Leveling Up Alone

Most humans would find Tia’s appearance repulsive unless they loved spiders or had strange tastes. She learned that humans often portrayed spiders as monsters in games or movies, so she knew her master would not love her forever.

Tia had already decided to leave once Han-Yeol no longer felt the sway toward her. Now that she was accustomed to being with someone, she knew that being alone would not be easy, but she also knew that it would not last long.

“Hmm… I think we can go with a different design,” Han-Yeol said.

“A different design?”

“Yeah, the armor that humans use is far too inefficient. The only benefit of walking on two legs is that it looks acceptable to humans, but it’s extremely inefficient for movement.”

“I-I guess you’re right, but…”

“So, I did sthinking. What if you designed them like you said as armor but made their lower bodies more efficient? For example, like… Ah, I guess making them like spiders would be ideal.”

“What?!” Tia shouted after being caught completely off guard. Then, she doubted her ears and asked, “W-What did you say just now, master?”

“Hey, pay attention when I’m speaking, will you? Anyway, we’ll go with your idea of designing them as armor for their upper bodies, but we will go with eight legs like a spider so they can easily climb trees, hills, walls, and other stuff.”

“T-Then…”

The fact that they were of different races made Tia certain that Han-Yeol’s feelings for her had started to change. However, what Han-Yeol said was the complete opposite of what she was thinking, and it turned out that he had been thinking of her all along.

Tia started tearing up despite being a monster. She had lived numerous lives and met different kinds of people, but this was the first tsomeone cared about her like Han-Yeol did.

She did possess the ability to charm others, but she only used that in combat. Since she was half-spider and half-human, she knew that no matter how much she charmed the other person, they would still leave.

However, the human she met this time, Han-Yeol, treated her as a good pet, friend, and comrade without holding any prejudice against her.

“W-W-What are you talking about?”

Tia wrapped her long, slender fingers around Han-Yeol’s neck, but she did not stop there as she teased him by seductively grazing her fingers against his skin.

She would often sneak into Han-Yeol’s room and ambush him while her adrenaline was still pumping from the thrill of a hunt, but those ambushes did not lead to anything passionate between them. She would just touch his body until she managed to calm down, and those experiences were like torture for Han-Yeol.

***

In the end, Tia tortured Han-Yeol for a little over an hour.

“W-White…” he muttered.

“When did I…?”

Han-Yeol felt like he had been wronged, as he was clueless about what she was thinking. Tia was now on par with a Master-Rank Hunter, so reading her mind using Telepathy was not easy. He could no longer read her mind even if he was curious about something, which was not a big problem at times, but it indeed beca big problem in times like these.

He was not aiming to be on par with Mariam or anything like that, but he felt the need to be adept enough to read the minds of Master-Rank Hunters.

“Y-Yeah… Making them look like humans is not a bad idea, but just because it’s not a bad idea doesn’t mean it’s good.”

“Well, I agree with you. We spiders have evolved to survive and hunt, so we are definitely more versatile than humans.”

“That’s what I’m talking about!” Han-Yeol exclaimed as his eyes shot wide open.

That was exactly what he wanted from his new golems. Most might think that humans were the most dominant species in this world, but that was only after they developed the various tools that granted them control over other creatures.

In the past, humans were just another part of the food chain, and they lived in fear of their predators, such as tigers, mammoths, and other wild beasts. They actively avoided entering the territories of these wild beasts and instead waged war against each other over what limited land was available.

Humans were in no way physically developed. Instead, their brains were far more developed than any other animal, and this allowed them to learn how to use tools that soon allowed them to dominate Earth.

Based on these facts, Han-Yeol did not think that the new golems designed after humans were that efficient. He considered designing them to walk on all fours like most mammals, but then they would be ineffective as manual laborers.

In the end, he cup with a brilliant idea to use Tia as the model and design the golems like the Arachnids.

“Then treataccordingly if you know!”

“F-Forget about it!” Han-Yeol flinched and covered his body with his arms.

