The sound came first.
Skittering.
Hundreds of tiny legs striking stone, echoing off the walls until it filled the cavern with a living hum. The four froze where they stood, eyes locked on the dark tunnel ahead.
Ryn whispered, "That's… a lot of them."
Her voice trembled, but her fingers still notched an arrow.
Then the glow came.
Faint at first, blue veins threading through the black like rivers of light. Then brighter, spreading across the floor, crawling up the walls, spiderwebbing across the ceiling.
Shapes began to emerge within that eerie luminescence. Legs. Fangs. Eyes. There were twenty, maybe more, crystalline spiders clinging to every surface.
"Guess we alerted a bunch of 'em," Ward muttered, planting one heavy foot back and raising both shields. Lightning crackled faintly along the jagged rims.
Ferric re-wrapped the chain around his wounded arm, the metal still glistening with blood.
"No backing out now."
Argent tightened his grip on his weapons, the wide dagger in one hand, the gifted giant's axe in the other.
"Then we make it count."
Ryn drew in a steady breath, pulling her bowstring until it sang. A shimmer of pale blue ran down the shaft, the earth forming a heavy mallet-shaped head at the tip, and this time a faint ripple of spirit light flickered through it.
She loosed.
The arrow tore through the dark, striking one spider that was on the ceiling, dead in the body. It fell, crashing down in a glittering explosion. Ryn fired again, one arrow, then another, then another four in total.
Three more of the spiders fell, but they were able to shake off the fall, staggering as glassy legs scrabbled for grip while standing up.
Ward grinned. "That's a good start." He slammed both shields together with a thunderous clang and took the front line, bracing himself where the cavern narrowed into the tunnel. "Let's see if we can hold them here!"
Ferric moved to his right, chains rattling. "I'll carve us some space."
He swung wide, the chains hissing through the air and striking the first spider that lunged. The links flared with dull metallic splinters as his element pulsed. Tiny metal thorns began forming along the chain, small spikes, growing thicker with every strike.
Each swing chipped shards off the crystalline bodies. Not much, but enough. He was learning to make the metal grow, not just wield it.
Ward caught another spider's leap with both shields. The impact drove him back half a step, but he gritted his teeth, lightning sparking along his arms as he pushed forward, smashing it back against the wall.
"You're heavier than you look!"
The spider, clicked twice, a noise that somehow sounded offended.
If spiders could think, this one's thoughts were very clear:
Impossible. This creature IS as heavy as it looks.
To his left, Argent darted forward, light glimmering from his dagger. The blade sliced through one spider's leg with surgical precision, and for a moment, the light extended ahead of the metal yet again, a thin spectral edge cutting before the steel touched.
The spider fell in two clean halves.
Argent blinked. "That...worked...," almost surprised as his increasing control over light.
Another came from his blind side. A strike too fast to dodge. The blow hit his arm, sending the axe clattering across the cavern floor. He reached for it instinctively, but before his fingers closed, a thin black thread pulsed from his palm, reaching toward the axe.
It extended only a few inches, flickered, and vanished.
Shadow. Unformed. Weak. But there.
Argent didn't have time to think, another spider lunged. He rolled, driving his dagger up into its throat, light bursting from the wound like a flare. It shrieked, crystal fusing and fracturing all at once.
Beside him, Ferric was bleeding. The spider he'd been pummeling sank its fangs into his arm, the same one already bitten. The sound of cracking metal rang out as its mandibles crushed through the chain wrap.
Ferric roared, smashing his other arm into its head until both cracked, spider and man alike, then kicked it off.
Ward slammed his shoulder into another, driving it away from Ryn. "Back! Stay back!" He pivoted, catching two legs under his shield edge and crushing them with a sharp twist. "Ryn!"
"I've got it!" she shouted, firing again, another earth-formed arrow tearing through a spider's abdomen. Blue shards sprayed across the cavern.
The air filled with movement.
Screeches. Impacts. Sparks.
Argent, Ward, Ferric, and Ryn, four against twenty. The noise was a storm. The cave was alive with light flashes, lightning flaring, light cutting, arrows flying, chains chattering. They fought until their arms burned, until the air turned to dust and blood.
And still the spiders came.
Ward shouted something, drowned out by the thunder of chitin against stone. Ryn's bow snapped back, her hand blistering. Ferric swung wild, striking one, then another, then nothing at all. Argent's dagger flashed one last time before something heavy struck his side.
