Chapter 112: Kayn's sacrifice

Fortunately, Kayn and the others were able to get inside the tunnel right on time before the countless spiders cover the path they'd just created with great effort. And exactly the moment all of them got inside, the path was instantly covered with the crawling spiders relentlessly trying to hunt them down.

Because of that, as soon as they got inside the tunnel, they didn't bother stopping for even a single second to try and catch their breath. Instead, they sprinted even faster.

Similarly, the spiders outside the tunnel started pouring inside to chase after them. However, because of the size of the tunnel, it was only the Ordinary Spiders and Green Stripe Spiders that were able to get inside.

Nevertheless, they still have to remain cautious because of their numerical advantage. Even if they kill ten of them, there would still be countless more to fill in their spot automatically.

As they kept on running, they eventually came to crossroads with dozens of tunnels connecting to one another.

Friedrich already informed Kayn about this before.

"Just follow the path that leads upward!" Friedrich reminded Kayn once again.

Making a quick scan of the paths, Kayn soon spotted a path that leads upward.

"Over there!" Kayn pointed out as he runs in that direction with the others closely following them.

As they continued to follow the second tunnel, they once again faced another crossroad.

Just like the last time, Kayn simply made a quick scan of all the tunnels, and not long after he found the tunnel that lead upward.

Once more, they repeated the same set of actions that they did the first time.

Follow the tunnel.

Encountering a crossroad.

Pick a tunnel that leads upward.

Repeating it over and over again.

None of them knew exactly where they are right now nor whether they are even close to the surface or not.

All that they are completely aware of is that they are no longer in the same depth level as the second floor of the Hanging Vines Cave.

All of a sudden..

"Wait for a bit," Kimberly suddenly decided to stop running and turned around as soon as they entered another tunnel.

Gathering mana in her hand, she soon fired a fireball at the entrance of the tunnel.

Whoosh!

"No!" Friedrich tried to stop Kimberly, but it was already too late.

Boom!

Bang!

Bang!

Bang!

The entrance to the tunnel was immediately blocked by the pieces of rocks that separated from the wall around it.

"You shouldn't have done that!" Friedrich scolded Kimberly.

"Why?" By doing that, the spiders would no longer be able to follow after them.

"A lot of these tunnels actually connect to one another somewhere along the way. So, even if you blocked the tunnel we chose, they would simply look for other tunnels to get to us,"

"All this time, the spiders were simply following us using the same path we have taken. But because of what you did, they would now start using the other tunnels,"

"Some of those tunnels would be longer than ours, while others are going to be shorter, which implies they could wait in the next crossroad until we come out from ours or that they would just get inside our tunnel on the other side,"

Meaning, Kimberly unknowingly made their situation really bad just when it was already turning out for the better for them.

"I didn't know," Kimberly lowered her head as she felt apologetic. All she was thinking just now was how to help them, never did she expected that it would turn out like this.

"In situations like this, never do something without asking your comrades for opinions," Friedrich reminded everyone else. "I don't want to see someone else do the same mistake again, do you all understand?"

"Yes!" Cedrick and the others nodded their heads.

On the other side, Kayn could only heave a sigh of regret. He absolutely can't blame Friedrich for reacting that way, but he also can't blame Kimberly since what she did was just an accident. Even he doesn't know that because Friedrich failed to inform them about that earlier.

Needless to say, he still can't blame Friedrich because there's practically no time to bother explaining as they have to focus all of their attention on running away and escaping this place as soon as possible.

"Let's not waste more time and let's go!" Kayn interrupted their conversation.

Kayn and the others continued running away. Unlike the last time though, they are preparing their weapons, especially Friedrich and Roshan who are both in front, in case a spider would suddenly jump at their party.

As they continued running, they stumbled on another crossroad.

Kayn surveyed the nearby tunnels to try and find the tunnel that leads upwards. However, he was quickly interrupted when a few spiders jumped out from the tunnel above their heads.

Shield Bash!

Roshan immediately sent them back to where they came from.

In hopes of redeeming her previous mistake, Kimberly blocked the tunnel above them this time by using vines. By doing so, the spiders won't try to look for another tunnel as they can still destroy the vines. Simply put, the vines simply serve as a way to buy some time for Kayn to find the next tunnel.

"There!" Kayn pointed while running into the next tunnel.

Following the path, they soon noticed some traces of grass on their feet.

