+Duty: Spinner's Deep

It is only recently that a new level seems to have been added to the dungeon previously known as Spinner's End. The mines have been restored, with Landers now working within the tunnels once again. For many, this is not their first visit, but things have certainly changed.

All previous evidence of the spider infestation seems to be gone. Carts move along tracks, carrying ore from the mine up to the surface. Miners offer their greetings to the Adventurers as they gather, bringing smiles and good cheer. There is even the excited sound of a few dogs barking, the once forgotten guards now back with their masters.

Mikage is standing near the entrance to the mines, leaning lightly on one of the larger rocks as she watches one of the carts roll by. She'd put out a party invite, seeing others who might be interested in checking out the new levels of the dungeon. Rama circles around her feet, the lynx seeming excited by all the activity.

"Meeting over here for the dungeon!" Miki cups her hands around her mouth as she calls out, waving others over. "Should be fun. I haven't been down in here since the level changed over."

    Merek had been to the dungeon once, this time he wanted to try for another award. All the same, he wears his usual dark attire, though this time he has a light black armor on with accents to it, sword placed into a sheath upon the hip while he waits, nodding a bit to Mikage and making a way to listen to people while they prepare for a dungeon dive into the quest. Adjusting the scarf which he wears, the man takes a moment to drink from the potion he brought with him.

"It's still weird, the way this dungeon functions." Cyrus remarks, rubbing his head while stepping over to Mikage. "A level requirement makes sense and all, but I wonder what kind of system actually halts progression like that these days. Most places you can just explore at will." The youth has always find this particular dungeon mighty interesting because of exactly that.

"I'm interested to see how it all works now." He's largely been ignoring the Landers on their entry into the place, following Mikage with this distracted look on his face, right until the others walk on over. He raises his hand in greeting to them. "Hey." He simply says.

He then glances to Mikage. "How many times /did/ you do the spider quests?"

Goldenblade has showed up again, there doesn't seem to be any helping it. She heads over to Mikage and the others, waving in greeting. "Hello," she calls. She nods about being fun, though she admits, "It's kinda hard, I found. I've been through part of it already, but hoping to see different parts. It seems like a pretty complicated place." She'll listen up to the others as information goes around. She's never sure which bits are important.

"Spiders."

Proteus says this with a measure of irritation in her voice as she looks over the mine. Not in assessment of the current state, but to look into her hooded eyes, one might notice a look of reminiscence. Still, the call brings the Archaeologist Imp over to the meeting place, and she sweeps into position to look her and the others present over, quietly counting heads and identities. "Mmm."

At that point, she looks back towards Miki, and she shrugs. "So, we are set to plunge into the true depths of the mine, then? I guess it will be a bit of an experience." She glances over to Cyrus as he muses on the nature of things. "Someone who believes in benevolence might say that it halted the progression for our own safety." Her head swings back to the entrance of the mine, and she goes quiet for a moment before uttering,

"One less forgiving might consider it something more of a way to restrict our progress. But we don't know which might be which. We certainly don't have a developer or even a Game Master on hand to inquire."

    Hifumi arrives with a dragon made of flowers and leaves sitting on his shoulder looking about. "So the level restriction dropped or we all leveled up enough I guess, wonder if it was a change because of us.. like really a change. Or if this was a scripted change from before the black wave that happened when we got strong enough." he shrugs "Either way, best to make sure the spiders don't come back up and attack Landers again. Funerals suck... even more when there's no body and everyone has to focus on themselves and grieving." he says. A kiseru smokes in one hand, the chef lifting the bit to his mouth and drawing in some of the bitter tobacco smoke.

Twice has Prophylaxis traveled to the heart of spider town, and twice has he encountered the mysterious dungeon entrance waiting at the bottom of the mines. And now, it's finally open! So of course the Doctor of Tolbana is interested in travelling down there to see what the heck is going on. Maybe they have a SPIDER QUEEN of some stripe to confront and defeat? Maybe something far more sinister? There's certainly going to be halfway decent loot to claim, so...

Why not, you know?

"I'm predicting that there's going to be at least a few spiders," Prophylaxis says as he approaches, leaning lackadaisically against his trusty wizard staff. "For some reason, I just can't shake the feeling that we're going to be dealing with... spiders..."

His eyes narrow conspiratorially.

Cyrus looks towards Prophylaxis, and quips; "And I am sure you have the solution to Spiders, don't you?" Before making a little set of hand-motions miming a fiery explosion.

"I might in fact have a solution to spiders," Prophylaxis answers back with a casual shrug. "It might, in fact, involve setting them all on fire. Maybe."

"Give him fuel give him fire give him that which he desires" Kauchemar singsongs.

    How long has it been since Mizuki was here? It was... early days, then. She contributed the first drop she got to the Ezzo rescue effort. And it was one of a couple dungeons that ended in a mysterious 'you must be this high level to pass' gate, which was mystifying at the time but with everything else going on she'd all but forgotten it.

    But now it's brought to her attention again when people say that it's changed. The mine has reopened!

    "Wow." Mizuki looks around at the bustle of activity, wide-eyed. "I heard one of the versions of the rat dungeon changed the end, but... to have a dungeon change so completely as this..."

    She scratches her head as Proteus discusses the motive of the level gate. "...I mean, if it was designed as a game, it would've been so we didn't have the un-fun experience of entering a high level area before we're ready... and if they were holding us back, why open it now? Why would we be allowed to progress at all? It's not like we ground up the slow way, we've been clearing the tower bosses."

    She nods at the assessment that there Will Be Spiders, even if this part of the mine isn't full of them anymore.

"Only three times." Mikage replies, as if it were prefectly normal to run the same quest over and over and over again, and yet never seem to get any new dungeon bosses despite their supposedly being some. God damnit RNG gods! ... She shrugs.

It is a long trek down through the mines, but for those Adventurers who have been here before, it may be a sign of just how much of a difference all their efforts had made. Where there was little but rubble and spiderwebs, there is now light, life, and activity. The Landers are happy, metal is now being produced from the mines, and things seem to be improving.

However, there is still the mysterious summoning chamber that lay at the end of the original dungeon. It seems that the Landers have sent some individuals down to study it. There are are scrolls and work tables set around it, but it seems that the Landers are unable to make much sense of it.

