Lifestealer: Cursed Healer [A LITRPG Isekai Survival]

Symon glanced at what he was pretty sure were baby spiders lying curled up on the floor before shifting his vision to the outline of the entrance. It was just his luck that the first place he went in the dungeon was a damn spider nest.

He knew he couldn't complain too hard. The spiderlings had basically been free vitality, allowing him to fix himself risk-free, for a certain definition of the word. A fall from the cavern wall would have been deadly, after all.

Plus, it was a dungeon meant for Second Steps, so it was extra lucky that his first 'opponent' had been defenceless yet vitality-rich little monsters instead of a true threat.

"So… what are the chances the mama spider bites my head off the second I poke my head out that gap?" Symon asked as he looked at the light streaming in from outside.

"The meat is old," Entisse hissed softly from her position next to the larger, quadruped monster corpse. "This 'mama' spider you speak of has not returned for some time. A week, at least."

"Err, does that make it more or less likely she'll show up now?"

"Less. It has likely perished while hunting."

"Or, it had no reason to come back while there was still meat left on the bones."

Entisse's white eyebrows stood out in the gloom as they furrowed. "Perhaps…" she allowed.

"Any advice?" Symon asked, directing his thoughts to Keelgrave.

<Oh, I wouldn't worry about any spiders if I were you.>

Symon's eyes brightened at that. "Really? What gives?"

<Well, no way we're getting out of this dungeon alive, so you might as well stop stressing and try to enjoy your final hours.>

Symon let out a long, slow sigh. "Great, thanks for your help, man." He turned back to Entisse, this time speaking aloud. "I think we should just go for it now. The sooner we get out of here, the better. I doubt the forest would be much safer, but at least I'd be able to swing my sword and could refill my Vessel from all the plants. Uh, but you're the monster hunting expert, so…" he continued, suddenly feeling awkward.

Hunting monsters in giant caves had literally been her life's purpose, so who was he to dictate their plans? He was feeling antsy about not having any vitality, though; his magic was his one real advantage, but he didn't even have any juice for it. He would feel a lot more confident with the safety net it offered.

She nodded immediately. "Yes, I will teach you. When hunting prey, you must know what you are capable of defeating. Even the most mighty of hunters must flee from a superior foe on occasion. This is not possible in this dungeon. There is no fleeing, not truly, and danger far above us lurks everywhere."

Symon nodded. It wasn't reassuring, but he hadn't expected it to be.

"You have heard me speak of claiming the strength of others for your own," Entisse continued, "and this is what we must do now, if we are to survive. We will not throw our lives away in vain, but we must not allow the fear of death to prevent us from living."

Symon blinked owlishly. Entisse could be taciturn on occasion, but talking about hunting monsters never failed to get her to open up. "Wow, that's kind of poetic. I agree that we can't just stay here forever, though."

"Then it is settled," she said with an air of finality. "We shall make our way down to the forest floor, refill your essence, and search for a— ah, it would appear you were correct."

"Ah shit," he murmured, already knowing what she was referring to. He drew his sword, though the cave — more a crack in the wall, really — was narrow enough that he'd have a difficult time swinging it.

Moments after, a dark shape blotted out the light of the cave entrance, leaving only a tiny sliver of an outline around a bulbous, hairy form.

His newly healed heart immediately doubled in speed, and he would have worried about straining it if not for the slowly approaching leg. It was about as thick around as his leg, though it was very, very, long. He slowly shuffled backwards, trying not to make any noise as the appendage searched through the cave. It tapped repetitively on the ground, the floor, and even the ceiling, eliciting a sharp clack every time it did so.

He held his breath as he continued backpedalling, while at the same time his thread moved out on its own. It slithered forward hungrily, its smooth and serpentine movement contrasting with the spider's sudden, jittering lunges as it continued to tap around the cave, slowly inching forward toward him.

Its approach was slow, which he hoped meant it didn't know for sure that they were there, but it seemed more likely that it already knew and simply wasn't in a rush.

This book's true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience.

Entisse's long, warm fingers wrapped around his arm, almost causing him to jump and swing his sword at her in surprise. He stopped himself before he did, and she held on tight as she guided him around a rock he could have otherwise stumbled over in his fear and blindness.

He wanted to let out a sigh of relief, but didn't dare make any noise, so he settled for an appreciative nod. She must have seen it, even in the darkness, as her hand retreated.

All the while, his thread had been hard at work. It had attached to the leg and begun siphoning out the vitality, only… it was struggling. Just like with the bestial man who had tracked him through the forest around Brackstead, the spider was so far above him that his magic couldn't affect it.

That wasn't entirely true, though. The man — if that was what he truly was — had been on the Third Step, while the spider had to be somewhere on the Second. The thread was still attached and seemed to be working normally enough, just without any vitality. It had the uncomfortable sensation of trying to drink through a blocked straw, only the straw was a part of him.

