The spider makes puppets

As I was standing there with my 'spider blanket', I realized that I had gotten quite hungry. So I made my way to the kitchen, to cook up some supplement soup.

"Urg" I made a grimace as I ate. It was somehow even more bland and tasteless than normal. It didn't help that I still clearly remembered the heavenly scent of the gangsters flesh.

Maybe I could sprinkle it with a little bit of blood? Just a little bit wouldn't hurt anybody right? No wait, what am I thinking! bad spider, no using blood as a spice!

"Haaaaaa" I let out a sigh.

At this point I might really end up attacking someone… especially if I run out of supplements.

No, now isn't the time to get depressed! It is time for reflecting and laying plans.

So what did I learn from this raid?

First off, I learned that although I have an enhanced physique, I am by no means a skilled fighter. Not really all that surprising, I wasn't exactly fighting people left and right back home. In fact I can probably count the times I've been in a fight on one hand.

Second off, I haven't really gotten used to my own strength. Scratch that, I am pretty unfamiliar with this body in general. Even my abilities are pretty much a mystery to me. Evident from all the times I've been surprised by them.

Third off, I clearly need more training with the puppeteer part of my abilities. While the puppets can attack fast and wild, they don't really have any finesse. Not surprising considering my own lack of fighting experience. But a better indicator of my lacking skill, was when I disabled my own puppets, by mistake. This could've been avoided, if I had used my spider leg to block the club. This is a mistake that shows my lack of combat experience.

Finally it also showcased another concerning problem. I have clearly become more aggressive than I used to be. I was never really one to act on my anger before. So this might be a result of me becoming a demon.

I wonder if there is a place that teaches anger management classes for demons… Probably not.

Maybe meditation or yoga could help? I looked down at the floor, and saw my spiders doing various weird stretches. It looked like they were performing some obscure form of yoga.

"pfff" I made an involuntary snort of amusement.

I stretched out my spider legs and began imitating some of my spiders poses. This let me to an interesting realization, my body has become way more flexible than what it used to be.

I was barely even able to reach my toes before. But now, I can not only reach my toes but even perform a perfect split.

My spiders clapped their front legs together in praise. I did a theatrical bow, to thank them for the moral support.

After my spontaneous yoga session with the spiders, I went to check the loot. I had gotten quite the hefty haul, and a lot of miscellaneous junk. It looked like my spiders had simply stripped the warehouse of everything, I even found a chair.

I gave my spiders a confused look and pointed at the chair and said.

"Why did you take the furniture?"

My spiders simply tilted their bodies in response. I got the feeling that the gesture conveyed about the same meaning as a shrug.

Oh well, maybe I can use it for something in the future.

I looked at one of the guns my spiders had stolen.

"Hmmm" Now would be a good time to test if my silk is bulletproof or not. I had my spiders create a sort of silk box, to stop any ricocheting bullets. Then I made them spin a sheet of silk. Once all of the preparations were done I took aim and fired. The conclusion was that my silk is definitely bulletproof… and so am I. In hindsight I should have given the box a backside.

After cleaning up from the firearms test, I began designing my puppets. I was going to make 3 different designs as a start.

while I was drawing sketches, my spiders were sitting around me, occasionally tapping the paper to give me their input.

After a while I finished my first design. I had my spiders gather the necessary materials and quickly began working on it. After quite a while of struggling with the materials to get the puppet just right. Me and my spiders were now looking at the finished product, with pride.

At first glance it looked like a tall man, dressed in a dark hood. But although we had made a human face for it, if someone had a good look at it, they would quickly realize that something was wrong. It's facial expression didn't change, and we weren't able to make it look like it was breathing. It also made some weird twitching movements, when I controlled it to move. but considering that I would most likely only be using it at night, it is likely more than enough to fool people.

More importantly I had managed to chuck it full of various hidden weapons. I even created a sort of taser hand, by combining a taser with a rubber glove. This even taught me a valuable lesson, my silks conductivity is enough for me to get zapped through it. Also getting zapped hurts…

The second puppet design I came up with, was a small puppet that looks like a child in an oversized hoodie. While it may look innocent at first. I had given it two hidden blades within its hands. It also had a hidden gun within its mouth. I had also aligned the outside of its hoodie with sticky threads. So if someone touched it they would be stuck to it. While this in itself wouldn't be all that threatening. The puppet was hollow with many small hidden exits. This was made so that my spiders could hide in it. Now if someone got stuck to the puppet, my spiders could come out off it and easily climb onto them.

But while it did look fairly convincing, this puppet wasn't without its flaws. If someone got a good look at it, they would quickly realize that something was off. Also it's twitching movements made it seem like it was possessed. Another flaw is that it isn't as sturdy as my other puppet, due to it being hollow. That being said it was still sturdy enough to withstand most firearms.

All in all I consider this acceptable, as it is made for ambushes and not a straight up confrontation.

My final puppet design was made to look like a bird. More specifically a European starling. This puppet was created with one aspect of my ability in mind. Namely that I was able to sense the surroundings of my puppets. Yep this puppet was essentially a surveillance drone. Take that conspiracy theorists! it's not the government using surveillance birds, it's the spiders.

My reason for creating such a puppet you ask?

Simple after having been sneak attacked once, I realized it would be stupid to not expect someone to try it again. So I came up with a countermeasure, I was going to place these birds in strategic positions around me. They would then warn me whenever someone tries to sneak up on me.

What's that? I'm talking like I plan to have many of them? But, of course I will. While one puppet could survey a decent sized area, I would need multiple for it to be truly viable. So yeah I was going to make multiple of these puppets.

They sadly weren't without flaws. First of all as the puppets weren't actually able to fly they would be relatively stationary. That is not to say they couldn't move at all, I could still make them jump quite far by yanking their strings. But this would likely give them away, as they wouldn't be moving like normal birds. The second problem is the same problem my other puppets have. If someone takes a good look at them they would realize that they aren't actually real birds. While they are certainly convincing, there are still small things that gives them away. The third problem is that I would have to stay relatively stationary for these puppets to work. Essentially if I start jumping about, I would end up yanking my puppets around. Finally they weren't exactly created for straight up confrontations. So they don't really have a lot of fire power. Sure they are still bulletproof and armed with steel claws. But they would have to get pretty close to do any damage.

After an undisclosed amount of time working on the puppets with my spiders. I was now watching the finished puppets. I felt like a proud artist watching their new masterpiece, or maybe a mad scientist watching their new inator. Regardless it gave me a warm bubbly feeling inside.

I did a little fist pump out of happiness. At least that was what I intended it to be. However it created a big gust of wind due to the force behind my blow…

I could practically feel my newly scattered spiders sending me disapproving looks.

"sorry…" I said in a sheepish tone.

Then I felt my spiders latching on to me in a sort of hug of acceptance. I looked down to see a bunch of happy little spiders looking up at me. Yep life isn't always bad, sometimes it can be downright nice.