There are strange etching and symbls on the wall, though none of it appears to be in any sort of known language. The whole place looks as if it were built by some other culture in some time long ago. There is even a mural, showing humanoids bowing down to some sort of arachnid creatures.

In the center of the room is a circular platform, which seems to have a number of different symbols around the outside of the outer ring. Strangely, the symbols seem to respond to a number of different stimuli, most notable being sound and the presence of magic.

    "There's another level in the dungeon after this, it's all level-locked, next one will be requiring the people level up to 25+," Merek notes, while he nods a bit to people. Then he looks along to that teleporter, "Interesting, been to this place, we will generally likely try it like that," he notes, pointing a few of the nice things to people as well.

Goldenblade follows along with the group, down into the mines, looking left and right, though there aren't going to be any threats before we start, are there? There's spiderwebs, tbough, and Landers working the mines, and ... what? It looks familiar ...?

Goldenblade sighs, looking at the symbols on the platform, and then wrinkling her nose. "What is any of this?" she wonders. She pokes at a couple of them with her finger, then looks around the room, and is basically useless in this case. She's a fighty person, or a bricklayer, this is ... not her forte. But she'll whistle a couple notes, because that's what's supposed to happen here, and she laughs, "Guess the sun even shines on a dog's ass once in a while."

"'Only' three times. Poor bugs are going to have it out for you one of these days." Here's looking at you, Napellus Martina. The youth travels along with Mikage, while giving Prophylaxis another one of those knowing looks.

Then, to Proteus, "I suppose one could believe someone or something benevolant is looking out for us. But that seems a bit... weird, doesn't it?" He dismisses the idea a bit out of hand while motioning his cane.

"But it would be nice if we /could/ ask a GM. But I will bet you anyone who had anything to do with this game is in hiding and keeping their mouth shut - because they don't know how to get out. Imagine revealing you are a GM to other players... what the response would be." Cyrus offers Proteus.

Down into the depths they go, nodding at a Lander as he passes on by, until they reach that summoning chamber.

"Some kind of Spider Monster being bowed to?" Cyrus approaches the mural, looking up at it. "... I'm pretty sure there's gotta be a Doujinshi about this." He points out with that 'are you serious' kind of tone to him.

Then, at the center, the various symbols.

When someone makes sound and one of them lights up, Cyrus attempts at few 'do-re-mi's at it, trying to catch the right tone for the runes to light up. But he isn't exactly... a good singer.

    Hifumi "Ooh, thats because the boss wasn't even a Lander. She's a young Adventurer, her names Sozoku she works for me now." he says "Gwen's the one who realized she was an Adventurer she was just scared and lonely and using a relic to control the rats." he shrugs a bit. "Now she plays at the Ryoken." he says wiwth a chuckle. "Anyone short on food? I brought Onigiri." he says producing bundles of the rice balls.

    When he gets to the chamber with the platform he looks. "YAh this is where the 'you must be this tall to ride' sign use to be." he draws some runes in the air. "Snakeroot." he says, the little earth summon of roots and leaves with two white flowers for eyes and venom dripping thorns for fangs burrows from the earth. "Go see if you can pump some magic in hmm? Give it a good channeling of earth for me see if it just needs juice." the little snake summon nods it's head and slithers over. "Snapdragon, go give your brother some help and get some fire channeled in the other side hmm?" the little flower drake opens it's mouth as if to call out or make some other vocalization but it's a plant so it just makes a cute dragon face befor flying over to land and start putting it's fire magic to work on the circle.

It takes a bit of walking, but walking has never bothered Kauchemar any. She works a side gig as a Messenger profession, after all. Eventually the group reachs what was once the final room, and the glowing markings on the platform. "Yep, this is the place. Time to get on with the show." While others gather around the platform to figure it out, she pulls out her lute and settles it into position, giving it a few strums before finally settling on something that should be fitting.

o/~ Echoes knocking on locked doors; all the laughter from before.
I'd rather live out on the street, than in this haunted memory.
Call the movers, call the maids; we'll try to exorcise this place.
Drag my matress to the yard; tumble, crumble house of cards o/~

Clearly the locking enchantments dislike the implications of some of the lyrics, because it doesn't budge.

"Yes, it's weird." Proteus replies to Cyrus. "And I don't like what that means. Perhaps someone well-meaning, but... Is it really good to make decisions for people as to what is best for them?" She replies. "And yes, you are correct. Anyone who has any form of former authority here is keeping their head down even if they might be able to ultimately help. It's a sad state of affairs." She sighs.

Still, she does brighten up a little at the sight of the mine working away. "It's good to see that our efforts are having a positive impact on Yamato." Proteus concurs with Mizuki's observation. "It shows that with enough work we can make anything happen here. We can reshape this world." She glances over to Mizuki, then, and smiles faintly. "And yet... Have you made your decision?" She asks, before turning away. "If there are more spiders, we will deal with it presently. Likely the same manner that we did before." She does not confirm nor deny Prophylaxis' comments on the preferred method.

The sight of the cleaned-up boss room and the mural gets a squint. "Worship of arachnids..." She mutters and steps over to the mural, running her hand over it. "Mmmm." She hums, lost in thought for a short time.

Finally, she turns away. "Foreboding, perhaps." She simply says, instead turning her attention to the runed circle. She looks over the pattern, arching a brow as she follows the lines of the runes. She withdraws a piece of chalk and begins making marks on the floor next to the runes, careful not to disturb the platform. "It looks like there is a correspondence here. Start here, and move around the circle like so."

It's when Goldenblade begins whistling that she snaps her fingers. "Aha! That will be it. Start with those notes you just used, Goldenblade, and proceed in this pattern..."

"Technically spiders aren't bugs, they're arachnids. They eat bugs, usually, as well as other things. All in all, I'm quite fond of them-- they do wonders in controlling the population of certain dangerous pests and preventing the spread of blood-borne diseases. But these ones are not quite so helpful, are they?" For one, they all live at the bottom of a mine shaft where they aren't being of any use to anyone at all!