Then the sound swallowed them, skittering, crashing, the deafening break of glass and bone.
***
Argent woke with a gasp.
Cold air filled his lungs, sharp, sterile. He sat up fast, heart pounding, eyes adjusting to the dim blue light of the resurrection chamber.
Across from him, Ward, Ferric, and Ryn all jolted upright in the same instant, the same desperate inhale.
For a moment, no one spoke. Then Ferric groaned and flexed his arm. "Well… I think it's safe to say the spiders didn't like us there."
Ward laughed through a wince. "Guess they were attracted to vibrations we made."
Ryn brushed a hand over her face, shaking her head. "I felt it right before they hit, through the ground. Like a flood coming."
"Good to know for next time," Ferric said dryly. "If the ground starts shaking, we run."
Argent stood, rolling his neck, then looked toward the statue at the far end of the temple. "Might as well check if it was worth dying for."
He placed his hand on the cold stone. The blue light surged up his arm, and numbers flooded his vision.
[Power Score: Calculating]
[Previous Score: 26]
[Natural Gains: 3]
[Merit Boost: 0]
[New Total: 29]
[Merits: Calculating]
[Previous: 1867]
[Transfers Since last Log: 1220]
[New Total: 647]
[Element Power Score: Calculating]
[Element Light: Natural Increase 6 points]
[Element Shadow: Natural Increase 2 points]
[Summary]
[Name: Argent]
[Death Count: 2]
[Element: Shadow - Power: 3]
[Element: Light - Power: 7]
[Power: 29]
[Merits: 647]
[Traits:]
[Giant's Mark of Stone]
[Perseverance]
Argent blinked, the stream of data fading as quickly as it came. His head ached, the flood of information burning behind his eyes. He stepped back from the statue, hand still tingling. He was not quite used to this yet.
He could feel it, something inside his chest, where the light and shadow had settled. But something was… off. The weight in his heart leaned heavy toward the light. The shadow within him felt faint, thinned. Unbalanced.
"Hey," Ward said, stepping up beside him. "Still early."
Ferric grinned. "Barely noon."
Ryn glanced between them, half-smiling. "You can't be serious."
Argent turned, a faint spark in his eyes. "Head back?"
All three looked at him, and then, as one, they said, "Head back."
***
The familiar damp air hit them the moment they stepped back into the dungeon.
Making their way quickly down into the cavern chamber they had just been.
The spiders' bodies were still there, as well as the shattered crystal chunks that had broken off before. A faint hum hung in the air, like the walls themselves were still vibrating from the chaos of the battle.
Ferric crouched beside one of the corpses, brushing a hand over the glittering fragments. "At least they don't dissolve like we do."
"Yeah," Ward said, hoisting one chunk into his bag. "We can just scoop them up this way."
Argent knelt beside another body, prying loose a large shard with the edge of his dagger. "Since these are the ore, we just have to be able to get to what we break, be it the bodies or what we smash off."
Ryn frowned. "That's…one way to look at it."
He smiled faintly. "Worth it though. A death for all this? Not bad too bad of a haul."
Ryn sighed, but the corner of her mouth lifted. "If we can keep dying efficiently, maybe we'll be able to fill up these pouches completely and make more profit..."
They laughed, alive again now and fully refreshed after dying. The sound echoed faintly through the cavern, mingling with the slow dripping of water and the soft metallic clinks as they filled their pouches with ore.
Argent wiped dust from his hands, glanced at the tunnel where the stampede had come from… and then grinned like he had just invented a terrible idea.
"…Soooo," he said, dragging the word out, "what if we just… do that again? Like..." he gestured vaguely down the tunnel.
"Cause another stampede, grab even more ore, die, come back, and repeat. Efficient farming."
Ferric froze for a second.
Ward slowly lowered a chunk of ore into his pouch.
Ryn blinked twice, worried and impressed at the idea all at once.
"…Argent," Ferric said, voice flat, "that's insane."
Ward scratched his jaw. "But… not wrong."
Ryn sighed, but the corners of her mouth betrayed her. "We did get a lot of ore…"
Argent raised an eyebrow. "So that's a yes?"
The three exchanged a long look, the kind shared by people who knew they were about to do something stupid, dangerous, and potentially brilliant.
Then, in perfect unison, all three nodded.
"Again."