Sense danger advanced to level 6

I ducked an attack from behind, a volley of spines fired from the twin tails of a six-legged daemonium spina, then brought out a pair of shields to defend against another pair of volleys from the sides. That left me unable to do anything about a fourth attack from the front, and a half dozen needles, thirty centimetres long and a few millimetres wide, pierced into my torso. My health didn't drop by much, but that would soon change given that both lungs had been hit.

The decision not to wear armour had been a considered one. I didn't want to risk bringing any seeds into the catacombs, so from now on it was nighties only.

Making the most of the time I had left, I dragged what air I could into my leaking lungs and flamed the throng before me.

"So, how did it go?" asked my zombie twin, the second I woke back up in the catacombs.

"Not great," I answered, before filling her in on the events. I'd expected her to make a snide remark about how useful her mind magic resistance training had been, but she kept a serious face throughout. Guess she didn't consider this something to treat jovially.

"So, if we do beat the tree, we face a demonic invasion. Turning it back to normal sounds like the best outcome, but remember that from what the demon told you, it sent its roots into the abyss before it was corrupted. Maybe it didn't know what would happen, but it might have been a megalomaniacal dick to start with."

As much as I hated to admit it, the last set of thoughts the floating brains had shoved into my head weren't entirely incorrect. I couldn't fight a demon army. The only powerful attack I had killed me with the backlash, and each time I died, the tree would gain another hour to conscript new demonic forces. I couldn't imagine winning any sort of war of attrition.

"I'm going back upstairs for a bit," I said. "I need to learn to fly properly. I should have done so ages ago. And then... Maybe I throw a bottle of black blighted pus at the tree, or burn the vines that lead to the abyss. Something. But I can't do a thing if I can't even reach it, and those imps are fast."

My zombie twin just sighed and waved me off. I'd need to spend more time with her once the fourth floor was sorted, to help her recover from the stress.

I spent hours in the wolves' cavern, working until I could reliably fly in the direction I wanted and manoeuvre with a little more grace than a charging bull. I wasn't going to be doing any aerial obstacle courses, but I would be able to point myself at the tree and blast my way there faster than my feet would take me.

Hovering over the cliff edge, I laughed at my old issues getting down it and how I'd wished for a skill that granted wings. Would I one day look back at my parasitic tree problems in the same way? When I'd picked up some sort of demon-cleansing purification skill that would have made the whole thing completely trivial?

Feeling that I could spend at least a few minutes unwinding from the constant fighting and training, I dived down the cliff to the larger caverns below, flying above the treeline. There was far less light down there now, but no patches of the unnatural darkness cast by the blight. Scars showed where crystal trees had previously grown. The fox-kin seemed to have taken a scorched earth policy, and with the blight gone, it had obviously worked.

I came across one of the seven-finned, blue, blimp-like monsters, this one a mere baby only five metres in length, and took a seat on its soft, bouncy surface. They'd always flown too high up for me to appraise, but now I finally had a chance to see what they were.

vesica pasco
These harmless, unintelligent creatures live out their lives high up in the air, grazing on the ambient mana. They are not limited by lifespan, but will continue to grow for their entire existence, until they reach a point at which the ambient mana can no longer sustain them and starve to death.

Well, that was a bit sad. I didn't see the giant one around anymore. Maybe the loss of so many crystal trees from the area, which had previously been discharging mana into the air, had lowered the ambient density.

I stood up to fly away, only for something to land on my head and yank me back down onto my back. Whatever I'd been hit with draped down over the rest of me, strong, sticky and invisible, gluing me to the top of the monster blimp. A couple of seconds of struggling was enough to identify it as a web. The spider queen's web, to be precise. And yup, sure enough, the whole blimp-like creature suddenly started moving sideways, in quick jerking motions, and before long a powerful presence came into range of my skill.

"I've caught myself a little fly," came the voice of the spider queen, as she hopped aboard my blimp. "A fly that has learnt to fly."

"Hello?" I tried.

"Hello indeed. Now, I know the two of us had no ongoing deal, but you do have to admit that after bringing me down here to feed on the vulpes sagax, decimating their whole settlement was in rather poor spirit."

"It wasn't on purpose!"

"No, of course not," the spider deadpanned. "You deliberately infected your captor with blight and expected it to what, exactly? Cause a sudden outbreak of sniffles?"