They are in fact locked behind a befuddling network of runes and inscriptions, all of which are... Actually very interesting. The way they're scrawled into the stone, the patterns that they weave when overlayed, it's almost like someone scrawled spiderwebbing script across the rock walls and left it there to be discovered.

"Correspondence, you say?" The doctor glances Proteus' way, then shrugs. "Who might be talking, I wonder? What kind of conversation might they be having? Maybe it's a warning, or maybe it's some sort of instructions..."

Or maybe it's a recipe for delicious bug stew? Do giant monster-spiders cook?

"No, more likely it's a prayer. Or a hymn. If it's a correspondence, then maybe it's on the part of worshippers to some sort of spider-god?" The doctor rubs his chin, then frowns and extracts a vial of venomous-green fluid from his coat. Gingerly, he pours the concoction into one of those glyphs and waits.

    "I heard about that, but I never encountered her, only the bosses."

    Mizuki looks around the chamber. She hadn't thought to stop and study it for lore significance after beating either of the bosses... damn. What else has she ignored without thinking about it?

    Once she DOES take a closer look, and notes the humanoids bowing down to spiders... "Well, that's ominous. I hope this doesn't mean a bunch of evil spider gods are going to show up. CC Corp doesn't have any licensing agreements with Wizards of the Coast, does it?"

    Still, the pattern of symbols is SOME sort of puzzle, and she starts poking and prodding and experimenting on them to work with others to find a pattern. When Goldenblade's whistling makes some light up, she wonders, "What the heck would a spider-related song be, though?"

    ...After a moment, she hums. Y'know, just to see. Spider man, spider man...

"If that were the case, then I'd have the rats really mad at me, as I've done the rat dungeon more than this one." Mikage replies with a roll of her eyes. Clearly, the Were Fang isn't concerned about being attacked by spiders outside of the actual dungeon runs.

As the group sets to the task of trying to figure out the entryway, she walks around, taking a look at the 'art' that has been carved into the wall. "You should probably keep your perversions to yourself, you know that, right?" She comments to the Snow Leopard, a smirk on her lips which then turns into a wince as he tries to sing.

She has little better luck with the entrance, crouching down to try and channel some magic into the runes, only to find that it barely lights at all to her touch.

Luckily, most of the others fair better with the task. It takes a fair few and a couple mistakes before the group finally manages to get the right combination of runes to activae the arcane teleporter. It lights up, creating a blue glow on the platform, giving them a very 'Star Trek' moment before they are neatly deposited into an entirely new part of the dungeon.

The underground chamber shows, who would have guessed it... spider webs. The area is lit by torches that must have been set by someone, but there is no sign of life to be had. In fact, they find themselves in what appears to be a large, underground ruin. There are crumbling buildings coated in webs, roads which haven't seen use in many years. The whole place has an eerie, abandoned feeling.

The group moves through the silent underground space, all the way to the far edge of town where a tunnel slopes away slightly downward. However, it looks as if the land here is unstable. If they want to go further, they'll need to reinforce the entrance, or risk not having a way back out of the dungeon.

Goldenblade follows the group along to the tunnel at the end of the road, and she peers skeptically at the tunnel. "Hang on," she advises, holding a hand up to Proteus and moving up to the trembling stonework. The fallen stones here, and some extra rocks and such gathered from nearby, with some thick mud as mortar, calling, "Hang on, hang on, wait a bit for the mud to harden." She looks around, roots out some more debris to use as bracing...

"Bugs eating bugs..." Cyrus sticks his tongue out. "I remember some of my neighbours who were obsessed with beetles. I think they were just really into the Masked Rider thing, you know?" He remarks as they others luckily figure out how to open the thing.

He then glances at what the doctor pours onto the glyphs. "I didn't know you did Alchemy too."

The youth then asks; "What is... Wizards of the Coast?" Not familiar with dungeons and dragons. Before glancing at Mikage, "What? No. I wasn't talking about..." He sighs, hanging his ears, while blushing up a storm.

He quiets a bit as they finally head through to the next area, only to come upon the weakened structural integrity there. "Seems a bit... I dunno." The young man, who's managed to ruin an entire Boat last time, decides to use his cane and some wood he's got in his Inventory to try and reinforce the place, but he's rather slow about it. "This might... help?"

    Hifumi looks at Golden "Here let me help with that." he looks at his dragon summon "Snapdragon, low temp, like bringing the oven up in the morning right?" he sends the little flower drake over to start lightly toasting the patchwork that Golden has done, baking the clay with a flame that slowly increases in temperature.

"Ugh." Kauchemar flicks her fingers to summon one of her will-o-wisp spirits, holding it hovering above her hand like a torch as they move through, of all things, a ruined underground villiage. "I don't know what's more ominous in implication, that people -lived- down here or that they were overrun by -spiders-."

Her steps are a bit heavy due to, you know, her feet being hooves and it doesn't take long for unstable ground to crumble and shift under her stride. "I take it back, -that- is ominous." She glances up, and shrugs. "Guess it needs a little horsepower." She picks up a discarded timber and shoves it into place to prop against a stone wall. "There." Dusts her hands off, then turns and leans against the wall. "That should do i--"

She's cut off by the wall, thanks to her improvised support, collapsing the -other- way and leaving her falling backwards into the resulting cloud of dust. "--Nevermind."

The group gets the teleporter working. "Excellent." She smiles as their combined efforts pay off. They hop onto the platform. A journey, possibly one-way, into dangerous territory? "Deja vu..." Proteus comments out of nowhere.

A moment later, they vanish... and reappear in the middle of a web-choked area. She immediately glances around. "... there's people down here. Or something." She says, pointing at the torches. "Spiders don't use torches." The fact that there's building crumbled around them seems to draw Proteus warily towards them, but she pauses in examining the fallen structures. "Not enough time..." She sighs regretfully, and heads out with the party... But she does draw back when Goldenblade holds up her hand. "Ggh?" She says, stopping suddenly...

When Goldenblade's perceptive notice of the instability bares the issue. "This... could be a problem." She waits for Goldenblade to take the lead, and then tries to help her... But the Archaeologist is no Architect. Her efforts are slow and comparatively fumbling, doing little to help things along.

