‘The Demon King!!!’
A wave of panic struck the Weaving Shadow Nest’s queen, causing her to nearly vomit the half-digested male spiders in her tummy.
“Demon king?! The new demon king?! That’s impossible! No, I mean... Of all places, why here?! Curses!”
Alakinse was anxious and angry. She stomped its feet in unease, her massive body generating ripples through her white nest. It was as if her lair had turned into a giant trampoline.
Arakdor was appalled as well.
He used to be a part of the Demon King Lej Dracul’s ten thousand men army. A mere glance from that furiataur was enough to make all of them prostrate on the ground, trembling in fear.
He didn’t want to return to those days.
But more than that, he didn’t want to make an enemy out of a demon king...
“Your Majesty... it looks like the underworld hasn’t forsaken this labyrinth. We have to quickly make a choice!”
“Make a choice?” Alakinse suddenly stopped bouncing about.
Her scarlet eyes slowly inched down to fall upon the insolent subject who dared to utter nonsense.
“Are you telling me to surrender now? Never! I have had enough of the demon king’s rule! My children shall only be fodder to me. The Weaving Shadow Nest will never be subservient to anyone! To hell with the underworld! To hell with the Demon God!”
Alakinse’s emotions crescendoed as she roared in anger. By the time she finished her last sentence, her massive body was already trembling uncontrollably.
Unlike the ratmen, who had never worshiped the Demon God, the crypt spiders carried faith in the Demon God.
Of course, that was different from submitting to the underworld.
Those entitled high demons had long turned their backs on the Demon God; They no longer cared about returning to the surface, yet they had no hesitation in sending the Demon God’s children to the surface to die.
‘I have never turned my back on the Demon God; the ones who did wrong are those who twist His Majesty Demon God’s will!’
As for Alakinse’s earlier curse, she had just blurted it out of agitation. It was normal for her to suffer from mood swings as she had just gotten pregnant.
‘I believe His Majesty Demon God can feel my deep loyalty!’
Looking at the frenzied queen, Arakdor shivered even more intensely. He pressed his head firmly against the ground as if boring a hole through it.
“No, that’s not what I mean!”
“What else do you mean?! Explain yourself well, or I’ll devour you right now!” Alakinse roared.
Even Arakdor’s thickest chitin went limp upon hearing those words. He was on the verge of flipping over belly up.
But he was not the Weaving Shadow Nest’s smartest general for no reason. He frantically racked his brain and soon came up with a plan.
“We... We can pretend to submit to him!”
“Pretend to submit to him?” Alakinse stared at Arakdor with narrowed eyes. “That sounds interesting. Carry on.”
Arakdor couldn’t stop shivering or whimpering due to the bloodline suppression coming from Alakinse, but he forced himself to remain composed and continued with a deep voice, “The demon king must have his reasons for setting his base here. He might have thought that our Weaving Shadow Nest poses the least threat compared to the other powers in the labyrinth... Ah, it’s not my intention to make light of Your Majesty.”
Alakinse waved her front limbs and said, “I don’t mind. Continue.”
Arakdor breathed a sigh of relief.
“Since we aren’t the biggest threat to the newly arrived demon king, he has no reason to deal with us first... unless we provoke him first. Given the current fight for power in the labyrinth, the demon king requires our support more than ever.
“If we approach and submit to him at this juncture, even if he knows that we harbor an ulterior motive, he’ll likely overlook it. This will buy us invaluable time, and we will have more options on our hands. If we play our cards well, we can even blame the chaos in the labyrinth’s first floor on our nemesis, the lizards in the underground sewer!”
Seeing that its queen was moved, Arakdor slowly raised his head and spoke even more firmly, “By the time the newly arrived demon king and Lej Dracul’s old subjects push a stake through each other’s hearts, we should have already built up enough strength. That will be our chance to turn the tables around and wash away our humiliation!”
...
In the hall beneath the demon king domain, the deceased crypt spiders were placed neatly against the wall, and the thumb-sized magic crystals were piled up into a small mound.
The players initially struggled to find the magic crystals. Sometimes, they would even get sprayed with spider juice. It was a good thing that the players were unable to smell, or else the stench would have driven away most of them.
But this situation didn’t last too long.
Over time, they grasped the trick, and their efficiency improved from three minutes per spider to three spiders in a minute. The fastest one could even clear a spider every three seconds.
Unfortunately, they were running out of crypt spider carcasses.
Otherwise, if these players were given more time, they might just start developing an assembly line for dissecting spiders.
In the corner of the hall, a skeleton soldier stood before a crypt spider carcass as it stroked its lower jaw in contemplation. A while later, it murmured, “Interesting.”
Upon spotting Tablecloth squatting by the corner, the bored Dogshit walked over and asked, “What’s wrong, bro? Are you growing mushrooms here too?”
“That’s not it.” Tablebench shook his head. “I just noticed something interesting.”
“What is it? Share it with me.”
Dogshit’s eyes glowed. He thought Tablebench had found a bug he could exploit.
“This magic crystal thing seems to be mainly situated near nerve cells.”
The air fell silent.
Dogshit thought that Tablebench hadn’t finished his sentence, so he waited. It took a while before he realized that was all. Confusion was written all over his face.
“Uhh... Is there a problem with that?”
Tablebench rubbed his nose as he replied in excitement, “There’s no problem with it... Don’t you find it fascinating?”
Dogshit: “...”
Fallingshark: “Do you know what became of our plan? It was a failure. Those fellows are too coarse! They don’t care how they smell at all, claiming that they can’t smell themselves and it would be a win if they could stink the enemy to death! Those stingy rascals! Shouldn’t they at least show some consideration for the Demon King?!”