The leg tip-tapped its way towards him at a glacial pace, but when a second one forced its way into the cave, he knew he was running out of time to do anything. Squeezing his eyes shut — not that he could see much in the dark anyway — he focused on his perception of the thread.

He couldn't exactly see it, but his sense of its location was so strong that it might as well have been glowing. Most of the time, he only felt the warm, fuzzy feeling of the vitality itself, but now, all that stood out was the sensation of the thread straining. It felt more physical than it usually did, in the same way that his muscles could feel sluggish and heavy after he exerted them.

He blocked out the sound of the claw-tipped legs, of Entisse's quickening breathing, and his own panicked breaths. He was used to being outmatched; almost every monster he encountered was a true threat, and even a random villager, bulky from a lifetime of labouring in the mines, would have given him a good fight without his unique magical advantage. Two weeks weren't enough to catch up to those who had been benefiting from the Ledger for a lifetime, let alone the monsters like this that were above them.

But it had to be.

He had so much potential with his magic, but he'd never been given the chance to reach it. Not the opportunity for personal power for its own sake, though his time on Cathar — especially recent events — had taught him the importance of that, but the opportunity to do good. To save lives, protect those in need, to fix things that would otherwise be unfixable for anyone else.

But he was just. So. Weak.

Dying now would be many things, but most of all, it would be a waste. He couldn't waste this second chance.

His focus narrowed to a scalpel's point, tracing its way along the path of his thread until it reached the end. He was so focused that he could almost see what was going on: a sheer mountain with a formless fog furiously gnawing at its roots. Flakes of stone might drift off, but he could sit here for days, and the mountain would be no worse for wear.

As he focused his attention, so too did the thread focus. The frayed edge of the thread twisted in on itself, and the fog began condensing down. From a gaseous fog, to gentle precipitation. This fed a gentle stream which lapped at the base of the mountain, but the rain quickly intensified, and the stream grew to a raging river. As the attack intensified, the mountain started groaning. When the banks started overflowing and lightning started flashing in the clouds above, hairline cracks formed in the stone.

Over and over, the river bounced off the stone before spraying into the air in a massive explosion of mist. This joined the clouds, intensifying the storm even further as more and more rain fell. His body might have grunted with the effort of the continual attack, but he was so focused on forcing the thread through that he couldn't tell.

Either way, the burning hot vitality sliding through his veins brought him back to awareness.

With a groan of equal parts pleasure and pain, Symon pushed himself back to his feet from where he'd collapsed. Stealing vitality normally felt like a warm hug, but this felt more like the scorching of strong alcohol. It was nice, in a certain way, but also painfully uncomfortable.

A loud hiss and a crash refocused him on his current situation. He must have only been out for a few seconds as he forced the thread to work, but seconds could be equivalent to a lifetime in a dangerous fight such as this.

Entisse was wrestling with one of the spider's long legs, having pinned it under one arm while the other savagely clawed at it. Flecks of dark blood, barely visible in the gloom, splattered across the cave wall, but her attacks weren't doing much beyond annoying it.

His sword was still in his hand, so he put it to work. An overhead sweeping attack, like cutting firewood, would have been perfect, but the cave was just too cramped for it to be effective. With his back pressed to one wall, he could reach out and barely touch the opposite one.

The patch of missing skin over his chest had already healed over from the new source of vitality, so there was no pain as he raised the sword, keeping the tip pointed down. With his free hand halfway down the blade for better leverage, he brought the blade home.

It didn't cut more than a few centimetres, but it wedged itself into one of the joints. The oversized spider let out an earsplitting hiss of pain and anger, to which Entisse replied with her own, decidedly weaker version.

It thrashed violently, but one leg was no match for two people, not with all the leverage they had. Entisse clawed wildly at the wound; now that Symon had opened up a hole in tough outer carapace, she was able to work her clawed fingertips into the squishier internals and wreak havoc.

Unfortunately for the pair, spiders weren't known for being reliant on a single leg. Symon was reintroduced to this fact when a second one slammed into his side. The effect wasn't nearly as disastrous as when he'd been punched by that Third Step, and he was beginning to suspect the spider wasn't focused on pure Strength, but it was hardly pleasant.

Ribs cracked from the impact, then groaned again when he crashed into the cave wall. But for Symon, such wounds were minor. It would be a matter of seconds to return himself to full functionality, and far less than a minute all in all to heal fully.

The problem was the single claw on the end of each leg. He didn't think most spiders had them, but then again, most spiders weren't bigger than he was.

More specifically, it was the payload of venom it had just delivered that was the problem. Even with his resistance, he could feel his side alternating confusingly between burning pain and numbness.

Symon grit his teeth as he rose off the ground. He'd been surviving stings from giant insects since almost as soon as he'd woken up on Cathar, and he'd be damned if he let himself get killed by one now.