    Merek would seem to listen to people on their commentary about it all, although he seems to content in trying to build a bridge, only to swing it around and almost swing the wood right into a few of the fellow Adventurer's faces as well. "Ah, apologies."

"I do a lot of things," Prophylaxis says to Cyrus with a mild shrug. He stows the little vial of DEADLY POISON away in his coat pocket and goes on talking, "It's helpful here and there around the clinic when you're able to make your own esoteric reagents out of stuff that just happens to be lying around. It's just too bad that I never picked up carpentry; seems to be a distinct dearth of skilled builders to go around."

SPEAKING OF WHICH.

Beyond the teleporter is a city of spiders, or something that looks much like that, at least. "You know," Prophylaxis says with furrowed brow, "There was a hero of the Gnomes once upon a time who, in the wake of the Scrapped Princess war, travelled deep beneath the earth intent on reclaiming his people's lost home..."

"Could this be... one such home?"

...Well. Whatever the case, the way forward is treacherous as anything else. "If you need any metal heated, I can help that way," Prophylaxis offers, but follows up with a helpless shake of the head. "But otherwise, sorry. Crafting this sort of thing is way outside of my wheelhouse."

    Mizuki nods at the comment about Mikage doing the rat dungeon plenty of times. "The delicious, delicious rats. I hope they're not after us."

    And then they freaking BEAM UP. "Oh f--" She looks around, "Did we just TELEPORT? Are we stuck now?!" Cursory exploration leads to a web-covered village. "Well, THAT'S not good..." When it emerges that the path is unstable, she tries to help with earth magic, but doesn't really know what she's doing.

Everyone chips in to try to reinforce the tunnel, but only a few seem to have any real grasp as to what they are doing and it looks like most end up doing more harm than good. For a moment, it looks as if the rickety scaffolding and haphazardly placed rocks might hold, but then it starts to tremble under the weight of the surrounding earth, pressing down on them.

"Uh, I think we should move. Like... now!" Mikage shouts, trying to usher the group further into the tunnels even as the supports start to give way behind them.

The party is going to have a heck of a time getting back out of here...

Further down into the depths, there are eerie scratch-marks along the walls, as if something large had gouged them there. Spider webbing droops down from the ceiling, getting into people's hair and tangling around their feet as they move.

Eventually, though, the tunnel does empty into an absolutely massive chamber. A chamber that seems to be almost entirely filled from floor to ceiling with webbing. The edge of the stone path drops off, meaning that the webs are the only way to get across to the other side.

However, where there are this many webs, there must be many, many hungry spiders. Spiders who would be more than happy to make a meal of Adventurers who make too much motion within their webs. The group is going to have to be sneaky. Hopefully more sneaky than the rockslide they just caused...

"It could be. From what I remember of the Lore, the Gnomes were chased out of their underground homes when the Monsters came. And it's a lot harder to defend against monsters out in the field behind walls, than underground, where they can burrow through walls and occupy underground fortresses." Cyrus offers to Prophylaxis while they team continues their attempts at making this place more... well... firm. "Certainly wish we had some Gnomes with us now though."

That's when the ground trembles, and Mikage says what he's thinking. "Shit-shit-shit-shit!" He runs forward, not even thinking about the fact that this is going to make backtracking a /real/ pain in the ass! When everything finishes collapsing behind them, he turns and stares.

"I just realized... what do you think this is going to do to our Oxygen in here? Do you think that's simulated... or...?" He grimaces. "I really don't want to have my first death by from asphyxiation." He grunts before looking furhter in. Scratchmarks and Spider Webbing. And being the tall one with all the mad hair, it means he's going to be the prime sufferer of most of those cobwebs. Damn for the system giving him a tall character.

"Uugh... I'll try to just... be quiet." He remarks as he begins to creep forward, hoping that he doesn't alert them.

Goldenblade had tried to stabilize the walls, but it's going to take more effort, and she tumbles down with the others, looking around curiously to try and see where we've wound up. She shakes her head to clear it, and says, "That could have gone better." But where are we now?

Goldenblade gahs as the party ends up in a room tangled with webs that are so thick the spiders must be monstrous. "Don't want to meet what spun that in a dark alley," she says emphatically. It's a maze, and she's webbed in by dead ends more than once before sighing and giving up on plan A. Switching to a sprinter's starting stance, she concentrates hard, and there's a flash of flaming aura, then she dashes in a straight line, the flaming aura burning through the obstructions as she encounters them, leaving an arrow-straight trail from where she was lost in the maze to the far side. "Hah," she says, though the truth is, she's burning through cooldowns and using up resources.

Oooh, lore. Even if Proteus (should) know all that already, she listens to Cyrus attentively. There's always time for lore. Well, okay, not always. Sometimes the place begins collapsing. The moment Mikage yells, Proteus is already in motion, rushing down the tunnel. She doesn't need to urge the Imp much at all, almost like she's used to running down hallways from falling rocks for /some reason/.

At the moment, Proteus is just hoping there's another teleporter at the end that will get them out. Still, the sight of the massive scratch-marks does little to console the tender and blood-filled Imp. At least the webbing sticks to the hood instead of her hair, demonstrating yet another reason why she wears so much obscuring clothing.

The massive, web-filled chamber does even less to keep her spirits up. Proteus grimaces, taken aback at the sheer scale of the webbing in the area. "Why us..." She hisses from her pointed teeth. "I'm not trying to think about that." She mentions to Cyrus when he points out quite rightly about the whole 'air supply' problem. "We should probably refrain from using massive fire spells as well because of this." Quickly, she tries to slip between the webs to work her way up, but she just can't seem to help brushing against one web strand after another. Hopefully, she won't attract attention...

Kauchemar manages to get up from her tumble just in time to avoid the rest of that wall continuing to crumble. "Yeah, leaving is a good idea!" Quickly she hustles after everyone else, not needing to be told twice to vacate before the entire passage turns into a tomb.

But hurrying nearly sends people running smack into more webs. She does see it in time to stop though. Leans over a little to look around. "Just like the internet, wide and full of bugs."

The were fang snorts softly then shifts into her human form. It's not that much smaller, per say, but certainly a bit less mass to have to weave through delicate strands. "Don't. Touch. Anything. Spiders -listen- through their webs."

