, sweeping its multi-eyed gaze from her to the carcass and back to her.

Only after quite a bit of back and forth, did it seem to understand, and shortly after disappeared in the darkness beyond.

Alice was torn.

On one side, this was the first sign of intelligence she had come across since her arrival there, on the other, it was from a giant spider that only yesterday had captured her as a snack.

Her internal debate was cut short when a glob of silk bounced into the antechamber, once again causing her to raise her weapons and prepare for the worst.

The spider followed close behind, making sure to keep its distance before pushing towards her the ball which, she noticed, had stuck to one side a fairly squished and very unfortunate screechling.

“Okay. This I can eat”. She mimed eating the creature before pointing at the spider which also clicked its mandibles.

“Now then, let’s see if you understand relations”.

The young woman pointed her hand towards the arachnid, mimed the sign for ‘eating’ and then pointed it to herself, repeating the gesture a few times, before the spider clicked its mandibles once and pushed a loose rock away from its body.

“Wow. And why? Why do you not want to eat me now? Can spiders lie? Why would they?”.

They had come to an impasse, unable to understand more from each other without even a way to communicate, save for the basic gestures that had taken far too long to be understood.

Unless…

She unhooked the line of silk she always carried at her side and, while keeping an eye on the creature, slowly started trying to form a humanoid shape.

The end result was an extremely ugly stick figure, but she deemed it good enough and slowly retreated back, shining her light on it and letting the creature inspect it as she kept pointing first at its shape and then at herself.

The spider stood still for a long while before starting to draw a thin silk line from its spinneret, quickly attaching it to a wall and starting to form a complex webbed pattern.

Quite a few long minutes later, the spider retreated, showing a cobweb embroidered in a spider pattern.

“Okay, I know I’m repeating myself, but what the hell is this” she pointed at the cobweb and then at the spider which clicked a few times in a way that seemed affirmative.

Eventually, the spider drew another web, the new one showing a rough humanoid shape with a large head and a large open hole that probably was the mouth.

The spider then looked at her, clicking a few times before it violently stabbed the figure over and over, large rends that marred the cobweb.

Alice had raised her weapon and was getting ready to fight, until she saw the creature carefully repair the cuts with a new line of silk, before pointing at the large hole that was her mouth and then repeating the scene more and more times.

“My mouth breaks the body? Repairs it? Are you talking about Hemostasis?”. Almost unconsciously the girl let the power flow through the last word, activating it.

The spider immediately trashed the cobweb before it started moving left and right while loudly clicking.

“You want me to use Hemostasis? on you?” she pointed at the creature which started clicking and weaving an even larger cobweb.

It took more than twenty minutes this time, but the final result showed a much larger spider, its limbs missing and broken and a small humanoid figure with a large head beside it.

“You want me to cure that thing? With Hemostasis?” the spider clicked and pointed repeatedly at her and the large spider.

“Oh fudge that” she said as she pushed the dead millipede away even further “I’m definitely not going anywhere near your mom or dad if that’s an accurate scale” she exclaimed before retreating back into her base once more.

*****

This chapter is officially sponsored by MR.DANTE!