After breakfast the next morning Scar announced that she was ready for her turn.  Jelin thought about it for a little while but couldn't think of any good argument against it.  Instead he offered to do the same thing he had already been doing and offer what advice he could over her choices.  They had already figured out what direction she should be aiming for so he didn't think it would be too difficult of a choice.

{Lesser Child Worker Arachne}

{Lesser Child Juggernaut Arachne}

{Lesser Child Builder Arachne}

{Lesser Child Fighter Arachne}

{Lesser Child Wild Arachne}

{Lesser Child Strong Arachne}

{Lesser Child Arachne Brawler}

{Child Fighter Arachne}

{Child Charger Arachne}

{Child Blood Arachne}

{Child Arachne Destroyer}

<I'm here if you want my advice.  Just remember not to look past 'Child'.>

<Okay.  I think I should get 'Strong', right?>

<I don't.>

<Why?!  It's strong!  I want to be strong!>

<It most likely just means more muscles.  Just because you might be able to pull a tree out of the ground doesn't mean you could fight with it.  You want to be a fighter so you should build a strong base first.  The 'Lesser Fighter' or the 'Worker' are your best first picks and 'Brawler', 'Juggernaut', or 'Wild' seem like the next best.  My advice is to pick one of those five.  I can explain better when you wake up again.>

<Then I'll pick 'Fighter'.>

As she faded out in the link he hoped that she remembered to pick the lesser variant but as there wasn't much else he could do until she woke up again he decided to go back outside.  He looked around for a few moments until he noticed Conk doing something by herself away from the others.  At first he assumed she was looking for some plants to help with the backup plan but then he saw her doing some of the poison tests and he was pretty sure he had already seen her testing that particular plant.  He managed to approach her just as she decided to eat the entire plant she had pulled up.

<Uh, what are you doing?>

<Poisoning myself.>

<...why?>

<I want to see if I can heal poison.>

<That's...actually a pretty good idea.>

He looked at her arm where he saw her rubbing the plant before she ate it and saw that it was turning red fairly quickly.  She looked down at it also and then touched it with one of her mantis claws.  A small spot in the reddened area around where her claw was touching started to turn back to her natural skin color for a few seconds before getting red again.  She started rubbing her claw all over her arm while her brows creased in concentration.  The now red arm started to slowly go back to skin color and after about five minutes of focusing on it intently her arm finally looked normal again.

She let out a sigh of exhaustion and let her claw curl back up at her side while continuing to stare at her arm for a few more minutes.

<It still feels a little tingly.  It's not itchy and painful anymore, though.  I think it worked.>

She moved her arm closed to him so he could examine it as well.  He looked at it for a few seconds and then reached out and ran his fingertips across her arm.

<Let's see if my fingers get poisoned.  Then we'll know if you got rid of the poison itself or dealt with it another way.>

He held his fingers up so they could both see them.  After a few more seconds he started to feel some itching on his fingers where they touched her arm.  As he saw them starting to change color he could also feel a slight burning sensation.

<The poison's still there.  It's on my fingers.>

Conk quickly reached out with the same claw that she had healed her own arm with to try and touch his fingers to heal them.

<Wait.  First touch my arm here with that claw.  If you didn't actually get rid of the poison then it might be on your claw as well.  It could make it harder to heal.>

She paused before nodding and doing as he said.  He waited a bit and although it was subdued compared to his fingers he could feel a little bit of itch on his arm.

<Yup.  There's poison on your claw as well.  I guess you should use your other claw to try and heal me before we go try and wash everything off.>

After he was healed and they had washed themselves clean he remembered watching her eat the poison plant as well and he grew worried.

<Are you going to be okay after eating the whole plant like that?>

<Umm...maybe?>

<If you start feeling sick then make sure you rest.  The more active you are, the more likely the poison will spread in your body.  I think.>

He didn't want to think about the incredible pain she was likely to be in before too long so he decided to try and find something to do for the rest of the morning.  For the first time he wasn't entirely sure what he should do.  He thought about it for a while before remembering that he wanted to still try and improve himself.  He hadn't even figured out how to do psychic things and there were likely other aspects of his species he hadn't fully explored.  Even his magic still hadn't been fully tested out.  

Psychic abilities first so I can help the others get them if they want.

He should have incredible potential when it comes to telepathy and empathy but he wasn't sure how to work on that since he used the link for telepathy and empathy with all the girls.  He needed to try and practice without the link.  He looked around for a bit and considered going out to find some creature or monster but dropped that idea almost immediately.  He didn't trust his current fighting abilities and he had no way to safely capture a monster or animal to practice with.  Leading with that thought made him realize that he did actually have access to capture living creatures.  The outer webs were constantly catching bugs.

Bugs might not make the best practice partners for telepathy but they were still likely better than trees.  He walked to the nearest group of webs and pulled off one of the struggling ones that he thought was freshly caught and held it in his cupped hands until he felt it stop moving.  He opened his hands just enough to take a peek in and make sure it hadn't died somehow before sitting down and trying to learn how to use his telepathy.

He wanted to try and get a reaction so he decided to try sending the simple though of shouting jump.  With all of his practice using the link he at least had some idea of what he was trying to achieve and how it should go which was much better than when he had tried to start learning magic.  The biggest problem he seemed to have was not reaching out and linking with the bug.  A few times he even did attach a tentative link which he had to quickly remove again.  He continued working on it until he heard the clamor of Claw returning with the lunch announcement.  He through his practice partner in his mouth as a lunch appetizer before walking over joining the girls for the noon meal.

This time he made sure they remembered to save some food for Scar.  Just as everyone stood up again to head to work they heard the cracking noise.  As everyone started to head that way, Jelin stayed back just a bit and called out to Scratches.

<I have a quick question for you.  Do you think you can do anything, crafting wise, with all of these molted shells we're getting from all the evolutions?  It kind of feels like a waste to just throw them all out into the wild.>

<What do you want me to do with them?>

<I don't know.  That's part of what I'm asking you about, here.  Maybe you can play around with them and see if you can figure something out.  Maybe we could use them to improve our home like in the ceiling or floor or walls, or maybe you can make some tools out of them, or maybe...I don't know...just something.  I don't know everything and as each of you heads more in your own direction you'll end up knowing more than me when it comes to those types of things.>

<So you want me to try and figure something out by myself?>

<Kind of.  It doesn't have to be purely by yourself, though.  Even the others might end up thinking of something.  Asking for advice or ideas is rarely the wrong thing.  Relying on others to just give you all the answers is wrong, though.>

<Hmm...>

Feeling he should leave her to her own thoughts for now, he pushed forward to check out Scar.  As far as he could tell, she had gone through some similar changes as Scratches' worker evolution.  Her arms were thicker all around, her spider abdomen seemed to be slightly smaller, her thorax was slightly larger, her breasts were half a size smaller, her shoulders were broader, and her legs were bigger in general while the parts connected to her body were noticeably longer giving her a slightly wider and more stable standing stance while lowering her body slightly more for a lower center of gravity.

[Lesser Child Fighter Arachne]