‘Seeing it in person is no joke.’
Watching the spiders, each the size of my knees, swarm in from all directions made me feel strangely itchy, as if bugs were crawling all over my body.
The Knight Commanders didn’t seem to feel much different, with the electric, icy, and fiery auras around them expanding even further.
“We’ll take care of those, so don’t worry and run, Delta.”
Lize lightly pushed me. As a signal, baby spiders rushed towards me as I approached the Spider Queen, like sheep flocking to their shepherd.
“Who do you think you are!”
Of course, I wasn’t touched even a bit, getting swept away by ice and flame.
They cleared a sufficiently large area to secure my running space without dragging me along, showing remarkable control of their power.
Each Knight Commander had a wide-area attack, so dealing with them was a certainty.
Claudia swung her greatsword, and baby spiders popped like balloons, not to mention the lightning wrapping around the sword increased her effective attack range even more.
Lize too, with the baby spiders not even able to attack, often found themselves slowed down and frozen by the frost mist and icy floor surrounding them.
Erica was no exception. Just by wrapping herself in flames and swinging her weapon around, flames spread, incinerating all the baby spiders.
“Did you come to be devoured?”
Arachnae, who had summoned the baby spiders and retreated against the wall, smiled enticingly and winked as I approached.
“No, I came to kill you.”
“Kill? You? Me?”
A chuckle bounced back. I calmly readied my stance. After all, there was more than enough time. The Knight Commanders would clean up the baby spiders and join me before my buff ran out.
“Can you?”
“Why do you think I can’t?”
“There’s a reason you’re here.”
Softly, her long, slender fingers caressed her chest, teasingly stimulating the pink protrusion at its edge.
With a playful moan and seductive gestures adding to the act, it seemed she was quite used to this sort of thing.
No, it wasn’t just that she seemed experienced; Arachnae was a boss that seduced humans to be their nourishment.
“You’re quite mistaken. My initial reaction wasn’t because I was entranced by your chest.”
“Really? Then how about I ask your body directly?”
Having regained her composure through our conversation, the spider queen wore a far more captivating smile than moments ago.
I mean, she was technically a monster that seduced to eat people, but it was the first time I experienced being the one seduced as the player.
During a boss battle, was it really possible to have a conversation with the boss? Unless she was the one doing the talking, that is.
“If you can, then go ahead and try.”
It was I who made the first move. I charged at Arachnae while glancing at the floor to avoid the thick, grayish areas, observing her arms and legs’ movements.
The left front leg of the spider part was lifted. It was an attack coated in deadly poison.
Just as Lize’s attack would deflect and accumulate ice, Arachnae’s leg attack would also accumulate poison stats regardless of whether I deflected it or blocked it. So rolling to evade was the right choice.
I rolled away from the descending front leg and slipped in, swinging my sword. A faint scar was left where the red blade passed.
“Kyaaa!”
An oddly sensual moan erupted. While she had clearly felt pain from the Knight Commanders’ attacks earlier, this one felt more like she was just being polite because I allowed the hit.
Or perhaps she was still trying to seduce me.
“Really, that hurts.”
Arachnae folded her body sensually, bringing her fingers close to her mouth. Then, she stuck out her tongue, licking it, and dribbled onto where my cut remained.
It was a very nonchalant action.
Compared to the Knight Commanders, who lost more than 40% of their HP after just three hits, my attack must have seemed easily bearable to her.
‘Let’s see how long that thought lasts.’
I closed the distance again. The spider queen reached out an arm towards me. A grab attack. I quickly rolled back twice to evade.
Arachnae’s arm sliced through the air, and I took that opportunity to swing my sword. This time, a red line was drawn on her white, smooth skin.
The spider queen, momentarily fiddling with the cut on her forearm, looked at me while trying to suppress her distorted expression.
“You shouldn’t resist. Keep this up, and I’ll punish you.”
“I told you. If you could, then try. What’s with all the talk since earlier?”
That seemed to be the decisive blow; Arachnae’s expression morphed into something vicious as if she were about to face the Knight Commanders now. It seemed she was ready to drop her mask.
The back-and-forth continued, but while it was called a skirmish, it could well be described as my unilateral play. The red lines appearing on Arachnae’s upper body gradually increased.
“I won’t let you die easily— cough!”
Arachnae, glaring at me with an extremely angry face, was struck by a blue dagger that flew swiftly toward her side, letting out a sound as her breath got caught.
“I’m coming to help, Delta! You’ve held on well!”
