Chapter 48: Intermission 4

Alicia was making an artificial cave for Rufus, according to his wishes after the recent thunderstorms. Cave despite it’s small size and unnatural formation, - composed of phyllite and shale sourced from the crust and nearby riverbed - was large enough to house the lupine. From her experience she had difficulty bringing up rocks from the soil as most of them were buried underneath materials not under the domain of Earth Aspect. Such as tree roots and biomass. That being said, the earth aspect in rocky terrain - like in the mountains where she used it accidentally, was much easier to make use of as most of the earthen minerals were exposed and even if they’re too large; following their structural grains and sheets she could easily break them into more manageable pieces. During this time she earned the educement ⟨ Horticulture ⟩ from seemingly nowhere.

However further investigation found that Dryssia was teaching one of her spiders on how to take care of plants…

‘Horticulture… Spiders know horticulture do they?’1Specific reference to this video. Random Far Cry 3 Bullshittery You can enjoy the rest of the video too.

Not long after his dwelling was completed Rufus set out to ‘recruit’ his companions. While observing how he avoided one of her spiders…

‘Even if he’s about the same size, he’s terrified of the Brides… Hope he’s not traumatized by them…… Might have something to do with being envenomed and partially mummified by them….’

>Notice. Idiosyncratic synchronization process of subject: C.Tornitua complete.

Mental harmonization achieved.

‘Okay but why does he have such a… husky… voice that’s manlier than I had?! That’s cheating!’

‘Monkeys…?’

‘I don’t know what that means…’

Although it was in her thoughts only, she expressed her confusion to Alice as well… no one knows why she delivered the way she did: In a hush… within her own mind where no other than Alice could hear her.

Moment she reached the vicinity few of the outlying rangers found  and ushered them to come, in a hurry.

There outside a hastily built barn a crowd had gathered… most of them -  judging by their attire - were rangers. The atmosphere was tense with worry and distress. Faenas who noticed Alicia and Ramiel coming rushed to her:

Her frantic speech and apparent alarm was rubbing off on Alicia as well who had to reel her back.

Deep breath and a few moments later she managed to regain some of her composure;

‘Damn they just kept going after being hit by a lightning strike? Guess their name goes more than the surface level.’

The area was packed full with rangers who had many important tasks to tend to.

Quiet murmurs of agreement circulated around them.

Although she managed to pacify them a moment ago, they were starting to get riled up again.

Alicia was eyeing the empty buckets and barrels.

Entering the crude but sturdy structure many of the goats noticed her and Ramiel, acknowledging them by look and greetings… of bleating.

‘Nope! Nope! Nope! Nuh uh. Electricians’ motto, if you conduct, you lose. I should tell them the good news about the goats. I think they will be elated to hear that they can be milked once again since they harbored such strong feelings about.’

When the elves heard about the cause, symptoms and the remedy they were predictably overjoyed and moved with haste in order to collect the milk. Enquiring about the reason revealed their  addiction to the ‘white dew’. From their descriptions Alicia got the impression that it was a thick, sweetened milk. Anything sugary and sweet as it was rare around these parts not to mention their nutrition. It was easy to guess why it was popular among the ranks of the rangers who were mainly formed of girls fond of sweetness.

As they were in the process of milking, someone who licked off some of the milk that had gotten onto fingers reported a strange new taste. Again rumors of sickness and malady spread. Indubitably Alicia had the honor of tasting it first to test if it’s safe for consumption, she had no strong feelings as she had Toxic Tolerance from Advanced Toxicology. Her eyes widening in surprise attracted concerned looks from the elves.

Gingerly Faenas sipped some for herself, licking her lips pausing, then wolfing down the rest before others could get their hand on to it. And with that a small clash over the limited supply of milk started.

‘I’m not a huge fan of energy drinks… feels like I’m drinking the physical embodiment of cardiac arrest. And when it inevitably crashes it is like as if my central nervous system is being hijacked by demons… but this? Tastes better, feels better, is healthier maybe and probably won’t give me caffeine crash induced psychosis. No wonder they’re fighting over this.’

After the great civil war of white dew had subsided thanks to the abundantly available supply. Faenas led Alicia to some sort of shed filled with piles of snowy mounds and brought her a basket of cotton like soft downy wool.

Picking up a bundle and rubbing it against her fingers showed how fine and soft they were.

Caught off guard by the excessively generous offer, Faenas was stupefied; burbling out nonsense sounds before getting her speech back in order.

