Lyrian continued running around as the spiders chased him in circles. 'Their only weakness is their low health since it's so easy to kill them, but the main problem is their speed.' He said to himself as multiple nets of web shot at him.
He dashed to the side, just barely dodging the webs as a little bit of one hit his arm. On contact, the arm shot back and stuck to the shoulder. As he ran, he quickly tore off the web and freed his arm.
Thinking about how to counter the main problem of the spiders which was their speed, Lyrian came to a sudden realization, 'These webs... they are meant to slow down the enemy. That's exactly what I need right now.' He paused, dodging a few more coiled balls of the web.
'If that's what I need, then why not use their own power to my advantage?' As he thought this, a slight grin appeared on his face.
Follow on NovᴇlEnglish.nᴇtTo execute the new plan he thought up in his head, he decided to suddenly stop running, and instead quickly dash in front of the spider closest to him.
The spider also stopped abruptly, not expecting Lyrian to do this. In the next second it turned backward and aimed its rear toward Lyrian, preparing to shoot a web.
Seeing this, Lyrian quickly dashed away again, not wanting to deal with a bunch of spiders. That would be the case if he stayed there too long, as the spiders would quickly catch up and overwhelm him.
'So their first reaction after I come up to them will most likely be a web throw huh?' He thought to himself, stopping his circular running pattern as he began running in a straight line.
Soon enough, the spiders also formed a line, chasing after Lyrian. Since they weren't running in circles anymore, the bunch of spiders quickly thinned out, creating more space between each other.
'Perfect.' Lyrian said as he stopped running. He quickly dashed back to the spider that was second in line. He had to do this quick, or the spider at the front would turn around and web him, or the other spiders could catch it as well. It was a risky play.
Still, he stood there for a few split seconds, making the spider roll back and shoot its web. Right before the web was released, the spider behind Lyrian lunged to bite him as well, but he quickly ducked under, causing the ball of the web to hit the lunging spider as Lyrian jumped to the side of the group of spiders.
Now that it was webbed, Lyrian threw out his hand, facing his palm towards the spider as he summoned fire. The struggling spider was quickly burnt to a crisp as the others backed off and dodged the attack.
Seeing this, a smile formed on Lyrian's face. Without wasting any time, he continued to do this several more times as if it had turned into a simple game.
The dwarf observed this from inside, before turning around and going back to his work, 'Brats not bad... maybe I'll test him out.' He thought to himself.
After a few minutes, the number of spiders had reduced to 5. At this point, Lyrian stopped his web strategy. 'Enhance.' He said to himself, powering up his body.
In the next moment, he quickly dashed towards each spider, slamming his fist into them as they burst into blood and guts without much worry of being caught off guard. He knew that 5 spiders weren't something to worry too much about.
Follow on Novᴇl-Onlinᴇ.cᴏmStill, he had to be extremely quick and precise about his attacks, or else he would be easily webbed and taken down. After 10 minutes, the find ended and Lyrian looted the corpses for the cores.
Going back up to the hut, he thought to himself, 'I wonder how many time's I'm going to have to fight them off. Inside the cave, there were probably over a thousand spiders if I had to guess... this smith better open the already, Im practically his personal bodyguard at this point.' He was slightly annoyed, but it wasn't enough to deter him from his goal.
After getting back up, he knocked on the door again and asked to be let in, only for another no response. He was slightly more irritated, but without anything else to do, he spent the day training his sword and cultivating with Gale.
The blacksmith dwarf took note of all of this, but still didn't open the door, 'He has potential in power, but still, he is only a kid. I know many powerful wizards who would fail in comparison to some weak low-status soldiers. What matters is not one's power, but one's will to win.'
The next day, the 18th of the exam, Lyrian fought off another wave of spiders. 15 this time, making it much more difficult than the first encounter. Still, he was able to defeat them using his web strategy. Although, he imagined he probably couldn't take on a squad of 25 or so, since his mana would run out even with Syan's Mana Ring.
As far as he knew, there looked to be two ways that his mana worked. One way was the way that let him cultivate and break through into higher ranks. Currently, he was in the high 20s where 200 was the max to rank up.
However, this didn't mean that he could simply use 28 mana. Instead, it meant that he could use 28 extra mana from the 100 of his previous rank. The 100 of his previous rank was a fixed amount of mana that he cultivated and entered into his core, just like the 28 mana that was currently in his core, so they both acted in the same way.
The 100 mana didn't show itself, however, as he had already ascended to a higher rank where the 100 mana didn't help him break through during cultivation.