"This is a good sign. It means that we are finally close to the surface!" Friedrich finally sees some hope of getting out.

Looking above them, some roots from the trees above could also be seen. At least just a small portion of the root. Despite that, it was more than enough to increase the low morale of everyone.

"Just a bit more," Kayn muttered.

Another crossroad.

However, this time, all paths were unexpectedly leading upwards.

"What I feared the most has finally happened," Kayn expressed his thoughts. He was already thinking of such a possibility along the way.

Previously, as he was picking what tunnel they would go through next, he already noticed that there are some tunnels that seem to be slightly leading upwards.

If he didn't have such good eyesight, he wouldn't have noticed that there were just some parts of the ground that strangely bulged or that there was a hole a few meters ahead.

Also, Natas was quick enough to approach those tunnels and inform him that they are not good.

More importantly, he is also familiar with the structure of tunnels, caves, and related environments after going through them countless times.

It was only through those three methods that he was able to lead everyone safely.

Because of the situation in front, Kayn and the others have no other choice but to temporarily stop.

Kimberly quickly started closing the tunnels that lead downwards with vines so that she can buy more time for the party to analyze the tunnels in the front and find the correct one.

Roshan also volunteers to protect their rear as he is aware that he can't do anything to help. He is actually good with a lot of things, it's just that analyzing the tunnels is not one of his areas of expertise.

Bang!

Bang!

Bang!

Not long after, the spiders finally started coming from the tunnels.

"I can't promise that I would be able to hold them for a very long time," Kimberly reminded them as she uses her mana to regenerate the vines.

Roshan quickly positioned himself behind Kimberly so that he can pull her to safety once things turn bad for them.

"Let me help you guys instead!" Gilbert finally decided to switch to helping Kimberly and Roshan instead as he conceded in trying to find which tunnel is the right one.

As more time go by, the harder it became for Kimberly to hold down the spiders.

Fortunately for them, the tunnel wasn't big, thus it only allowed a few of the spiders to attack the vines.

Regardless though, they can't stay and wait here for a very long time.

"My mana is close to running out!" Kimberly exclaimed.

"Just a bit more!" Friedrich asked for some time.

"How about that?" Cedrick pointed to a certain tunnel.

"No, there's plenty of small holes, leading me to think that the ground would collapse and bring us down again," Kayn shook his head.

"That tunnel seems quite good!" Friedrich pointed towards a tunnel.

"No, that's a dead end!" Kayn could roughly guess since the slope's vertical angle seems to be tilting to the roof instead of forward.

"Forget it, all of you go there!" Kayn pointed to one of the few tunnels he is believes to be the correct path to the surface.

Hearing Kayn's words, Roshan immediately pulled Kimberly and Gilbert as he then rushes to the tunnel.

"Go, go, go!"

Because Kimberly was no longer applying mana to the vines to reconstruct them, it didn't take long for the spiders to finally destroy and get through them.

"Gooo!" Kayn pushes Friedrich to the tunnel as he quickly notices that the latter seems to be thinking of buying some time for them to escape.

As soon as Friedrich was pushed into the tunnel, the entire space suddenly started rumbling as if an earthquake is taking place.

The source of the rumble seems from deep underground and it was also clearly not an earthquake or something similar to that.

Boom!

In the next moment, the ground got blasted open as a huge head of a Green Stripe Broodmother broke through and created a hole.

Fortunately, Kayn reacted on time to narrowly avoid the bite of the Green Stripe Broodmother. However, the direction he jumped toward was to the opposite side of the tunnel where Friedrich and the others are. What was even worst was that the tunnel close to him was leading downward.

"Kayn!" Gilbert called out.

"Go!" Kayn gestured his hand to leave him.

"No way!" Friedrich was instantly against the idea.

"Just go and don't worry about me!" He can take care of himself.

"There's no way we'd do that!"

"We'll try to get to you!"historical

"Just wait over there!"

Because of the loud voices of Friedrich and the others, the Green Stripe Broodmother turned in their direction.

Seeing this, Kayn didn't hesitate to throw a Molten Ice Slash at the Green Stripe Broodmother in order to get her attention.

It was effective as the Green Stripe Broodmother turns her head to look at Kayn.

"Leave and ask for help from Old Chief George to rescue me!"

This time, Kayn no longer stayed as he stood up and ran away to the tunnel close to him.