Tragedy Struck. A great member of the tribe was lost. The strongest spider, who delivered fear into their greatest enemies, was now gone.

Bored the Alpha looked up from their meal at the skittering shapes in the fortress’ front alcove. Seeing its leader waving their arms wildly caught the large spider’s attention, but after not receiving any sort of command for several seconds, the [Adult Alpha Dungeon Spider] acted true to his namesake and returned to its meal.

How could this happen to you?! Screamed Click inside their head. You scared off all of the [Dungeon Hounds] and are the reason why we’re not all dead! How did you turn into a rock?!

The crystalline statue, vaguely shaped like a spider, stood silently still.

Come on, wake up! Wake up! [Command Subordinates], WAKE UP!!!

Nothing.

Click could’ve sworn there was the smallest bit of movement, but repeating the Skill and command resulted in nothing. The lead spider let out a sigh. They knew that that was life, a great tool could be gone in an instant- no, that only applied to newborn spiders and the weakest of their species. The stronger ones, the ones with many levels, a high Body attribute, and plenty of health, could survive.

This spider was strong as well, but apparently not in the ways that counted. Whatever that way was. Because whatever happened to it, whatever force, attack, or spell that turned it into a statue, was entirely unknown.

So to Click, it was just another tragedy. And the spider already knew how to deal with them.

I keep moving forward. New plan of action; I won’t be able to scare the [Dungeon Hounds] away with what I have, so instead I’ll just have to…

The [Spider Army Commander] walked to the entrance of the alcove and regarded all the others.

[Command Subordinates]! We barely survived the last attack thanks to all of your hard work! Click shouted to the others. Well, most of your hard work. But the one soldier we had that used magic to instill fear in the enemy is now gone, turned to stone!

The other spiders looked on, some of them let their mandibles droop in sadness, while others looked on in confusion as they regarded the resident Alpha.

So we are now weakened without its power. Our traps alone were not able to scare the [Dungeon Hounds] away, as they were willing to fight to the death to bring about our own destruction! So what shall we do? The answer to that is simple; we kill them first.

The rest of the tribe looked around. The ones with a high enough Intellect kept staring forwards, enraptured by Click’s speech and wanting to know what he had in mind. The others, the ones who had not gone down an evolutionary route that favored that particular attribute, began to join their largest brethren away from the speech.

We have leveled up, we have evolved! Well, the rest of you have. And with that comes power! [Web Spiders], all of you with [Silk Spinning] above level twenty, come forwards!

The original metal eater stepped forwards as expected. But this time, it was not alone. Around the tribe’s home, about four more spiders joined in with the first, skittering in from all over the fortress’ grounds.

[Command Subordinates]. You five, eat more of the sharp artifact we found and use your hardened webs to enhance the traps! Make the tip, as well as the side of the whipcords that hits the ground, out of the substance. I guarantee they’ll kill a [Juvenile Dungeon Hound] in a single hit.

The quintet jumped up before running towards the remnants of the various traps scattered about the fortress.

Another call to [Command Subordinates] added a contingent of four times as many lower leveled [Web Spiders] joining the first group in resetting the traps.

That just left the [Hunter Spiders], and all of their variant evolutions. They stood where they were, looking around at each other between bouts of focus where they expected Click to address them. When their leader finally opened their mandibles and triggered their Skill, the fighting spiders all lifted their heads in anticipation.

Hunter spiders- I don’t know what to have you all do yet.

And their mandibles fell.

Click was no fool and could read the crowd, but even a fool could see how they all felt at being left out of the action. So, the lead spider responded appropriately. You are all much more powerful now, and we killed more of the hounds than they killed our members. Combined with how we all gain experience no matter how much we contribute to the fight, I know we’ve gained much more power than them!

The flattery raised a few spirits, but the smartest ones in the crowd could make out the lack of any actionable substance behind the statement. Even the dumbest ones, who didn’t understand much of it, at least knew that the so-called “command” didn’t come with an actual command to do something.

Click saw this as well and continued. So until the next attack comes, we’re going to get stronger! We’ll be fighting, training, leveling!

The spiders all began to cheer up. Raised arms and mandibles filled the air as the speech reached its crescendo.

I’ll be taking all of you on a raid… as soon as the eggs hatch! Click exclaimed and then scuttled back into the deepest parts of the fortress.

The other spiders remained frozen, looking on at where their leader stood. Slowly, their limbs dropped back down to the ground as their mandibles drooped down to meet the dusty earth.

Back in the fortress, Click’s own face showcased a similar expression after having gotten a quick peek at everyone's reaction to their words. What was I supposed to do?! I thought throwing around all of those promises would cheer them up, not make them sad at how long they’d have to wait!

The lead spider walked forwards, passing through defensive walls that parted to the [Spider Army Commander]’s small size and compact strength.

I can’t exactly leave while the eggs are here, or else the hounds will just attack again, and probably break their way through without me to guide everyone. Maybe I could get them to lead their own raid? But if they get ambushed, I’m losing whoever I sent out. I can’t afford to do that with my veterans.

Click let their legs curl up as they tried to clear their mind, but not before working their way into the innermost chamber that housed all of the eggs. The small orbs were shrouded in darkness, but Click could feel the potential in each of them. A would-be newborn spider, a myriad of possible evolutions, a potential soldier. If only they wouldn’t take three weeks to hatch.

Click let out a sigh.

“Try to command them to hatch faster.”

The lead spider’s head shot up. Who said that? Click looked around and even poked their head out into the alcove of the fortress to see if there was any source of the noise. But there were no creatures who spoke nearby, just the spiders down below and the crystalline statue to the side.

Wait, [Decipher Language] didn’t trigger, what’s going on?

Click spent another few minutes skittering around the fortress and just outside of its grounds to search for any intruders. The [Web Spiders] in charge of monitoring the security webs all reported that there were no intruders.

Eventually, Click calmed down, but only enough to accept that there was something inside their fortress that they weren’t able to do anything about. No point continuing to freak out if there was nothing to do about it. The lead spider did issue a quick command to the [Hunter Spiders] and all of their evolutions to be on the lookout for intruders, which did give them something to do in the meantime. But who knew how long their interest in that would last?

Click let out a sigh and headed back into the egg chamber. The spider continued to stare at the eggs for a little longer before they remembered those strange words. Eh, why not?

[Command Subordinates], grow quicker, hatch faster!

One of the eggs shook.

It was just a little, tiny nudge, only a millimeter. But that miniscule shift began to repeat amongst all of the eggs, and it continued until the inner chamber shook! And then it stopped. It was only for a brief second, but Click knew that the unborn spiders inside had heeded their command. Maybe it would make a difference?

[Class level up! Anthropologist (5)]

[Class Skill Obtained: Child Rearing]

[C̷̬̰̬̥̒͒͝͠ḽ̴͙̠͙̈̃̓̕a̷̱̪͍̗̓̒͜s̷̠̼̤͑̂̿̔̈ͅs̸̩̭͉̻͌̔͋̕̚ ̸̖̯͍͆͛̄͌L̸͎̲̩͋̎͗͆̽ȇ̷͔̋̄̍͝ṿ̸̹͇͕͂̇̕ę̴̟̤̣͈̓l̸̹̮͐̆̋͘ requirement achieved for evolution]

Wait, it can do that?!