She herself wiggles and winds her way past, making good use of that dancer's grace to do so without so much as jostling a piece of silk.

    Hifumi scrambles "Snapdragon!" the flower drake flops and runs before flapping into the air to land on his shoulders. A large pile of rubble JUST missing the chef. "Hey look...there was a collapse and I wasn't under it." he grins "I have a good feeling about this place." he follows the scraped tunnel and looks at the spider bridge. "Uah... I take that back... alright Snapdragon keep me up okay?" he moves out onto a thick strand. He starts shuffling along, when he starts to tip or loose his ballance, snap dragon flaps her wings and helps get him upright again. "Don't look down, don't talk, don't listen, don't fall." he says under his breath in a constant littany while he makes his way across the web.

The cavern thankfully does not (entirely) collapse (on top of them), but even so Prophylaxis spends the next stretch patting the soot out of his robes. "It's probably fine," Prophylaxis says on the possibility of asphyxiation. "If there was a city down here, and if there are spiders of such prodigious size, then there's probably an abundance of oxygen to sustain them all. Spiders need air too, you know? If we breathe, then they probably do too. We can always test that by drowning one though, if you'd like?"

Or maybe... It is they who will drown.

In spiders.

Hungry, hungry spiders.

Prophylaxis grimaces, a thick mat of webbing falling across his face. He gingerly lifts it out of the way like a discarded veil, careful not to disturb the spiders that must surely be waiting in the wings. "Are you all /sure/ that you don't want to just... set them all on fire? It's still an option, you know. We'd just have to dodge the burning webs as they fall."

It's not the *best* option, but it's still *an* option...!

    They have to run to avoid the landslide! "...Great. I hope completing the quest teleports us back, I don't want to live the rest of my virtual life stuck in a cave." They move onward into Spider Territory. "I don't have arachnaphobia, but I never liked spider webs. It's just unpleasant. You're walking along and bam, something icky and sticky is clinging to your face. Or somewhere else. ...I guess it'd be harder to feel with fur, but that just means more places for spiders to hide..." she shivers. The Room Of An Uncomfortable Amount Of Spiders is quite memorable.

    When Goldenblade raises the trouble of oxygen in enclosed spaces, Mizuki creates some fresh air with air magic. "Yeah, enclosed spaces are dangerous in the real world, but we have magic."

    When it comes to stealth, the cat ninja has it down! She moves between the webs and makes it look easy! ...If you can even see her. Where'd she go?

    Merek would begin to evade along from the webs, while he nods a bit to people. He tries to keep from generally trying to touch the webs while he nods to the party.

Most of the time, it is raw strength that will get the average Adventurer through a dungeon. However, in this case, it requires more... finesse. The problem being that not everyone is graceful enough to move through the webbing without causing a disturbance.

It starts with a shadow that sort of sinks down from the ceiling. A very large shadow... Prophylaxis, Cyrus, and Proteus just so happen to be the three that fall behind. The snap of pincers sounds behind the trio. Enough that Prophylaxis may very well be considering that *fire* option in that moment.

The entire web shakes, causing everyone to have to hold on or risk falling into the abyss below. The spider strikes out at the three, long legs trying to grab at them through gaps in the web. For each few inches they manage to move forward, it chases just behind. It chases them all the way to the other end of the chamber, where they just barely manage to get under cover, the huge pincers still snapping at them from behind.

They are safe... but not for long.

The ground grows thicker with webbing even as it opens up into a strange, underground jungle. Everything seems to be lit by strange green and purple plantlife, obviously tainted by whatever poison runs through this place. The Spiders that live here seem to feed off of it, stoping to drink from flowers or to dip their legs into obnoxiously colored pools of water.

However, they seem to sense that something has interrupted their strange haven. Spiders drop from the trees, or turn their attention towards the party. The clicking sound of their approach is eerie, the poison dripping off of them seeming all that much more dangerous in the dim light.

"Sorry." Cyrus answers Proteus - keeping his voice down as they try to sneak past the webbing. Then, to Prophylaxis, "I don't know. I mean, Monsters seem to be any size or whatever they want to be. It always seems like the Beasts are the only ones who really care about actual food and all that. But I could be wrong." He's honestly not looked into Monster behavior. It's not his field.

"Shiiiii." That's when he notices that Proteus, himself, and Prophylaxis are getting chased by mighty pincers. "Faster-faster-faster." He tells the other two and tries to pick up the pace, exhausting himself a bit until they finally get to the other side.

Into an underground jungle with even more webs. "Well.. guess that proves me wrong." Cyrus then remarks as he watches the spiders drinking from various substances and... bathing?

"You know what... I'm with Prophylaxis on how to solve this matter." Right as he throws a series of potions in order to create a set of flaming 'walls' that are intent on scaring off any spiders from approaching them while they continue further in!

    Merek would try to work a bit of magic from Earth to begin shifting the poison away, though he isn't able to really manage it, while he takes the time to align with the party. He does not really want to deal with these things, "I really want to know the people that thought these places were a great idea."

    Hifumi looks at all the poison and spiders. "Hey Snakeroot." he says, the summon crawling out of the earth. "Why don't you go show these spiders what poison is all about hmmM?" he winks as the serpent of roots and leaves. The summon dives back into the earth bursting up and savagly biting the spiders that get close. The little monster injecting it's own poisons that are plant and fungal based... nothing like some vegan venom for those spiders to have a 'taste' of their own medicine.

The snap of pincers makes Proteus simply hurry up, quickly hustling forward. "Spiders shouldn't have pincers...!" She hisses, moments before she leaps for a long, thick strand, just barely evading a huge spidery doom-lunge. She doesn't stop moving, immediately abandoning all semblance of stealth in favor of speed to get ahead to shelter. "Working on it!" She says to Cyrus as he urges them on. No complaints, just acknowledgement.

She barely makes it, her cloak getting snagged and ripped from the pincer slash. "Gggh..." She breathes heavily, coming down from her adrenaline burst... but not entirely. They're not out of this yet. "I hate spiders." She mutters.

