Mysterious Fog World: Eldritch Nexus

The spider boss dropped down from the web. After landing, it dropped quickly towards Ayame. Ayame was ready to face it and Yumi had already drawn her bow on the tree, ready to shoot it at any opportunity.

When the spider was already within ten meters of Ayame, it suddenly jumped. In the air, it turned towards Yumi and unleashed its sticky silk on her.

Yumi barely dodged the attack as it was too quick and sudden. Her Perception Mastery barely registered the attack. She jumped from tree to tree, but the spider kept on shooting its silk at her till it finally landed on the ground.

It knew that Yumi with her long-range attacks could become problematic for it, so it wanted to decapacitate her first by binding her in its web and then deal with Ayame after that. The paralysis poison mixed with its web would paralyze her and leave her unguarded for when it would kill and consume her later after doing the same with Ayame.

Yumi was only slightly tired after dealing with the spider monster horde, but dodging the spider leader’s attacks had already tired her so much that she was covered in sweat. Though the attacks lasted barely a few seconds.

Ayame blended with shadows and ran towards it when she noticed it was about to land. She used her previous tactic and slashed the monster’s abdomen from behind, but it dodged faster than she attacked. The twins couldn’t believe its speed. Its body was huge but its speed was much faster than them.

After dodging the attack, the monster lunged toward Ayame, its fangs wide open dripping with concentrated neurotoxin. Each drop corroded the ground wherever it fell and created fist-sized holes with

Sizzling noises and dense smoke.

Ayame barely dodged but her arm was still scratched by the spider’s sharp legs that created a deep and long gash on her right forearm.

Ayame felt searing pain in her arm but she didn’t change her expression after getting hit. She was used to heavier injuries after training in the Training Room. She felt that her hand was a little numb. If not for the antidote she ate in the beginning, the poison on the spider’s leg could have ruined her entire right arm.

She ran to the front of the spider and attacked it head-on. The spider’s senses were so sharp that it either dodged all her attacks or parried them with its two front legs. But she only barely dodged its attacks when it tried attacking her either by biting her or hitting or piercing her with its forelegs, which were like spears.

Yumi didn’t let go of the opportunity and attacked it with arrows from behind, but it dodged most of the arrows by either moving or jumping as if it had eyes on its back. Only one arrow hit its abdomen but it barely pierced a few centimeters. Against the colossal size of the spider monster, that attack was barely more than a pinprick.

It randomly attacked either of the twins and none were able to handle its attacks. They could barely dodge them and could only occasionally counterattack. The spider could deal with most of their attacks easily by sensing them.

While fighting with Ayame, it would randomly jump and shoot its silk at either of the twins. Sometimes, it would pounce on them. Many trees broke because of that, as the twins used the trees as shields to protect them from the pounce which would break when the heavy spider dropped on them.

The smaller spider bosses were not too strong so they were easily handled by the twins, but the main boss had a speed slightly higher than them. Moreover, the senses of the spider monster were too sharp that it easily dodged most of the attacks on it. And even if it didn’t focus on defense, it was still high enough that it could ignore most of the attacks done by the twins.

All these points made the spider monster, the worst monster that they had ever faced.

The fight against the spider had exceeded half an hour but the spiders had barely any injuries. It had only four arrows sticking in it at different locations and a few minor cuts here and there.

On the other side, the twins’ condition was exactly the opposite. They were covered in webs. Ayame only had a few webs as she faced the web attack much less compared to Yumi who was covered by the web in many places and was somewhat restricting her movements. The only reason they were safe from the paralysis poison in it was because of the antidote they consumed. Ayame was also covered by many cuts from head to toe. All of her body was faintly numb.

Ayame was fighting the spider monster. She was tired, numb, and bleeding from various places. But her daggers didn’t stop one bit. She was crazily dodging or parrying its attacks.

She stopped its fangs once again with her daggers, but her left leg was injured again by the spider’s foreleg as she was not quick enough to dodge it.

