Arachnid Menace

From high above the sky, one can see a white dome that mimics the size of a large mountain. Its white figure ominously towering over the rest of its connected structures, accentuating the creepy aura that lingers upon it.

Upon closer inspection, the white mountain is actually made up of countless strings of silk, its surface being treaded on by similarly colored spiders that is constantly adding more strands on top of the already large structure of the mountain of silk.

It has an edge, though it looks more like an extension. An extension that looks like a thick blanket that stretches for kilometers, with spiders scurrying in massive waves within them.

As one looks further away from the massive mound of spider silk, the blanket slowly thins until the trees and the leaves can now be visible, until there is no longer spider silk present on the trees of the forest.

But despite that, there is still a large amount of white spiders that is roaming around, killing whatever remained from its previous hunts. The kills being dragged inside the kingdom of strings, dead and alive.

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"Ahhhhhhhhhhh!!!"

"Get away from me, you piece of sh*ts" A man is rapidly slicing the white spiders that is slowly encroaching upon them with a bronze sword.

His arms filled with lacerations and wounds from the sharp fangs and leg tips of the spiders, and unfazed from the scream of one of his teammates.

"Hahahahahah, did you seriously just squeal? Isn't that a bit too pathetic from you, Mr. cold face?" Another man says with a shit-eating grin, while also defending from the spiders, just in a different direction.

"You bish, it frickin hurts you know" The man that screamed from the pain earlier quickly recovered his composure and returned to defending his position.

The group of three is fighting rigorously as waves upon waves of spiders rain on them, whittling their energy and flesh, bit by bit.

"Is this where I die? How can my beautiful face be eaten by spiders" One of the three complains as they slowly start to get overwhelmed by the spiders.

"We aren't dying here you narcissist, and if we did, I am pitying the spiders for getting diarrhea when they eat your face" The other guy replied.

"Can you 2 lower your voices for a bit, you are wasting precious energy. Help should be arriving anytime soon... I think. " said by what seems to be the most calm and strongest member of their group.

"Your hesitation wasn't calming"

"If that was for morale, it was horrible"

The 2 other members said at the same time.

"Remind me why we are friends again" The third member broke his calm demeanor, his voice changing to a more playful one.

Whooooosh!

Suddenly, a larger spider jumped on one of the members and bit him ferociously, a chunk of flesh flying off as it avoids the retaliatory slash.

"Will!" The other 2 screams in terror at what happened, their voices laced with worry.

"See! They like my beautiful body, they must also like my beautiful face" Will said while groaning in pain, his part of the defense slowly caving in to the overwhelming viciousness of the arachnids.

Suddenly, within the scope of their vision is marble-sized balls of fire that rapidly flew towards the spiders.

The moment a ball of fire touches a spider, it burst into a much larger flame that engulfs the spider, and dispersing out in a single second. Despite the shortness of the flames, there's not a single spider that stood up after getting hit with it.

They feel like they are seeing some kind of horizontal rain as the fire balls rapidly dwindle the number of spiders surrounding them.

After 3 seconds of the rain of fire, and the hordes of spiders is no longer within sight, they are suddenly lifted up.

Their bodies floating up above the trees, together with an old man that has a smooth beard and hair, adorned with intricate clothes and with a frown in his face.

The 3 men gawked at what is happening, their faces filled with question at what the old guy is doing. The old guy only looked at them with a momentary glare, before flying off with them, making distance between them and the spider swarm.

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"Why did that guy fly off again?" A woman says as she looks at the direction at where the old guy flew off, her eyes vacant.

"You have asked that question thrice now, Ria" A man that is slightly taller than her replied, his voice exhausted. Someone much younger than them is also with their group, his poker face tinted with slight amounts of annoyance too.

"Oh, there he is" The woman pointed at the direction she is looking.

The other 2 quickly looked to where she is pointing, only to see the finger pointing at a trunk. The guy can only have a deadpan face while the younger one somehow managed to look more deadpanned than the other.

"How did I fall for this?" The younger one spoke with disappointment, both in himself and the woman besides him.

"Do you only speak when your emotions suck" The man, also said with disappointment, said to the younger guy.

Suddenly, the younger guy's eyes widened a bit.