The sight of the poisonous, web-choked jungle below almost makes Proteus have a breakdown right there. "GGggh! This is horrible!" She mutters, and glances over to Prophylaxis and Cyrus. She nods. "I'm right there with you but..." She isn't certain yet on the application of fire. "I'm going to try to scout ahead." She says, gesturing into a window that opens for a moment: ( * #

The Arcane Eye that manifests zooms ahead, and Proteus tries to follow it around to plot out a safe path for them all, but there's just too many shifting interruptions, Proteus almost falling into the poisonous pools more than once.

Goldenblade makes it through the maze, blazing through the webs faster than the spiders can react. That's a damned useful power, she thinks smugly. Even so, her MP, low to start with, are close to gone, and there's another complicated challenge before us. She looks around, watching the spiders to see if they're moving in patterns or what. There's no chance of fighting these, either. Any one would be a boss monster by itself, she imagines. But she's got the Tao of moving through here, now, slipping past a tree, finding a shallow gully, using trees and bushes for cover, and advancing steadily.

A few yards this way, duck through between two berms, another few yards, hop over a fallen log, pause to suss out the path ahead. She belly crawls in a few places, blending with the earth, it might seems, but finally, she makes it past the huge spiders.

Wow, that sure is a great big spider chasing them-- but why does it have pincers? It's not like spiders are well-known for having pincers. Those are more the domain of beetles and ants! But maybe it's some kind of assassin bug...?

Prophylaxis should maybe stop trying to analyze the taxonomy of the big hungry monster spider chasing them down, at least until he can get out of range. Which he does! Eventually. It takes a brief close call that ends with Prophylaxis setting the web he's standing on alight and then sliding down a muddy slope until he rolls out just inches from one of those awful bubbling pools.

He is positively covered in muck, but at least it's not /poison/ muck.

"...Well, isn't that interesting?" The doctor muses, even as a colossal spider not a few feet away ominously begins polishing its fangs with the contents of that pool. He gestures with his staff and the filth he was so recently coated by begins to shift and gather, forming up into a clay bowl. Hooking it carefully at the end of his staff, he dips the bowl into the poison pool and then transfers the goop into a half-dozen empty glass vials...

...For future analysis, yes. Definitely just that.

    So much for stealth! Mizuki hurls kunai and frost bolts back at the spider chasing them, but apparently it chased them too far from its spawn point and ends up retreating. So now they're not being attacked by a gigantic spider anymore.

    Instead, they're in a poison jungle surrounded by less-gigantic but still pretty big spiders. "Great."

    Why was this place a good idea? "Eh, spiders are a classic monster, right? Creepy and they've got no face for us to feel bad about beating up."

    As Prophy sets up the fire walls, Mizuki hurls ice magic. "Alright, duel tech time! Antipode!"

Out of the frying pan and into the fire as they say. So hopefully certain mages brought plenty of it.

Kauchemar pauses after a few steps to admire the lush yet vile environment that some dark corruption of nature has allowed to grow into a thriving jungle around them. She even takes a deep breath as if taking a whiff of the fumes from the noxious pools. "You know, if it wasn't for the spiders, this wouldn't be all that bad of a location." It's dark and putrid, of course the nightmare with the macabre facinations would actually kind it comfortable ... Except for it's unwanted occupants.

Poisonous occupants, that are the size of humans as they drop from trees and crawl out of the cesspools. Kauchemar grunts, gesturing as if rolling up the sleeves she doesn't have. "Okay, I've had enough of spiders thinking they're the most terrifying creepy crawlers!" Her cloak, skirt and hair all start to flutter in the flow of arcane energies around her, giving a bit of an ominous appearance despite still being in her human form. "But I'm a master of fear, and you know what spiders fear?"

She thrusts an arm overhead, and behind her the ground rumbles a bit before rising up, driblets of poison trickling down body segments made of stone and moss that looms above the summoner. Pinchers made of jagged rock edges clack a few times, multitude of legs squirming as it leaps over Kauchemar to scrabble across the ground and into the spider horde. "Their own natural predators!"

The sedimentepede, actually being more of an earth elemental just summoned in the form of a giant segmented arthopode, sluices through the noxious pools with little care to grab several spiders and crush them in it's tectonic pinchers and start clearing a path.

As Proteus tries to reach out and see beyond what is in front of them, what she sees is something else that may or may not be equally horrifying. There is a glimpse, though briefly, of a set of giant daddy-long-legs that are feasting upon what looks to be the remains of a grunty. The sight is just distracting enough that she steps foot into one of the poison puddles, giving herself a poison debuff.

Merek, on the other hand, may not be fond of the dungeon, but at least one of the spiders seems to be fond of him. It drops right down onto the wayward Adventurer, trying to latch onto him and drag him to the ground. The sting of being bitten giving him his own matching debuff and a bit of lost health.

Liberal use of nearby magic is the only saving grace, as one of Mizuki's ice blasts slams into the spider atop Merek, sending it flying into one of the nearby pools.

Though they are able to stop the immediate threat, it becomes clear that there are more spiders waiting in the wings, so the party moves on quickly, rather than have a prolonged fight here.

However, the further they travel, the more dangerous the path seems to become. The walls glow an eerie green as drops of acid threaten burn into their armor or skin. It all seems to lead to what looks like a dead end at first glance...

However, as they approach, the wall hisses open, as if it had sensed their arrival. There, before them, is a boss chamber that looks eerily like the one they had left behind in the mines. The coloration is different, though. The etchings are lined with more of that glowing, acid green, causing certain images to stand out more brightly against the darkness. Most notibly the one of worship before a great aracnid creature.

Then, the boss steps into the light, the green reflecting off an armored torso that would look almost human, if it were not attached to a giant spider's body. Glowing red eyes look at them all threateningly, "You will go no further..." It warns in a rumbling voice, raising up onto back legs, the front ones sharp as razors. Then, it starts to scuttle towards them, moving creepily fast despite the monster's large size.

Goldenblade is panting hard as we make it to this boss chamber, which looks suspicuously like the one above. Reusing graphics much? But the huge armored monstrosity facing them is definitely facing them, and she grumbles as it tells us we shall not pass. "We'll see who passes and who doesn't pass," she calls back, as if it could hear or understand, and will keep to the shadows as she slips around behind the monster. A quick slash, the ducking into cover as it turns on her, slipping away, and coming in fron a different angle. She repeats the process, which keeps aggro from building up. It's a slow DPS process, but she's out of cooldowns, so it's just the basic damage, and hiding awat from counterattacks.