‘Oh boy, I can’t carry all this… uhm let's think about what I can take from them as a repayment… that seems to exist only in their minds… What do I need… Huh. Here’s a thought. Looking back to that incident with the ogres revealed the flaws in my methods. I can’t just hope everything to just somehow wander or run face first into my webs every single time, in that case I have to give them a reason to rush me down. Pestering them from range is just what I need. Also if they keep their distance and attack me from range I’m just sitting a duck.’

You are reading story Reincarnated as a Spider (Draft/Writing practice) at novel35.com

‘Spells from the fire aspect are too flashy and just give away my position. Not good for when I still want to deal with things from a distance but don’t want to be seen. Air aspect is great for this but it’s so good at its job that I don’t think they’ll even know where they’re being attacked from. It’s likely they’ll rout and flee rather than face me. Earth aspect… No just not going to work… But I can make new anchor points with them if I need to… Water… Eh… Cryokinesis is a thought but propelling the crystals needs some involvement from other aspects like water or air, fire is just counterproductive… Too many extra steps.’

Few minutes later Alicia was guided to an archery field where she would be evaluated. Handed with a plain training bow, despite it being the first time ever holding it she felt strange familiarity with the weapon, instinctively before Faenas was done with her explanation she nocked a blunthead let loose at one near targets marked on tree stumps. Although slightly off to the left and somewhat overshot away from the point she was aiming for, it was still on within the marked area. A successful hit though not perfect.

The uncomfortable gaze she turned to Alicia was akin to how someone would look at a raving lunatic.

Attributing as one of her weird quirks she carried on.

She just noticed it now after being mentioned but she had a wooden ring on her thumb. It was there to facilitate the string drawing and to protect the skin.

“-  There are more or less two other drawing techniques than the pinch draw. The three finger draw3The mediterreanean draw. index finger on top of the arrow middle and ring finger underneath it and the thumb draw. Three finger draw helps if you’re having difficulties with the draw weight. And if you’re a ranger you’ll eventually learn how to do this.”

Completely facing away from the target she held her bow horizontally raising it up high and nocking an arrow. As she draws in the string she brings it down, using her hand holding the bow as a guide and twisting the hand drawing the strings behind her neck and head, pulls and releases it hitting the stump behind with having to turn towards it.4What she does here is a technique called Jarmakee.

Video one: Archery FAQ: Jarmakee, what and how?

Video two: Signalling Arrows and Jarmakee

In an unrelated note; I’m really bad at describing things.

Her voice and expressions made Alicia feel like she was speaking from experience…

She turned to Ramiel who was chomping on a bush.

With weak nods she answered Alicia’s question.

An annoyed sigh escaped from Alicia;

They were one of the inspirations for Tolkien in creating his version of the race, now predominantly used in modern media.

Amused by Ranger captain’s troubled expression Alicia had a smirk naturally forming on her face.

‘Waiting until the bow is done is gonna take a while is there any other ranged options I haven’t thought of…’

>Educement: Modified Venom Glands allow for projectile spitting.

‘There’s no harm in trying it out right? Six point cost though… are they each three points?’

>〔Parthenogenesis〕 Costs 5 points.

〔Modified venom Glands〕 Costs 1 point.

‘I mean it’s probably worth it to invest into it, considering how much it costs… Alright go ahead…’

‘Oh… Oh no. This is bad. REALLY BAD.’

Auratic

I was also cursed by the lord of flies himself. I swear it's like fighting the hydra from the greek mythology, with each fly I kill there's like 2 other that just spawns inside my apartment out of the aether. With the amount of kills I have on it I better be getting my prestige  golden skin for my fly swatter I swear. Since no one answered: Dryssia's name comes from the word Greek word Δρύς (Drýs) meaning Oak. Although the word Dryad used to mean specifically tree nymphs of oak trees, it has expanded to encompass as umbrella term for the more general tree spirit race. If the dryad is a literal walking talking tree, that is called Hamadryad who would die if their that they're bound to dies (A popular example would be Kii from Monster Musume, She is a Hamadryad). Any human tree hybrids would fall under the Hamadryad category. This is not the case for Dryssia who can survive even if her place of provenance (The great oak tree) is destroyed though she would've been severely weakened if not for Alicia's presence. Covenant basically turned Alicia into Dryssia's Provenance. And Dryssia is meant to portray a dryad in the most classical lore friendly way I could. Dryssia is also extremely shy of strangers, with the exception of Alicia. Besides the confusion between dryad and a hamadryad; the lesser known dryad subspecies include Daphnaie Laurel tree nymphs, Epimelides fruit tree(mostly apple) dryads and the protectors of sheep and Meliae ash tree dryads.

We'll cover Spitting spiders and Asexual spiders in the future. Kekw.

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