"Well, I expected it to... Hey, wait. How do you know that?"

"Because I asked, you foolish fly. Feeding where there are so few left would immediately attract attention I couldn't handle. Rather, I traded them my protection. The faster they repopulate the cavern, the better for me. Not that they believe they'll get the chance."

"Why? What's happening now?"

"You, you foolish fly. You and your Goddess-given quest. They seem to believe that once you complete it, they'll all cease to exist."

I sighed as I stopped struggling against the web and flopped backward into the comfy and squidgy monster I was pinned to. So, my guess about the arch-mage's motivations had been correct then. He had nothing against me personally, at least until I blighted them all, but had only been trying to memory wipe me to make me forget about my quest, making sure I'd never complete it. He'd simply been trying to protect his people.

"This world is fucked up," I lamented. "What sort of personality does the Goddess have, to build a place like this?"

Or worse, what sort of imagination did I have if this was all plucked out of my own head? It couldn't have been, surely?

"An interesting question, but not one that weighs heavily on my own mind. I did not cast my nets for a philosophical discussion. I cast them to catch my dinner."

"I don't have time to respawn right now. If you want more kidneys, wait until after I've done something about the megalomaniac tree that's trying to assimilate all life, and the possible demonic invasion from the abyss."

"Oh my, the little fly faces such large problems, while little old me faces only insignificant things, like wondering where my next meal is coming from."

"Yes, yes. You can cut the sarcasm. I've got a bunch of those panther things from your jungle upstairs if you want them."

"No thanks. I'd rather eat you."

Damn... Stupid me for thinking I was safe in the air. I'd guessed she wouldn't be happy to meet me, and had deliberately avoided her copse, but how was I to know she had moved and could fire her webs from outside of my presence detection range?! That was completely unfair. Anyway, when the centipede's attention was on me, I could feel it from the other side of the floor. How hadn't I felt her? Could she mask it?

At least now I had a means of fighting back. The queen effortlessly lifted my legs and started releasing silk bindings wider than she was, rapidly wrapping me from the bottom up. I waited until she was standing on top of my tummy and I had a clear shot at her without risking hitting myself, and flamed her.

She dodged, but wasn't quite fast enough, and I struck her legs down one side. She darted away, and a sudden stabbing pain in my neck accompanied my body falling limp.

Poison immunity advanced to level 33

My poison resistance had evolved since our last training session. The feedback told me that her kiss of paralysis would last for only half an hour, and I still had some amount of movement. Enough to use my fire breath, but not enough to aim.

"Just how many new tricks has the little fly learnt," muttered the queen, and I could see her out the corner of my eye shaking her burnt legs. "Wings, fire breath, toughened skin, and your ability to resist my kiss has grown stronger again."

"Belll..." I slurred, attempting to make intelligible noises through the paralysis. It didn't work too well.

"But not strong enough, I see. A pity, for I would not have been averse to continuing our conversation while I dined."

I apparently hadn't caused the queen any serious injury, and she resumed gift-wrapping her prize. Should I self-detonate again, just to be vindictive? Or activate trigger respawn and hope for more resistance levels before it fired? So much for only spending ten minutes flying around the lower cavern; now I was going to waste another hour.

I activated trigger respawn and left the spider queen to it. Levels were levels, after all, and it was going to cost me an hour either way. Besides, I still had a bit of a thing for being cocooned. Not that I'd admit it to anyone other than my zombie twin, who already knew. Some relaxation before getting back to the megalomaniacal tree wouldn't hurt. I still had to maintain the look of the thing, though, so I gave the queen my best glare as she wrapped my head.

I felt the bumping and scraping as she effortlessly dragged me off somewhere, before she hoisted me into the air, leaving me upside-down. "Mmpff," I complained, to no avail. Sense presence could pick up a few dozen signatures nearby. Fox-kin?

"What in the abyss are you doing?!" yelled a male fox-kin voice, confirming my guess. She really had made some sort of deal with them. How in the hells could she get on with them after eating them, when I couldn't? Life was so unfair...

"Calm down, little vulpes," answered the spider. Why was I the only one she called a fly? "This isn't one of you."

"What is it then? I haven't seen any monsters that shape in the cavern."

