Gwenevere is a child of infinite possibility, and she has five thousand competitors playing her game. For Eliza, Nox, Zola and Bleidd, this means facing down thirteen floors riddled with dragons, cat kingdoms and cabbages. Yet in a world where anyth...
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The tunnel sounded like it was already mourning him, with its sad, dark notes.
Nox felt frozen as he watched the long, skinny arms creep around the bend. It didn't take long for him to realize what it was.
Spider.
A big, hairy, black spider.
The fat body was soon in view, and Nox found himself fixed in the glares of eight glistening black eyes.
Though it was the long black mandibles that really made his heart fall into his stomach.
Beads of sweat formed on his brow as he yanked on the strands that ensnared his hand, growing desperate to escape. The monstrous spider stared at him from the end of the tunnel, flexing its mandibles dripping with venom. It looked far to much like it was preparing to have him as his next meal.
It sounded like a hundred creaking bones when the spider started forward, its long, sinewy legs making alarmingly quick work of the distance between Nox and the spider.
And all that he had to defend himself was the strip of meat jerky he still held in his free hand.
His satchel had been slung over his free arm but the actual pack rested on the opposite side of his hip, so there was no way to reach it. Not that a map or water canteen was going to do any better good against a six foot tall arachnid.
He glanced between the spider creeping towards him and his hand. "You've gotta be kidding me," he moaned, furrowing his brow. I would much rather have been eaten by a dragon than this thing...
So, doing the only thing that he possible could, he threw the jerky at the spider. It sailed through the air... And bounced right off one of its lean legs.
If anything, the spider seemed confused, and even paused to try and figure out what had just happened.
That didn't comfort Nox at all though— as there were only a few yards between him and the monster now.
And the jerky didn't distract the spider for long. After a moment of twiddling its fangs in thought, it started towards him again—
When something leaped over his head and engaged itself in attacking one of the spider's hairy legs in a flurry of white fur and fangs.
Nox at first couldn't make out what it was that had saved him— the scene ahead was a cacophony of snarls and the spider's screeching. The smaller creature had latched on determinedly to the arachnid's joint with a solid jaw, scarlet eyes flashing in the dark...
It's the white wolf, Nox realized. The same one from earlier!
The spider continuously tried to reach the wolf with its mandibles, spinning in circles and in various angles of the tunnel. The wolf, light on its feet, easily darted and dodged and scored countless bites and scratches against the beast. At some point, the spider even seemed to be retreating back into the depths of the tunnel.