‘This can’t go on. At this rate, we will all become its dinner if we fail to defeat it. Both mine and Yumi’s injuries are increasing. If they increase even more, we have to use that. But it may take some time and lord may get hurt or even die in the meantime.’

‘No, I can’t allow that.’

‘I can’t allow that.’

‘I can’t allow that.’

‘I can’t allow that.’

Ayame started repeating the same sentence again and again in her head while fighting and dodging the monster.

Suddenly she felt as if the monster’s attack slowed down as it tried to bite her left hand. She easily stopped it with her left dagger and pushed it back. At the same time, its foreleg attacked her right flank. She easily dodged it with a slight step and slashed its leg. The spider who sensed the attack couldn’t pull back its leg in mid-air fast enough and a small part at the end of its leg was cut and separated.

Name: Ayame Murasame

Mastery: Perception (Beginner, Lv 20) -> (Intermediate, Lv 1)

“KHEEEE”

It screamed in pain and anger. That was the first real damage it got. One of its legs was shortened.

Ayame on the other hand was feeling entirely new sensations. She felt that all her senses had improved significantly. Even in the fog, she could see farther. However, she didn’t dwell on it any longer and focused her attention back on her opponent.

The spider lunged at her again, but she dodged the attack far easier than before. She counterattacked and the spider barely dodged. Her breakthrough in Perception Mastery to the Intermediate Stage had put her above the spider in the competition of senses. With only a slight difference in speed, Ayame was finally able to fight the spider boss on equal foot.

“Time for Round 2”, said Ayame with a smirk.

Yumi had already noticed Ayame’s change and understood it was due to her increase in Perception Mastery. Both of their Perception mastery was at the Beginner stage, level 20. Only one more step to reach the next stage. But they didn’t have enough time to reach it. Ayame got an opportunity and reached it in mid-fight.

Yumi saw that Ayame was much more relaxed while fighting with the spider than before. Rather it was the spider monster that was getting frustrated at how the prey it was playing with was suddenly able to handle its attacks so well than before. She shot a few arrows and it was not able to dodge many as Ayame occupied its attention.

Like before, they didn’t do much damage. But Yumi smiled seeing that. She was happy not because of the low damage but because of the higher hit rate than before. She replaced her arrows with incendiary arrows from before.

She didn’t use them previously as they were limited and would be wasted if the spider dodged them, but with its lower dodge rate, she confidently used them.

She shot one after another arrow that hit directly the spider's abdomen. The spider monster dodged a few but most hit its abdomen. Wherever the arrow hit, it blasted and created at least ten centimeters holes in its body with strange goo flowing out of it.

The spider cried in pain, but Ayame didn’t allow it to turn and attack Yumi. Yumi completely utilized that opportunity and shot one arrow after another. Before long, the spider was covered in holes with fire burning at various places.

It was finally getting slower. Ayame didn’t let off the chance and slashed at its front leg. A deep cut formed there. She kept cutting at the same stop whenever she attacked and in a few slashes, the leg separated.

The spider monster became unbalanced, but quickly balanced itself again on its remaining seven legs. Ayame quickly slashed one of its eyes, when it was balancing itself and blinded that eye. She continued like that, cutting all its legs and eyes one by one.

The spider monster was in a very miserable state. All its legs were cut off with its abdomen completely damaged. It was blind, in immense pain, and could no longer move. It could only weakly move its fangs.

Yumi climbed down from the tree and moved towards her sister. They just stood near the crippled spider monster. Drake also reached their location Aria. Aria who was following behind Drake was amazed when she saw the monster up close.

The reason the twins didn’t kill the monster was because Drake refused them to. He wanted to do it himself as he thought to add it to the Training Room.

He jumped on top of the spider and held his sword vertically downwards over its head. Then in one swift motion, he impaled its head, piercing its brains and freeing it from its misery.

After that, he moved towards the platform with the parchment on it. When he reached there he found it was a very thin booklet with only three pages. He got excited as he understood what the pages contained.

‘These are-’, Drake's thoughts were interrupted by the sudden voice.

“All of them are tired from fighting for so long. Kill them quickly then we will decide how to share the potion formulas between us.”