I felt movement around my head, followed by a burst of light as the silk bands around my face were torn off. There was a cross looking fox-kin in front of me, and I was sure I'd seen his face before. One of the mages? What his name was, I had no idea. Then he saw my face, and his expression darkened from merely cross to utter hatred.

"Her," he muttered under his breath. "Fine. I may have promised not to go after her, but if she turns up here... No-one could blame me." He continued to glare for a few seconds before speaking back up more loudly. "Whatever. I'll be back in a moment. Just keep her uncomfortable."

"You make many enemies, little fly," commented the spider.

"They... started... it..." I forced out, the paralysis having worn off to the point I could form words again, with enough effort.

"Perhaps. But the little vulpes did raise a valid point. You seem far too relaxed there, and at our last meeting, keeping you paralysed meant that I missed out on your beautiful screams."

Another prick on my neck accompanied a burning sensation flooding my body, but with my pain and poison immunities, I didn't even whimper.

Poison immunity advanced to level 34
Pain immunity advanced to level 33

"Was... that... supposed... to... hurt...?" I goaded.

"Yes, but alas, our previous session appears to have been too effective. Never mind. I shall wait to see what your vulpes friend has in store."

He returned minutes later, holding a choker. My first thought was that I'd get to add yet another slave collar to my collection, but on closer inspection, its appearance was subtly different. A little thicker, with a jewel set in the front.

Cursed choker of petrification
This magical item petrifies the wearer. This item is cursed and is irremovable once worn.

"I think I've got a handle on your abilities," said the fox-kin with an evil grin. His plan was already obvious without saying anything more, but alas, he didn't know I'd already appraised it, and he was wearing a full-blown I'm-about-to-start-monologuing smirk. He obviously wasn't going to be able to resist the urge to explain how clever he was. "You can generate a new body for yourself at will, but it takes an hour to form. Or if you die on your own, you resurrect automatically one hour later. In either case, once your new body is ready, your equipment transfers to it. So, if you happen to be wearing a bit of equipment that kills you... Well... Let's just say you aren't going to have a good time."

Yeah... Screw that. My zombie twin could just remove it, and maybe it would be good for more resistance levels, but I couldn't justify the lost time, and there was always a risk the catacombs would have been overrun in my absence, leaving me on my own. He wasn't directly in front of me and I couldn't move my head, so I couldn't flame him. I'd need to self destruct. I breathed out and prepared to take a deep breath in, only for a glob of silk to smack me in the face, blocking my airways.

"You caught me once with that trick, little fly, but I'm hardly going to fall for it a second time."

Bah... I hadn't taken her seriously and now I was in a dangerous situation again. There was still far too much time left on trigger respawn. I couldn't breathe, but he could get that collar on me long before I suffocated. I felt a cut around my throat as he sliced himself access through the cocoon and my armour without caring whether he cut me in the process, followed by the feeling of cold metal around my neck. There was a click, followed by the worst pins and needles I'd ever felt in my fingers and toes.

"Have fun experiencing the pain of your body turning to stone, over and over and over, with no way to stop it," exclaimed the fox-kin mage, his unstable and overexcited voice getting progressively louder and higher in pitch. Presumably, his need to gloat was the only reason he hadn't broken out into maniacal laughter. Which was fine, because maniacal was supposed to be my thing. Shame I couldn't, with my mouth covered. He should know that I grew resistant to stuff, though. Had he forgotten? Or did he think this collar was sufficiently powerful to overwhelm any resistance?

"Turning to stone? You said it was to kill her! What are you doing to my dinner?!"

I felt a stabbing sensation in my back, no doubt the queen collecting my kidneys before they petrified. Meanwhile, the pins and needles had progressed to my hands and feet, and I'd lost all movement and feeling in my fingers and toes. I couldn't see what was going on, but at the rate of progression, it wasn't going to kill me before I suffocated or bled out from having my kidneys unprofessionally removed. Presumably it was supposed to go faster, but my curse nullification was slowing down the effect.

And once again, I really had to wonder if the correct response to hanging upside-down, cocooned, suffocating, gradually turning to stone with spider venom still running through my veins and the offending spider herself burrowing into my back, was to complain about what a waste of time it was. Shouldn't I be just a little more upset than that?

Curse nullification advanced to level 21