Shadow Slave

As they ventured deeper into the southern reaches of the crimson Labyrinth, the situation slowly turned worse and worse.

The iron spiders that had been not too threatening to the cohort of powerful, experienced Dark City hunters at the start of it all were growing more and more deadly with each step of the way. Their numbers grew exponentially, becoming a real danger pretty soon. More and more often bigger and stronger monsters appeared at the head of the attacking beasts, bringing with them all sorts of problems.

What's worse, the spiderweb they used to trap their prey was changing, too. The metal wires from which it was weaved became so thin that it was at times almost impossible to notice it, and sharp enough to cut through armor and bone — while maintaining the resilience of superb steel.

The whole Labyrinth was covered in it, turning from crimson to dull grey.

The cohort bled much more because of the invisible webs than they did because of the spiders themselves. Of course, the iron spiders were cunning creatures, too. More often than not, they only attacked once one of the humans was caught in their nets, leading to a few really harrowing experiences for the members of Changing Star's party.

And there was a wide variety of other terrifying creatures waiting to ambush them in the twisting pathways of the crimson coral, too. What made them so dangerous was that the cohort didn't know anything about their anatomy and abilities. Every fight was a gamble, often resulting in one or several of them sustaining serious wounds.

There were three things that made the situation somewhat bearable.

The first one was Nephis and her healing flames. Although using the Aspect Ability took a toll on their leader, it was often worth it, especially if one of the members of the cohort received wounds that limited their mobility.

One thing was far more dangerous than any Nightmare Creature that lived in the Labyrinth, and it was not reaching safety before the torrent of black water flooded the Forgotten Shore, bringing inconceivable horrors with it. Thanks to Neph, they didn't have to worry about anyone slowing the cohort down.

unexpectedly, was the iron spiders themselves. Because of the peculiar way they hunted, a lot of creatures found their deaths in the cutting embrace of the wire spiderwebs. Finding these eviscerated corpses or cacoons containing old carcasses became a

to study and anticipate many of the monsters they had to face in this region of the Labyrinth. A lot of potentially deadly surprises had been avoided due to the cohort stumbling onto a corpse of a similar creature prior to fighting against a living one and spending some

the Blood Arrow. In the hands of an experienced archer, it was almost as deadly as it would have been in the hands of an inexperienced one… the difference being that the latter would mostly be a danger to themselves, quickly

experienced a disturbing feeling of shock. That time, they were facing a large group of iron spiders led by a much larger arachnid — the awakened monster of their

their defenses. What's worse, due to the speed with which the wretched abominations moved, it was especially hard to catch them in a gap between the armor

while the Stone Saint was butchering the third one. With his shadow observing what was happening behind his back, he didn't miss the moment when the cunning awakened monster suddenly disengaged from Nephis and dashed into his direction, its mandibles moving in anticipation of

dodge, Sunny tensed his muscles… and

air. Its shaft was made out of dark polished wood, with black feathers for fletching and a vicious

and tore deep into his body. Even though Kai messed up his shot a bit and hit the monster in its abdomen instead of the head,

once again, but

and then stopped. Beneath the iron plates, the spider's body grew taut and shriveled, like that of a mummy.

blinked, shaken by this disturbing image, and couldn't help

Blood Weave, he might have ended up as

off his arm and survived, most likely. But if he had been a

to think

glad that the Blood Arrow was on

Sunny didn't know what it felt