    Hifumi looks at the armored spider "Did they just upgrade the other boss? I swear it's about the same right? LIke just metal instead of thick chitin?" he nods "Alright well... lets do this Snakeroot, rock walls." he says the summon diving into the ground and eruppting at semi random places around the room, leaving a wall of stone with a jagged lip everywhere it's burst from the ground. Leaving cover for every one else to use in the battle.

    Merek looks to the boss while he notes that it's the one he fought before. All the same, it looks like a lot of people in the place did not fight him, so he uses the Mind Shock to begin distracting the enemy so that people can take it on as well.

There's a smash of something against Proteus' head a few moments later as the team catches up. "Antidote." Cyrus remarks to her as he walks onward, followed by another Antidote being thrown at Merek's head - shattering on his body. It doesn't really hurt. The Integrity of those bottles are pretty low, and they shatter without any flair to them. And the anti-poison is quick to act.

It would appear that Prophylaxis is not the only one around who knows how to make some potions like that. Though notably, they're pretty low level ones. Cyrus carries on along with the rest, keeping the flames up until they've all passed by, until they get to the opening wall.

"What is this... some kind of automatic door?" Cyrus raises his brow. "I certainly haven't seen that kind of technology outside of the Root Towns." He notes as they step inside into the 'boss chamber'.

Etchings all around and a boss stepping into the light. "Oh geez... ew, it's half human, half spider." Cyrus grimaces. "You know... you guys go first. I'll keep you all healed." He remarks as he throws a quick BLINDing potion at the creature to try and cloud over some of its eyes.

"I'll be back here, supporting... from the rear." He pats Mikage's shoulder as he steps back. "You just ehmm... take care of that."

The sizzling pain of the poison debuff causes Proteus to stagger about, grimacing as she clutches at her shaking body and feeling her HP drop even as the bar visibly depletes. "Poison..." She mutters to herself. "Spiders and poison..." She says nothing of the horrifying sight she beheld of the Grunty being consumed. Some things are best not shared. Except maybe with Kauchemar, later. They like that kind of thing.

For now, however, she pushes forward through the gaps made with the massive magical outlay, pushing into another strange room... A somewhat familiar looking construction that causes Proteus to frown. "It's another..." But before she can complete the sentence, the boss steps into view... "Oh hell." She gasps, reeling at the sight. "What kind of abomination is this!?" She gasps... Before the creature immediately begins attacking. "Not so fast!" She says, her hands snapping up and forming a complex pattern. ( ! 8 #

Around her, sigils form in hissing darklight, splaying out in an Omen as she begins to call out enemy attack patterns and tell people where to stand to deny the enemy their ability to mount an effective assault.

Knowledge is power, and Proteus intends to make use of every bit she has.

The use of antidotes isn't lost on the good doctor. His gaze is suddenly fixed quite firmly on that bottle twisting through the air. "You know," he says, matter-of-factly, "Potion materials are getting quite hard to find these days. You might want to think about being a little more judicious with their use. Maybe figure out how to make it go a little further rather than chucking potions at people's heads? Do you happen to have a supplier I might be able to talk to?"

But then! The party's progress is apparently stymied. The way forward is blocked by what looks to be a solid stone wall...

...Which slides, ominously, out of the way. The hairs on the back of the doctor' neck stand on end, tingling with anticipation for what he's sure he's about to find up ahead. Everything about this situation screams <<BOSS FIGHT>> and he is certainly not disappointed by what is waiting for them.

It's... some kind of spider-person.

"Oho, are you a friend of that summoner-spideress from back up above?" Prophylaxis asks, possibly intending to prod at the fact that said spideress is quite possibly very, very dead right now. (He should know, having killed at least one iteration of her). "She wasn't just a one-off then. I suppose there's a whole civilization of your kind down here?"

The creature charges. No matter, he has an answer for that.

"Debuffs!" Prophylaxis declares, sweeping his staff in a wide arc. Bolts of corrosive dark magic streak out like an inauspiciously negative rainbow. Curses of all stripes stream forth, penetrating through even the hardiest of carapace and armored plating to infect the spider warrior beneath with debuff after debuff after debuff.

...What?

You didn't really think fire magic was *all* Prophylaxis liked to toss around, did you?

Kauchemar just leaves the elemental centipede to do it's thing like a big squiggly stone tank and moves on while it has the spider's distracted.

Into a room even more noxious and foul, to a point that the putrid ooze is dripping down the walls. "You know what. I've changed my mind on kind of liking this place." The monsterous armored spider-taur rumbles into view. "Especially now. Tch. That's big -and- ugly."

With a growl she curls her hands and crackles with dark energies as she throws her head back in malicious laughter. Shifting back into her proper Nightmare form as she does so, psychedelic lavanders eyes glowing with a sort of inhuman glee. "Looks like one of those times stopping a monster takes another monster."

Kauchemar licks her lips with her demonic tongue. Then slams a foot forward into the ground to brace herself as she leans in, and opens her mouth. Wide. Much wider than should be possible for someone of an anthropomorphic build. As she's learned hyperextending her mouth open is like a megaphone and helps to amplify her voice and it's effects even more.

"NYEEEEEERAAAAAAAAH-AAAAAAAH-AAAAAAAAH" The unholy sound that emits from her is the ultimate Death Metal Scream, bolsted by the nightmare's natural horrific dread inducing cry. Assaulting the giant spider warrior through a means his armor will provide very little protection, through the senses and into the mind within.

    People get bitten and poisoned! "Yeah, I DEFINITELY don't wanna stay here! ...Oh wait, this better not be an ironic thing where some boss jumps out all 'Wish granted, you respawn!' and kills us..." Mizuki complains as they run, only to find... another teleporter room?

    "Hey, so uh, what is your DEAL anyway? Like, you're the first thing that's TALKED that we've seen down here, and-- woah, okay!" Mizuki scatters, running perpendicular to the charging boss!

    "Do you think blindness debuff affects spider sense?" she tosses a couple of balls of magic darkness at it to find out!