“Well, that’s how it is.” Sinkingwhale nodded with a smile as he rubbed Fallingshark’s head. “Would you be interested to give it a try? Just entrust everything to us; you don’t have to care about anything else... It only costs 1000 hell coins.”
‘1000 hell coins? That is around... 500 kilograms of coal?!’
Hungryhungry was still thinking about supporting their little business when the math clicked in her mind, and she balled up her shoulders reflexively to pull away from these two black-hearted skeletons.
“Is it yet another failure?” Fallingshark sighed, not forcing her case any further.
“I told you... Who would accept such an offer?” Sinkingwhale was also disappointed, but he still tried to console his friend. “Entrepreneurship is a path filled with hurdles. It is all part and parcel on the road to success.”
Hungryhungry was envious of their friendship, but at the same time, she couldn’t help but retort to the little play they were putting up, “Have you considered doing stand up comedy? I think that will be more profitable than a dry bathhouse.”
“Really?!” Fallingshark, who was still depressed a second ago, suddenly lurched up to Hungryhungry, grabbed her hands, and asked, “The ticket! How much would you be willing to pay for the ticket?!”
It felt like the soulfire blazing in her eye sockets had turned into hell coins.
“Um... 10 hell coins?”
“So little!” Fallingshark pounded her empty left chest, acting as if she had suffered a heavy blow.
Sinkingwhale thought hard about the idea, his eyes gleaming with astuteness. “Stand up comedy, huh? But I think a bathhouse for beauties would be much easier to market.”
Hungryhungry: “I don’t think skeletons... need baths.”
Fallingwhale: “Even if we do it live?”
Hungryhungry: “Huh... Huh?! Are we talking about the same thing?”
It felt like their conversations had gone tangent at some point.
Fortunately, Sinkingwhale quickly realized the problem in his business venture and gave up on the idea. He heaved a sigh and said, “Forget it... This path doesn’t look feasible. I’ll have to wait till I reincarnate into a slime before trying again.”
Hungryhungry exhaled in relief. She was curious to know why Sinkingwhale thought it would work out once he became a slime, but her instincts told her it was best not to probe.
It was a good thing this game didn’t allow players to reincarnate as slimes yet, so these two couldn’t lead the game astray yet.
‘Now that I think about it, it’s my first time having such a long conversation with someone else in the game. I feel my exhaustion is going away...’
Fallingshark: “I’m curious to know why you are wrapped in spider webs. Were you kidnapped by a boss?”
“No, it’s a mission from the Demon King...” Hungryhungry embarrassedly told them what happened earlier.
She was so afraid of spiders that the Demon King tasked her to clean up the place instead. Before she knew it, she was already wrapped in spider webs,
“How pitiful!” Sinkingwhale looked at Hungryhungry in sympathy. He inspected her web-covered body before eventually sighing helplessly. I doubt we can pull it out. Do you want to try burning it with fire, or maybe respawning will work?”
Hungryhungry sighed too. “I’ll think about it.”
Fallingshark consoled the depressed Hungryhungry with a grin, “You don’t need to be so down. The web looks not bad, just like a wedding gown.”
Sinkingwhale: “You mean the ripped kinds?”
“Hoho, you get it too?” Fallingshark jabbed Sinkingwhale with her elbow. “Send me some of your stash to enjoy too!”
“I can do that... but now that you mentioned it, I have an idea that I’d like to try out.” Sinkingwhale stroked his lower jaw in contemplation as he studied Hungryhungry from head to toe. His eyes were slowly getting heated up. “Why don’t we make clothes out of this?”
‘Clothes?’
Hungryhungry’s eyes lit up.
‘That sounds like a good idea... Why didn’t I think about that!’
She had difficulties moving in real life, so she often spent her time doing handicrafts such as knitting sweatshirts, scarves, and doing embroidery.
“But do skeletons need clothes?” Fallingshark frowned. “Those barbarians don’t care about their image. Why don’t we do stand-up comedy—”
“You fool!” Sinkingwhale smacked her head. “Think further than just clothes! What about backpacks? Surely someone here would need a backpack, especially those try-hards, right? They can spend more time in the field and bring back more items to sell in each trip!
“Defensive gears are a no-brainer, and bandages too! It will be a bummer if your bone suddenly snaps while exploring the labyrinth, right? With our bandages, they would be up and going in no time! Can you imagine how explosively popular those goods would be?!”
“Oh gosh oh gosh!” Fallingshark trembled in excitement. Her soulfire once again transformed into hell coins. “You are a freaking genius! We can use the ratman’s leather as material too!”
“Of course!” Sinkingshark smirked in glee. He turned to Hungryhungry and offered his right hand. “You are the one who sparked this inspiration... So, what do you think? Do you want to join us?”
The answer was obvious. Hungryhungry’s eyes were glowing so much that there was no way she would turn them down.
She wanted to try to find meaning in her existence, even if it was in a game.
Most important of all, she was sick and tired of mining coal.
At the rate she was going, this exciting, refreshing MMORPG would become nothing more than a coal mining simulator to her.
She put her hand on Sinkingwhale’s hand, and Fallingshark excitedly added hers on top too.
“Wonderful! This marks the founding of Necropolis’ first textile factory!”
“Let’s get straight to business” Sinkingwhale placed his hand on Fallingshark’s shoulder and pushed her toward the Demon King’s workshop. “If we are going to do this, let’s do it good. Let’s begin making preparations.”
Many materials were needed to weave cloth, including wood for constructing spindles.
Northpeak Shaft’s entrance was blocked by a wind wall, preventing players from leaving the area.
However, the NPCs in the game were so intelligent that Sinkingwhale thought they could communicate with them and convince them to let them out. Not to mention that the NPC store was already selling wrenches and hammers.
It would be baffling if they couldn’t gather materials to craft with!