The Spider Queen

(Hydra Star System- Planet Eleron)

(Training Field No.12- Special Arena)

There was complete silence in the arena as the surviving students froze in place after just witnessing such a brutal death.

Sophie's words of advice were still ringing in their ears and despite every instinct in their bodies screaming at them to flee…

The students remained in place.

Minutes slowly passed as not one student dared to take a single step.

Even Sophie herself remained motionless as she crouched down in a defensive posture.

Blackie's left head whined softly but was immediately shushed by the middle head that gently headbutted him.

The holographic screen floating above the arena kept displaying the remaining time for the second stage that was gradually ticking down.

"I think it might be safe now…" one of the Mendolesa boys in the distance called out nervously.

He did not have any points and after no movement from the worm-like monster, he assumed that everything was okay.

Only Sophie would have gotten some points from her actions to wipe out the shadow figures' village but everyone else was on zero.

The Mendolesa boy walked forward a few steps and the ground beneath him trembled.

A look of complete shock flashed across his face as an enormous maw rose up from the sand and swallowed him whole.

"What? The monster did not leave?" someone exclaimed in shock.

"How can we get out of here?" another cried out helplessly.

"Fuck! I knew I shouldn't have followed the hybrid girl!" someone else complained angrily.

Sophie leaked out a trace of her killing intent and the girl who was about to complain even further felt a cold chill run down her spine.

"What are we going to do?" Luna asked softly as she stared at the countdown on the floating holographic screen.

"Let me think for a moment," Sophie replied as she closed her eyes and thought about the situation carefully.

The worm-like creature was an ambush predator. It lurked beneath the sands and would strike anything that moved.

Its weakness was its lack of eyes but clearly it could detect movement above the sand probably due to either ground tremors or psychic means.

Sophie was currently leaning towards it possessing an ability to sense ground tremors since it would have attacked them already if it had psychic powers.

There were two options in front of them.

The first was to either flee which could be done using techniques that enabled flight or teleportation.

The second and far more risker option was to fight the monster. Clearly a beast that size and dangerous would be worth a lot of points.

"Luna… do you want to try to hunt it or just run?" Sophie softly asked her friend.

"Hmm… I think we can give it a try," Luna replied after a bit of consideration.

Sophie nodded and quickly glanced at the remaining students to count the number of people left.

There were about ten other students nearby and about five in the distance. The hybrid girl cupped her hands around her mouth and shouted at them.

"We are going to try to hunt the monster. If anyone wants to join then say what your cultivation specialty is," Sophie yelled loudly.

"If you don't want to join the hunt then the beast is tracking us using ground tremors… all you have to do is not come in contact with the sand."

"Use movement or flying techniques."

Sophie recognised a few faces from the elite class, so this was a good opportunity to earn some goodwill from her classmates.

It wasn't hard to figure out the beast's weakness so this advice was nothing that they would not eventually discover.

Several students began floating in the air using a variety of peculiar techniques after hearing Sophie's suggestion.

Wings sprouted out from behind someone's back while another student simply rose into the air and stepped onto what appeared to be invisible steps.

There was even a student who crouched down before levitating upwards.

"I'm a sword cultivator," a brave girl with a whip-like blade suddenly shouted.

Clearly some students recognised the value of joining Sophie's team since it was becoming apparent that the desert biome was an extremely dangerous place.

Unlike the Tundra biome, teamwork was almost a forced necessity due to the dangerous nature of the monsters lurking beneath the sands.

"I can use needle techniques…"

"Explosions… I packed around five tier one bombs…"

"Err… I can manipulate water particles…"

"My combat pet can burrow into flesh…."

Sophie listened carefully and mentally noted the more impressive abilities among the students who volunteered.

Most of the stronger students were from the elite class but there were a couple from the ordinary class that surprised her.

Especially the young Quafes boy whose combat beast pet was a tiny leech that was attached to his forehead.

"Okay…. I can use my clone technique to distract the monster… does anyone have any plans to take it down?" Sophie asked curiously.

"What if one of your clones carries my bombs so when the beast swallows her… I simply activate the trigger," a student suggested.

"The monster is over sixty feet tall… will your explosions really cause enough internal damage to harm it?" someone retorted.

"Hmm… that is an interesting suggestion… I can also have my clones hold vials of poison but I'm not sure how effective toxins will be on such a large animal," Sophie freely admitted.

Still, it didn't hurt to try.

"Does anyone have any other suggestions?" Sophie asked politely.

The girl with the whip-like blade raised up her hand as if she was standing in a classroom. Sophie stifled her urge to laugh and pointed at her.

"When the worm lunges upwards from the ground for a brief moment it is exposed… I don't think its natural defenses are very good," the girl explained her deduction.

"Why don't we use long range attacks to hopefully injure it severely."

Sophie nodded in approval at her suggestion and then asked a few more times to get everyone's thoughts.

Unconsciously she was beginning to emit the aura of a natural born leader and the students were slowly getting used to her commands.

It was a combination of both her impressive strength and the noble aura that surrounded Sophie's body.

After finally deciding on a two-pronged attack, Sophie pulled a few vials out of her storage ring and downed their contents into her mouth.

She could feel a burning sensation in her stomach as the deadly poisons began to circulate through her body.

The poisons gradually arrived at her venom glands where they were transformed into truly horrific biological weapons.

Sophie's fangs slowly lengthened, and a greenish liquid began to drip from her hollow teeth.

The hybrid girl's golden eyes darkened as she prepared for the upcoming fight.