“Oh my~ You’re so cute, master~”

Unfortunately, he had no idea that doing so would only excite Tia even more. The silver lining for him was that Tia had already satisfied her desires a while ago, so she did not go wild.

“Alright, shall we get to work?”

Tia cracked her knuckles and started sculpting the lava with her hands as if she was playing with clay.

Han-Yeol could have joined her too, but he decided to leave it to her. The Arachnids were blessed with craftsmanship that even the goddess Athena envied, and he knew that he would only get embarrassed if he attempted to create something.

Most people would experience making something with clay in primary school, but that was the tin Han-Yeol’s life when he was the poorest. He vaguely remembered being so poor that he did not tell his father and took bits from his friends instead.

He could call it just his memories now, but life was really hard back then. He remembered how embarrassed and humiliated he felt whenever he did not have enough money to do what others did.

He distinctly remembered one girl, who was the class president, during his primary school days. She was from a rich family, and she would bring this expensive clay set to class. He tried asking her for a bit, but she rejected his request, saying that her clay was expensive, so it would not mix well with the cheap ones used by the other kids.

Han-Yeol remembered grabbing her hair after hearing her condescending tone, and a fight broke out between them.

Han-Yeol reminisced for two hours until Tia was done.

“All done!”

“What? Already?”

“Wow…” Han-Yeol muttered in amazement after seeing her work. Then, his eyes shot wide open as he exclaimed, “It’s awesome!”

“Yeah! It’s so awesome!”

“Thank you, master~”

His eyes sparkled as he inspected Tia’s sculptures. This sculpture was on a completely different level from the statue of the goddess she had previously made.

Well, the statue of the goddess was indeed an amazing work of art, but Han-Yeol was not a fan of statues of gods and goddesses.

However, the sculpture Tia made this time, which had armor for its upper body while its lower body was that of a spider, completely captivated Han-Yeol.

“Oh!” Han-Yeol exclaimed while inspecting every nook and cranny of the sculpture, which was 99.9% complete.

The sculpture was not that big, as he did not plan to deploy it for combat anyway. Still, they stood at more than one hundred ninety centimeters due to their long spider legs, and they looked quite imposing in their own way.

Their weapons had still yet to be sculpted, but they would definitely look cool if they held an axe, shield, or lance.

Han-Yeol intended to use them as manual laborers, but Tia’s excellent craftsmanship made them look as if they were an elite army that unified the continent, judging by their armor which resembled ones crafted by dwarfs in mythology.

“Wow! This armor design makes them look like a powerful empire’s elite knights!”

Of course, she used herself as the model for the lower body of the golems.

The laughter might have sounded like Tia’s, but it was actually Han-Yeol’s.

“It’s now tto replace the skill!”

“Oh, that sounds a bit sad…”

“Instead, I’m going to use this more than I did for the old one!”

“Then it’s going to be an honor, master.”

[You have satisfied the requirements to change your Summon Lava Golem skill.]

[You may not summon both Lava Golems.]

[Please choose between the two.]

[Retain or Overwrite]

“I’m definitely overwriting it!”

[The details of the skill have changed—Lava Golem.]

A magic circle appeared in mid-air as soon as Han-Yeol overwrote the skill. The statue of the goddess emerged from the magic circle and shrieked in agony, but something dragged it back into the magic circle.

“Finally!” Han-Yeol trembled and exclaimed after reading the messages that popped up in front of his eyes.

The skill turned out just the way he wanted it to, and he could not have asked for more than this.

He already had the Black Orc Horde, but they existed in this world, so he could not summon them whenever and wherever he needed them.

However, that was not the case for his new Lava Golems, as he could summon them whenever and wherever he wanted, and he could even summon an army of them once he leveled up Summon Lava Golem to a certain extent.

“Let’s go! Arise, my golem army! Summon Lava Golem!”

There was no reason to delay using the skill. Han-Yeol struck while the iron was hot and immediately summoned the newly designed Lava Golems.

Then, a two-meter-wide magic circle appeared on the ground, and the Lava Golems Tia had carefully sculpted started to emerge from the ground, boiling with lava.