The dagger, disregarding the laws of physics, returned on a bizarre trajectory and landed safely in Lize’s hand. The baby spiders swarming toward the Knight Commanders were all cleared out.
With electric crackling, freezing cold, and ashes of fire, the corpses of the baby spiders littered the ground.
“Aaaah! My cute children!”
Seeing that, Arachnae screamed as if in agony. There was no trace of leisure left on her face.
“You call them cute but send them into battle?”
“Maybe she thought she was raising them strong. Too bad the opponent is too strong, and they collapsed and died.”
“……When you think about it, Erica, you seem quiet but actually have quite a lot to say.”
“If you’re trying to say I’m similar to my sister, I won’t let that slide, Claudia.”
Erica and Claudia exchanged strange remarks while following Lize. They really were sisters in every sense, as Erica also had her moments of not holding back her words.
Once I saw Arachnae turn her head toward Lize, I quickly fell back. I didn’t want to catch aggro and add to my troubles.
Though the buff from the Blood-Stained Sword still had plenty of time left, I could always replenish my health with potions and use it again once the buff wore off.
In the Silver Dawn Knights route, it was fortunate that I could obtain low-level potions moderately through Iris.
By the way, there were also potions that, while having slightly lower recovery amounts, could be used infinitely as long as you rested. But since anything could drop me in one hit in the Darkest Light Mod, I didn’t bother to get any.
“Gaaah!”
A desperate scream echoed throughout the Boss Room. While I was lost in thought for a moment, the Knight Commanders were relentlessly pushing Arachnae back, and her overall wounds were becoming visibly numerous.
“How dare you, how dare you, how dare you, how dare you!”
Arachnae staggered back.
Having said that line meant her health had dropped below 30%. I pulled out potions from the pouch at my waist and downed two of them.
They were low-grade, so they wouldn’t fully recover my health, but anything was better than nothing. I stabbed myself with the sword to siphon blood and pulled it back out.
‘Come to think of it, why don’t I feel any pain?’
The nature of the action itself made me hesitate for a long time when I first used this special ability, but strangely enough, I didn’t feel any pain at all. The wound even seemed to close automatically.
Now, I could use it casually as if inputting a command without a second thought. Honestly, if I had to stab my belly while actually feeling pain, I would have considered it seriously.
I didn’t know if it was just the Blood-Stained Sword that worked this way or if other self-harm type buffs also had the same effect.
“Delta! It’s your turn— cough!?”
Erica, who was about to shout at me, was suddenly swept away before she could finish her sentence. Arachnae had grabbed Erica. Her body floated upwards for quite a while.
‘Was the floor still there?!’
I quickly checked Arachnae’s lower half. The flames swirling at the ground had just begun to disappear.
If I calculated backward the duration of the flame, it was clear that Erica had attacked right after Arachnae’s health had dropped below 30%.
Due to the massive damage, the pattern cancelled and her summoning was delayed by a beat, and of course, Arachnae used her grab pattern at just the wrong time.
‘Could the timing actually get that messed up?!’
To reproduce this situation now, I’d need Arachnae’s health to drop below 30% and Erica to hit right afterward, with a damage amount large enough to cancel the pattern, and there has to still be a hitbox remaining even after the damage.
Additionally, Arachnae, having its summoning pattern cancelled, had to use a grab.
With four conditions to meet, it was inherently tough from the start. While the damage-related conditions would be fine since the Knight Commanders were capable, the timing was virtually impossible to get right.
So I just couldn’t believe it would actually happen.
“Come forth! My children!”
Arachnae’s voice boomed, and soon after, the sound of countless baby spiders breaking through their egg shells filled the air.
Lize and Claudia, who had rushed to save Erica, stopped abruptly as if overloaded. Their eyes switched back and forth between Erica and me.
“This irritating thing!”
Arachnae ripped off her iron helmet like tearing cardboard and violently snatched the Japanese sword from Erica’s hand, throwing it away.
Despite Erica’s desperate attempts to struggle, no matter how much she was a Knight Commander, she couldn’t overpower a boss monster. Her armor crumpled like paper.
“Delta! Stay close to me! Hurry!”
Lize pulled me tightly as she summoned a blizzard. All the baby spiders approaching me were swept away in one go. Meanwhile, Lize’s gaze never left Erica.
“This is a little… dangerous!”
Lightning struck down around Claudia. More than ten baby spiders were killed in one shot, but over twenty new ones filled their places.
I hoped the green liquid staining their silver armor wouldn’t eat through Claudia and Lize’s armor.
“I’ll suck up every last drop of blood!”
With fangs bared, Arachnae leaned in toward Erica.
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