Cute Spiders Playing

The hundreds of spiders were all bunched up together, crowding over one another as if they were crazed fans swarming their idol.

Consisting of various spiders of different shapes and spiders, the pile was already a gross enough image to come upon on its own.

In the middle of them all, the thing they were desperately trying to reach, was the thing that truly turned it into a twisted image.

It was a single large spider, the only spider in the entire horde that was larger than the average grey and brown spiders that could be found outside of the nest.

What made it so disgusting, so fucked up, was the action the large spider was doing.

With its two front legs, it was scooping up the small spiders that were surrounding it, throwing them into its mouth as it ate them.

Crunching their bodies, and sending goo and legs everywhere with every single bite, the image was enough to make a weak stomached individual retch.

The room was covered in bits of spiders, legs strewn about, the fleshy bits hanging off of them after having been discarded by the spider as it ate, and there were even half eaten spiders, barely hanging onto life by a thread.

Even worse, these half eaten spiders were still dragging themselves back to the pile with broken legs, as if they weren't satisfied with only being half eaten, going back to become the spiders desert.

6 had no idea why these spiders were so determined to become the spiders next meal, but he was willing to bet that it had something to do with some kind of emntal ability, especially after his own recent experiment.

From prior evidence, he knew that the spiders didn't have some type of hive mind, as he had even recently seen two competing with each other for their spot, and they didn't behave like most hive minded creatures.

Which meant that this was something else.

The spider itself resembled the first large spider 6 killed, to an eerie extent. Compared to most of the other spiders he had stumbled upon in the nest, this was the first he could call similar to that spider, though this one was quite a bit larger.

Large enough that 6 wasn't even considering getting into a fight with it.

The only main difference between the two was actually the front legs of this spider. Not that they were different visually, but that they had some kind of effect that wasn't present in the other spiders.

Like giant spoons, with each scoop of its legs, a huge amount of side were lifted into the air, picked up by some invisible wall surrounding the legs.

This was despite the legs themselves being quite thin, just as any spider's legs would be.

6 would bet money that functioning as giant spoons to feed itself wasn't the only way the spider could use whatever ability it was using. Some kind of hammer legs crashing down on you when you were expected to be blocking the strike of a regular spider leg would be a recipe for disaster.

Just the monster cannibalistic spider alone was a threat, not even mentioning that it was surrounded by a ton of other spiders that were clearly very devoted to it, to the extent of becoming its next meal.

Though Trivrium hasn't mentioned anything about it having a presence, he wasn't about to let that void his perception. Just because it didn't have a presence didn't mean it was weak, and if it had mental abilities like Trivrium warned about, this could be the end of his mission here.

'This type of shit is gonna start knocking years off of my life, creepy fucks. What are the odds of this thing stopping you from teleporting me?' 6 asked.

[They aren't low. If it makes you want to be eaten, you won't have a desire to leave this world. Can't take you away without permission, so you'd be on your own. You can still write a will, if you'd like.]

'What if my will included 'don't let me be eaten by creepy spider thing'? Any chance you can do something about that before I'm dead?'

[That is not how wills work.]

Shrugging his shoulders as he had no way to disagree with her, 6 silently left from the way he came, giving up on any fantasies of killing that spider.

He comforted himself by reminding himself that there would be other spiders to kill.

Thinking about it, with everything he had seen since entering the near, the odds of this infestation being intentional, a result that someone caused in order to gain something, were low.

There were no signs of human activity whatsoever, and though the nest looked odd, more akin to the nests of ants, it wasn't entirely out of expectations for a spider nest to look like this.

If a human was involved, it was likely that it was in the capacity of some kind of eco terrorist attach, the equivalent of setting off a spider bomb in the middle of Erver. They shouldn't have any control over the nest, and if anything they probably already died when the spiders took over.

But that wouldn't explain where they came from.

A huge amount of spiders, even if they weren't large to begin with, and only experienced explosive growth once they were at the nest, wouldn't go unnoticed.

Someone would've reported the mass migration of spiders, unless this world was truly inept.

With the cannabilism that 6 just witnessed, the spiders definitely shouldn't be under the control of any sentient thing.

Most likely, something natural caused the birth of these spiders, or made them as well as the entire nest.

But what could form something this massive? And along that line of thinking, who the fuck actually thought a massive unexplained nest like this was something beginner adventurers were suited for at all?

It was fucking miles wide and beginner adventurers were only suitable for exploring outside of the nest.

Sending one inside was basically asking them to be cannon fodder.

Even if 6 was the weakest of the weak adventurers, he only survived this long not because he could fight well, but because he could hide and evade pursuit extremely well. An adventurer who specialized in head on confrontation would be tore to pieces not long after entering the nest.

Alright, fair, someone like that would only have themselves to blame if they accepted a reconnaissance mission without the proper capabilities, but still.

These missions really didn't leave any room for error. Why even let any adventurer to accept a mission if it was only suited for a certain set of skills?

When he brought this up to Trivrium, she explained that most beginners don't care to pay heed to any recommendations, and that with missions at the lowest level, almost no requiments can be imposed.

This was because any requirement would be so basic that everyone fulfilled it, or it would be completely out of reach for beginners.

Even the lightest, most basic requirements, something like requiring them to have 6's stealth skill, might take years to find a suitable beginner with the skill.

So Domus planets were forced to give the missions out ot any that would accept them.

It didn't help that most Domus planets considered beginner level adventurers as uselss, and didn't care what happened to them.

6 was tempted to make a snide comment toward Trivrium about that, but she pointed out that she was protecting him by offering the teleport almost exactly when 6 was about to make a joke about it.

[Something with presence has just started moving through the nest.]

As Trivrium put these words in front of him, 6 held his breath even tighter, as he was currently suspending himself in the corner of a room, with several spiders beneath him, playfully wrestling with each other.

He had been resting in the room before they barged in, rolling over each other as they played.

At least, 6 assumed they were playing, as none of them tried to seriously injure each other.

But with the threat of something with presence, 6 was forced to abandon his plan to attack the spiders once they got near him.

'Where? It it nearby?' 6 asked, keeping his words short.

[No, but it is moving in this direction, quickly. I suggest you do not move at all.]

'Right, right, cause I was actually considering running through the nest, screaming and broadcasting my every move.'

Though he wasn't in the best position for this, it could definitely be worse.

He could hang in this corner for at least an hour, and in a way the spiders in the room would provide some level of camouflage.

As long as the whatever presence Trivrium detected didn't barge right into here, interrupting the cute little spiders as they played, he should be fine.

Really, who would want to kill these adorable, playful guys? They were so harmless, even 6 himself was finding it hard to want to kill them.

As they tumbled and tripped over each other, it truly reminded him of a group of puppies playing, not even used to walking on their own legs yet but so eager to have fun with their siblings.

They seemed so innocent.

[It is heading straight toward you! Getting faster every second!]

The moment the warning from Trivrium appeared, with the same urgency in her words as she had the first time she told 6 to run from the massive spider that had presence, he jumped from his place in the corner of the room, slamming his body directly onto the spiders, using their crushed bodies to break the fall as he rolled to his feet.