"Scaredy cat." Mikage comments as she walks right past Cyrus and further towards the boss monster. Usually, the Ranger doesn't bother getting up close and personal, so she simply extends her hand, summoning a bow made out of light energy. As she draws back the string, an arrow forms, held steady between her fingers. When it fires, it lands with a heavy thud, right into part of the warrior's armored chest.

The fight takes time, but isn't, perhaps as difficult as some of the previous rooms for the group. Perhaps they are just tired of dealing with spiders. As the creature's health begins to drop, it begins to back away from the Adventurers, moving closer and loser to the back wall of the chamber. At the last moment, it turns as if trying to escape, but it is too late. The dryder explodes into a shower of colorful pixels, leaving behind pieces of its armored shell upon the ground.

However, much as Merek had earlier hinted at, where it had been trying to dig gives way, revealing a passageway that seems to head upward and out of sight. When approached, it gives a warning, but a barrier of light will not allow the group to travel further.

"Well, at least it isn't a teleporter this time." Miki comments, trying to get a peek beyond the barrier, but the pathway disappears upward, revealing very little about what might lie beyond.

Kauchemar closes her mouth back up, jiggling her jaw back and forth a few times. That still feels kind of weird when she does it, but not in a bad way. Just a reminder that she's something more than human.

A hand combs through her mane to drag some stray strands disrupted by the dread wailing back into place before she does finally speak up again. "Not so much of a surprise this time, either. Oh well." She picks up one of the chunks of armor that fell off the Boss instead of pixilating. "Huh. It's like last time, but fancier."

Goldenblade sighs at no reward for this mission. But she had fun, and it was a useful thing, plus good training. "That was a hard run," she observes, "but still, we pulled through. I had to do a bunch of stuff I don't usually need to, but it turned out OK. Though I wonder what would have happened if we hadn't gotten tripped up at that one collapsing passage." She looks around, and will try to find her way back. The path forward, she's seen, and she glances, but then says, "I'll be back for part 3, count on it!"

    "Oh no, another load-bearing boss!" Mizuki cries out when part of the ceiling collapses. She moves closer to the entrance, but the dungeon ends up NOT collapsing. Yet.

    And then at last, a way out!

    ...But it's blocked.

    "...Well, shit. Do we have to go all the way back...?" She starts looking for patterns in this room to see if there might be another teleporter. "I HOPE there's a teleporter." She comments, when Mikage mentions she's relieved there's not one. "I don't want to have to fight our way back to the entrance and dig through to the teleporter... heck, we don't even know if it was two-way! We don't know how FAR we teleported, we could be miles underground! Or on a completely different map!"

    Merek nods a bit to people while he takes a moment to find a way in the place back along to the entryway.

"Not exactly what I meant." Mikage turns away from the blocked passageway, "Just that I wouldn't want to have to solve nother puzzle door to get to whatever is on the other side of this."

Of course, Mizuki has to remind her that they did sort of collapse the tunnel behind them. "Shit. I kind of forgot about that." Reaching back, she rubs at her neck with a sheepish expression, "Well, maybe we can dig our way back out? I've still got some mana left and a bit of earth magic..."

They may not have a fun time trying to find their way back out...

    Once things calm down Hifumi produces a big cloth bag. "So did anyone want some of this Onigiri?" he asks reaching into the bag and pulling out a rice ball. He takes a big bite out of it chwing happily. "Always get hungry after a dungeon."

It's a hell of a situation to be sure, but the concentrated firepower is enough to get the job done. The warrior-spider being falls to the adventurers, and Proteus steps forward, collecting a couple plates of chitinous armor as part of her reward for a job... done? Well-ish done?

She looks to Cyrus, however, and nods to him. "Thanks for the antidote. I don't think I would have been able to concentrate on the Omen if I was taking all of that poison damage at the same time." She gives him a wave, then, and she glares at the barrier of light. "Another level gate..." She mutters. "I wonder if it would be possible to..." She takes a step towards it, holding up a hand... But she pauses, shaking her head and turning away. "Not yet." She mutters. Instead, she rejoins the others. "So.... How do we get out of here?" She pokes around, perhaps hoping for another teleporter platform.

Another piece of armored plating, and this time it doesn't look like it'd be very useful if bolted onto a castle wall somewhere. Prophylaxis shrugs and stuffs it into his pack regardless. Maybe he can make something useful out of it?

"It sounds as though we've got another <<FUN ADVENTURE>> on our hands, then!" The Doctor says with characteristic eagerness. "Let's double-back and see if we can find our way out. And if not, maybe we'll just have to go back the long way! If the gnomes could dig their way into a place like this, then surely we can dig ourselves a way out, no?"

And possibly not release SPIDER APOCALYPSE in the process...!!

"I still have a collection from before the prices went up. The glass is easy to get. It's the herbs for the antidote that is the problem." Cyrus answers Prophylaxis. "Trust me, as an Alchemist, I'm quite aware of the costs. It's a pain in the ass."

Cyrus then nods to Proteus. "Of course - you're welcome." He then turns to the way they came. "Well, we are no longer in combat. So we can call on various Alliance folk to come help dig us out. I think there's some people really good with Earth Magic with Olympus." He remarks, looking to Proteus for a moment.

"Guess we can just... start working our way out."

"I am reasonable with Earth Magic myself." Proteus replies. "I can also call in some help. If we don't have a teleporter..." She sighs. "Then let's get to work."

"I can always conjure an Earth elemental again to help with digging," Kauchemar provides. That counts right? She is in an Olympus guild.

    Mizuki looks between Prophylaxis and Cyrus. "Can't you go to the well dungeon and farm poporings? At least for Green Herbs? I'm not so sure where to get HP recovery ingredients..."

"You /can/ but then you need to go somewhere else to find the red and blue herbs you need to mix things all together for proper medicine, and that's just a pain in the buns right now." Prophylaxis sighs, shaking his head. It seems, though, that Cyrus is also having trouble acquiring ingredients. Is it the truth, or... Is the New World Alliance also having... issues?

Hm, curiouser and curiouser.

But for now, they must escape. Escaaaaape!

"Just think of it as another adventure, friends. Who knows, we might even find more of that ruined city to explore on our way out!"