"Ria wasn't messing with us, he really is already here"

"Oh"

The sounds of air being cut suddenly appeared, and started getting stronger till 4 male figures appeared from the cover of large trees.

The 3 new faces brought by the old guy roughly fell when the magic enveloping their bodies disappeared, their groans coming out as they complain in pain.

"Damn, old man, couldn't you have been more gentle"

"Just wait, this handsome master will someday make you experience that"

"Was that really necessary"

While they are complaining, the powerful old man gracefully lands on the dirt, his face still solemn.

"What the heck were you thinking when you got closer to the Spider Hive." Suddenly, the old man snaps and reprimanded them with anger clear in his voice.

The 3 whiney guys suddenly got into place, and said sorry as the old man's voice slowly starts to calm down.

"The old guy has energy" the 3 other persons thought.

The old man can only sigh, and continue with the task he is assigned.

"Enough with this, let's go to the city already. So far, your group is the only one that caused this kind of problems and survived with no losses. The other 2 wasn't too lucky" The old man said.

"Now, follow me!"

"Yes, sir!" The 3 men exclaimed with passion, while the other group just followed silently.

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A few kilometers away from the monstrosity of a spider hive, is a grand city sticking out from its lush environment. A lush environment that is being quickly mowed down by the citizens from the dense urban center, with other quickly following to plow the cleared lands.

The concrete walls of the city is ladled with a liquid, a white liquid that also stains the outer reaches of the city.

Some people seems to cleaning off the white liquid, while some is collecting the remaining dismembered carcasses of arachnids, with most of them working to clean the white liquid off.

There are also people working on the restoration of their properties, and the reorganization of their respective communities. With the occasional chaos being suppressed by the watchful city guards.

In the southern side of this city, close to the center, is a grandiose palace that distinguishes itself from the rest of the city's buildings. With a height that towers over even the highest buildings on the city by more than twice, [though the height of the tallest building in the city isn't quite larger than the rest due to city regulations.

Within one of the larger rooms inside this palace is a group of people, all of them look prominent from their clothing, with some armored knights standings behind their sides.

Most of their faces are solemn, with some annoyed faces mixed within. The silence is dominating within the room, forming an atmosphere that seems like it is made with the density of butter.

This would be quickly broken.

"So, any suggestions on how we should deal with the waves of white spiders?" A beautiful woman spoke out, her gentle face contrasting with refined and sharp aura she gives off.

"Shouldn't you have already figured something out, little girl" A man with a condescending smirk annoyingly replies to the woman's remark.

"If you wish not to contribute anything, please remain silent" Another seated man replied.

"Are you ordering me, commoner!" The condescending guy silently raised his eyes, anger present in the pupils of his eyes.

"Silence!" An old man suddenly ordered, his chilly voice lowering the temperature of the large room.

"Please, let's conduct this meeting in a civilized manner, we don't have much time. Also, kid noble, it is best that you fix your way of referring to the 2nd princess" His eyes calmed down from his initial outburst, but still maintaining an eerily cold voice.

"Ahem. We have already planned for the possible utilization of our current forces to quell the horde, and the reinforcements have started arriving for the quest." Another guy says, his voice monotone.

This extracted some ohs and hums from the rest of the table, their way of giving approval to the actions done.

After a moment, another person said something.

"Quell you say? by quell, how much are we speaking here exactly? Please don't tell me that we can totally end those damned things, we don't have the capabilities to do so" A woman says with a frown, her voice filled with doubt.

"I know that Madame. That would have been the case if we are alone in the successful implementation of the military plans, fortunately for us, that is not the case in this world."

"Is that so? Is there other reinforcements besides the quest takers?"

"Yes, Madame"

After this small exchange, silence once again returned to the room.

"The details of the plan will be sent to your respective offices, including new information that we have gathered. We will conduct a meeting again tomorrow at the same time, for the decision to whether go with it.

For now, let us proceed to other matters of the city" The 2nd princess suddenly speaks, her eyes more authoritative than her usual voice.

Getting the eyes of the people in the room.

(An hour later)

The sounds of the steps is resounding through one of the hallways. The 2nd princess and Karl, her knight is silently walking towards the library in the palace.

"Everything's gonna be okay your highness. We will successfully return their attack from a month ago to them" Karl suddenly said.

A single sigh is the only reply of the princess as their bodies continue walking throughout the hallways.