Reidar glanced back. Jake's face was pale. Lena's hand rested on her blade, but she didn't draw it. She knew as well as he did—fighting would ruin everything they did.

Another battle here would draw the attention of all the monsters heading toward the battle they created.

The horde surged forward. They didn't slow. They didn't turn. The noise of the battle ahead called to them like a siren. Reidar held his breath.

Time stretched.

Then the tide thinned. The last of them vanished around a corner, drawn by the distant clash and burning fire.

Silence returned, but Reidar and the others kept receiving the various notifications that signaled the Rift-Sprites were killing the monsters and that they had never abandoned them since they started all this.

[Level 97 Monster Chitinous Ravager defeated.]

[Level 102 Monster Glimmerfang defeated.]

…

…

…

[Level 107 Monster Grimfang defeated.]

[Level 102 Monster Glimmerfang defeated.]

[LEVEL UP! You have reached Level 97.]

[You have gained 0.5 attribute points to distribute.]

…

…

…

[LEVEL UP! You have reached Level 101.]

[You have gained 0.5 attribute points to distribute.]

"Well, at least we are getting something out of this. I don't think anyone had been able to level up as fast as us."

Reidar waited another ten seconds before raising his hand again. This time, he gave the signal to move.

"Let's go," he said, voice low. "But be quiet."

He nudged his wolf forward, ears tuned to every shift in the air. The battle was still far off, and so were the notifications coming. This meant more monsters were headed toward the battle, and they might end up having to fight them, ruining the entire plan.

Lena and Jake didn't speak. None of them did.

…

…

…

The theater loomed over the ruins, a twisted monument to something that shouldn't exist. Its marble facade, scarred by the apocalypse, was marred by deep cracks that went through its columns, while entire sections of the roof had collapsed in a heap of broken stone. Yet, despite the ruin, the Gloom-Web Arachnids had taken it as their own.

Strands of webbing crisscrossed the ruined structure, patching up shattered walls and reinforcing weakened sections with thick, sticky silk. It was like they'd woven the whole place back together.

The creatures had done more than repair; they had expanded the place. Blocks of stone from neighboring buildings hung suspended in a web framework, adding new chambers and passages to the original structure.

Reidar stared at it from their hiding spot, and the sight filled him with unease.

They were animals first and monsters second, and they should not have had that kind of intelligence even if they were monsters.

But the Gloom-Web Arachnids did. That made them far more dangerous.

<They're smarter than they look,> Reidar thought. <Mana corruption usually destroys higher brain function. It turns creatures into killing machines driven by hunger and rage. But these things...>

"These things are too great a treat," Lena said. It was clear she was having his same thoughts.

Reidar could do nothing but nod.

"We made the right choice in coming here… We really need to kill them all before they reach other towns, or worse… Cities."

Creamont was not that far from Loden, so the monsters might end up there sooner or later, and the problem was that, given their high growth speed, they were going to turn into a problem no one would be able to face.

"Look at the parking lot," Lena said.

Reidar shifted his gaze down. A two-hundred-meter expanse of cracked asphalt stretched between their position and the theater.

Dozens of the massive spiders perched on vehicles, using them as elevated platforms. Their eight crimson eyes swept the surroundings, creating overlapping fields of vision that covered every side.

They were sentries. Guards. A defensive perimeter that made approaching the theater without being spotted impossible.

Reidar counted them. Thirty. Maybe thirty-five. They were all Dread-Spinners, and all were at level 120 or higher.

"What do you think?" Reidar asked, not moving his eyes from the parking lot.

Lena was the hunter, the one with Predator's Echo. Her trait gave her an understanding of monsters that his A.C.U.M.E.N. could never match.

He might be smarter, able to process information faster and with greater clarity, but knowledge came from experience.

Lena had spent the past months reading the behavior of creatures, sensing their movements, and predicting their actions through intuition rather than analysis, because that was what her trait did.

"You're the expert," Reidar said. "What do you suggest?"

Lena studied the theater.

"We attack," she said.

Reidar raised an eyebrow.

"At this point, there's no better option," Lena said. "You'll need to recall all your creatures. Bring them here. Every Rift-Sprite and every summon still fighting in that plaza. Concentrate everything on this location."

Reidar nodded, but he knew that recalling all his creatures from the ambush point meant he would lose out on the C.L.A.S.P. and survival points from those ongoing battles.

However, the situation demanded it. The Gloom-Web Arachnids were too strong, and he could not defeat so many of them if he didn't give his all.

He took a deep breath. Lena had a knack for reading the patterns of their enemies, and her instincts had proven reliable time and time again. He better listen to her.

He could do nothing but nod. Now it was time to enter the last phase of their plan, the last phase of their hunt.

But first, he had something else to do.

"Jake and you didn't gain any C.L.A.S.P.," Reidar said.

Lena's expression hardened, but she nodded. The system measured combat capability, survival skills, and personal contribution to fights. Reidar's summoned creatures were extensions of him. When they killed, he gained credit because he directed them, controlled them, coordinated their actions, or at least he was the source.

But Lena and Jake had done nothing during the onslaught. They simply followed Reidar as they went to the theater, and the system did not reward passivity.

Jake remained at level 70. Lena was still at level 93. Reidar had climbed to level 103 through the chaos his summons created, but the gap between him and the Broodmother was still massive.

"Jake said the Broodmother is level 140," Reidar said.

"I know."

"It means we need you guys to contribute to the battle, because all help will be useful here."

"Yes."

"So, we need to understand how to tackle this, aside from simply attacking," he said.

Lena scanned the parking lot again.

"We kill the sentries first, obviously," she said. "We can't allow them to join their broodmother if she decides to grace us with her presence, which I'm sure will happen."

"And then?"

"We need to injure the Broodmother indirectly while we kill the Dread-Spinners."

Reidar frowned. "I will need to split our forces. Facing 5 Gloom-Web arachnids with 100 monsters was hard already; to face the Dread-Spinners, I would assume we would need 100 each, and there are around 35 of them. It means I will need 3500 monsters."

"Yes." Lena pointed at the theater. "You would need to have enough creatures to burn down the theater and to kill the Dread-Spinners, and you must kill them fast. The entire structure must be destroyed. Fire is one of their vulnerabilities. Set everything ablaze and let it spread. The flames will force her out, injure her, and weaken her."

Reidar considered it.

He had 5,703.74 mana points. Not much, not little, certainly more than most people had right now, but he didn't know if this was enough to kill the monsters. If he really wanted to kill the broodmother, he would need to spend them all, because he needed to summon as many creatures as he could.

He began the computations in his mind, aided by his large amount of A.C.U.M.E.N.

He would need to spend his entire mana pool, leaving him with just 3.74 mana points. As soon as he could, he would have to summon the guardian shade and then use his own attacks to trigger arcane leech and get more mana. Regardless, he would be able to summon 5,390 Rift-sprites.

Reaching that conclusion only took two seconds.

He opened his eyes. "Five thousand, three hundred ninety," he said. "That's the absolute limit of creatures I can summon with my mana."

"That should be enough," Lena said; she then turned to Jake. "Jake, tell me, can you increase Reidar's A.C.U.M.E.N.?"

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