As she stepped through the broken passage, Calyra entered the vast chamber. Her eyes had instinctively risen the instant she crossed the threshold.

The cavern stretched out before her like the hollow inside of some buried cathedral, its vast walls rising so high that the tops faded into the distance, hidden in a pale haze.

She had expected darkness in a place this deep inside the dungeon, but none had greeted her. Instead, an odd light remained, spreading across the stone.

The feeling had left her with a quiet unease in her chest.

’The structure changes here...’

’This doesn’t look like territory shaped by the Carapace Crawlers.’

But she already had the feeling that whatever this Voidspawn was, it’s a different breed.

Calyra narrowed her eyes as she studied the cavern.

Normally, the structure of a dungeon was heavily influenced by the type of Voidspawn that inhabited it. Each species slowly changed their territory, molding it into a new form that was conducive to their nature. Yet, what she saw before her, however, did not quite resemble the dominion of the Carapace Crawlers.

From what she could tell, the design of this chamber was not quite finished, as if the dungeon had not quite completed its process of evolution.

As she studied the cavern, she realised that it was in a state of limbo, its original design slowly being consumed by the influence of another species of Voidspawn.

She breathed out slowly, as the cold touched her skin. Then, her blue eyes dropped, examining the floor that stretched out before her.

’This is...’

The chamber was wide and open. The floor was smooth in wide areas of exposed rock. Shallow grooves and scattered pits marked the surface.

The space felt far too open and... too empty.

Then, as if every sense within her suddenly screamed in warning, Calyra’s body tensed.

Every impulse within her urged caution!

Following the direction of this dreadful force, her eyes began to move upwards — towards the distant ceiling of the cavern. Far above, at the location where the pale haze obscured the uppermost reaches of the cavern, there was a concentration of mana.

This concentration of mana was similar to a storm brewing; it was thick and oppressive, and its sheer weight was titanic!

And crushing enough for her to feel it even from this distance.

Despite the deathly pressure, Calyra did not move; she simply continued to peer through the haze.

Finally, after a few moments of careful attention, the being shrouded within the haze began to make itself discernible.

It slowly began to descend.

The figure continued to drop, inch by inch, hanging from something that her eyes could not perceive. As the distance between them shortened, the outline of the creature gradually sharpened.

The lower half was obviously that of a spider, with a distended black abdomen hanging below a strong thorax. From this, six long legs extended, angling sharply at irregular intervals. They were strong and imposing, their dark surfaces covered in coarse, bristling fur.

But above that monstrous body, which was the upper body, the form was different. Instead of the chitinous thorax, a pale figure of a woman rose from it.

Her skin was unnaturally white, smooth and flawless like polished ivory, standing in stark contrast to the dark mass of the spider body beneath her.

Two slender arms extended from her upper torso, resting loosely at her sides as she descended. Long strands of white hair flowed around her shoulders, drifting faintly in the cold air.

For a moment, the figure held a deceptive serenity.

Then Calyra saw its eyes.

Two crimson points slowly opened within the pale face. They burned with a deep red glow, fixed directly upon her.

Instinctively, she summoned her staff from her dimensional space.

"I have been wondering what sort of monster ruled this place. Never did I expect it would be the Queen of the Arachnids herself..."

Calyra sighed.

"This is going to be very bothersome."

The Queen of Arachnids, or more commonly known as Silk Tyrant, was not unfamiliar to her. Among the Malice-class Voidspawn, it was regarded as a particularly dangerous specimen.

Much of that reputation came from its ability to produce large numbers of Lesser Spiders, allowing it to overwhelm intruders through sheer numbers alone.

But that was not what concerned her the most. More troublesome than its brood was the creature’s own unique ability.

Closing her eyes, Calyra activated [Heightened Sense], sharpening her sensitivity to the flow of mana around her.

Then she saw it emerge before her.

Innumerable threads of condensed mana stretched across the chamber, weaving from wall to wall and from floor to the distant ceiling — silently crisscrossing the vast space, filling the cavern in ways no ordinary sight could perceive.

’No wonder this place felt so saturated with mana... and why the chamber appeared so empty.’

Calyra’s expression remained calm, though her thoughts sharpened.

’Still... I was careless.’ 𝘧𝓇ℯℯ𝑤ℯ𝘣𝓃ℴ𝓋𝑒𝑙.𝑐𝘰𝑚

’Had I walked forward blindly and brushed against one of these threads... I might have cut myself without even realizing it.’

Well, not quite really.

Thanks to her sharp mana sensitivity, she had already instinctively avoided the string as she walked inside.

After that, Calyra immediately activated another two spells.

[Fly] and [Cryostatic Field].

Then, her body slowly levitated, lifting from the ground.

At the same time, the temperature throughout the vast chamber plummeted to a depth of cold so absolute that every breath turned into pale mist before it could even leave the lips.

The change came swiftly.

Where moments ago the chamber had appeared empty, the countless invisible threads woven throughout the space suddenly began to reveal themselves.

One by one, they began to form, crystallized and clear.

The threads that had been hidden from sight now had their lengths encased in ice.

In an instant, the room was filled with a vast quantity of frozen threads, wrapping around the room’s surfaces.

At the center of it all, Calyra hovered serenely.

Her long, flowing white hair swirled around her shoulders, and her bright blue eyes glowed with calm resolve.

Within the radius of her spell, warmth had no place to exist.

The chamber had become a domain of absolute frost.

Even the invisible could no longer hide from the merciless stillness of her winter.

’So this is why he gave me this necklace. But even with its enhancement... expecting me to defeat a Malice-rank creature alone is hardly a fair assignment.’

Sensing the disturbance within its domain, the Silk Tyrant immediately moved, disappearing from its previous position.

"I guess Silvena was right...

"...That man is a tyrant."

And at the same instant, Calyra moved as well.

[Blink]

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[Chapter 104: The Deepmarch Dungeon (9)]