Chapter 776: Revelations are funnier
In the past, travelling from Emerald Eye City to Stone Claw City take anywhere between four days to a week, depending on the weather, the terrain or if any known antagonistic forces were active in the region.
One would think that reports and rumors of bandits and infamous criminals being ripped to shreds by a pair of mysterious insect-like warrior women would deter such forces from acting up, but one would be quite surprised.
It wasn’t until a proper road was built that, not only did the amount of dangerous encounters decreased, but the travel time was cut in half. Strangely enough though, a lot of people who took this road started complaining that despite being an objectively shorter route, they couldn’t help but feel it was longer than anticipated.
Which lead to a lot of conversations like this one.
…
“Are we there yet?,” Zhen Guo asked for the sixth time in two hours. “Normally I’d complain less about this sort of thing, but I’ve been noticing these sign markers for the distance till Stone Claw and I swear I saw one saying that we were only a mile or so away. The anticipation is doing terrible things to my skin’s complexion, not to mention staying up this late.”
At this point in time, the Zhen Clan’s homebound caravan was still driving down the road at the tender hours of the early morning, early enough that the sun hadn’t fully risen yet.
As such, the Zhen Clan thought it prudent to do rotating shifts of spotters and drivers while everyone else could sleep. The lucky two chosen at this time was Zhen Yue and Zhen Guo.
“I think were almost there, Xiao Guo,” Zhen Yue replied while channeling a bit of aether into her eyes and tapping into the totem of the Owl. “I think I can see our estate from this distance…”
“Hell yeah! It’s been a way too long since I got to sleep in my own bed. That and I’m almost out of moisturizer. Especially after the sun-burning incident back on the-”
“…and what appears to be giant spider type aether beasts being used to construct what appears to be an expansion of it.”
“c…wait a minute, what the fuck did you just say was happening?”
“Take a look for yourself.”
Now believing a word out of his cousin’s mouth, Zhen Guo began to channel aether into eyes and gazed into the direction she was looking into earlier.
Unsurprisingly, Zhen Guo went real quiet and turned a lot more pale when he saw that there were about a half-dozen giant spider type aether beasts constructing something on their family’s estate.
“Who the hell dares to…wait a minute, what the fuck?”
However, Zhen Guo’s fear and mild anger quickly turned to confusion as he noticed that there were humans directing those giant spiders, and that both species were wearing the emblem of the Zhen Clan somewhere on their respective bodies.
“Wait…what the fuck, we have a flying insect division now, too?”
“Apparently, we do.”
As Zhen Guo and Zhen Yue kept watching the spider rider construction going on, eventually, another member of their clan showed up while on the back of giant lacewing, carrying all sorts of construction materials and supplies.
What this meant exactly was unknown, but the two Zhen Clan scions could at least guess.
“Did…did the elders that got left behind, organize entirely new divisions of beast riders? Because I don’t recall any familial forces of ours that made use of giant spiders or giant lacewings.
“Neither do I,” Zhen Yue answered honestly. “But I think I have an idea as to how this happened. Remember how weirdly insistent grandfather’s new secretary was about the quality of spider silk above all other fabrics? And how her companion had this lacewing motif going on?”
“That’s…a bit of a stretch, don’t you think?”
“Only lead I got.”
“Huh…”
Incidently, Zhen Yue managed to figure it out with a single guess, as Miss Aranea was involved with the new giant spiders roaming about while Miss Lucille was responsible for the giant lacewings buzzing about.
As to how they managed to pull this off, well…
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‘Okay, it’s a good thing y’all warned me about all of these changes ahead of time, otherwise, I’d be significantly more shocked…and probably complaining more about the giant spiders and insects, how the hell did you pull that off?’
[Oh, it’s quite simple really. I went over to Insect Hell and stole a variety of eggs from the various spider nests that lined the jungle valley’s walls,] Arachnidame answered in a matter-of-fact tone. [For good measure though, and knowing that it would take forever for these eggs to grow from adorable hatchlings to full blown members of society, I made sure to pacify a couple adult spiders into coming with me. You’d be surprised how obedient the average giant spider becomes when you punch them in just the right spot.]
‘I…that makes a little to much sense. What about you Lacerage?
[Similar story to the control freak here. I went into Insect Hell, grabbed some eggs and vamoosed. The only difference is that I couldn’t bring back any full grown specimen due to all the fucking webs. Otherwise, you’d be complaining about all the buzzing and not all the skittering,] Lacerage answered in a weirdly proud tone that stumped Zhen Liu.
Thankfully for him, Arachnidame decided to help move the conversation along for them.
[But now that you’re here, young master, the dainty bitch with a sharp tongue and I would like to give you a warm welcome back.]
[Hey! Who you calling dainty, you eight-eyed bitch?]
[Oh, so you were fine with just being called a bitch?]
[Bitch, imma about to cut you.]
[Would like to see you try.]
[I-]
‘Alright! Enough with the…arguing/flirting or whatever it is you toe have got going on,’ Zhen Liu interjected since he didn’t want to deal with arguments in his brain first thing in the morning. ‘Should the family and I be expecting you guys to come and grab us or…’
[Oh yes, please stand by the area where you and the rest of the clan have entered into Stone Claw. “Lucille” and I will be there shortly to give you and the others a tour of what has changed and what babe features were added to the estate.]
‘Cool-wait…features?’
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“And we’re -holy shit.”
“This is…different.”
“Is it just me, or is there a lot more people than usual?”
“That’s what you notice? Not the sudden surge of buildings and building quality?”
“Are we seriously just ignoring the GIANT SPIDERS AND LACEWINGS?!”
“Maybe.”
People often say that everything can change in the blink of an eye, but a lot of people have trouble comprehending that familiar places and things also have a tendency to change too.
Especially when those aforementioned changes occurred over the span of about two, maybe three months, it’s been awhile since any of the Zhen Clan members stared at a calendar.
The last time they were in Stone Claw City, it was more or less a frontier town with a couple of medium sized buildings that were made of stone, while the rest were small wooden buildings. As for the population it was somewhere in the high quadruple digits or low quintuple digits, with a minority portion of the population owning aether beasts.
For reasons beyond their comprehension though, but could probably be pinned on a certain, scarily competent secretary, that had all changed.
Many of the wooden structures for replaced with buildings made of stone, while the aforementioned medium sized buildings made of stone were upgraded to being large sized buildings made of stone.
As for the population, while the Zhen Clan weren’t able to get proper headcount for the city populace, they did notice that there was an uptick of tamed aether beasts roaming about.
“Alright, that’s enough for the day. Call up the lift.”
“Thresher?”
“Skriii!”
Off to the side of where the Zhen Clan caravan made their entrance, they could see a crew of miners from the Diggers Union, making use of what appeared to be a Steel-shelled Tarantula to operate a lift. Alongside the returning miners though were Treasure Sniffing Hounds and Bronze-Clawed Badgers, both of which were aether beasts that the Zhen Clan would regularly train and rent out to independent prospectors. The fact that the Diggers were using them now though was a sign that something had drastically changed in their relationship.
Luckily for them, they wouldn’t have to remain in the dark for too long, as the sources for all these changes soon made an appearance.
In a rather grandiose fashion.
“Huh? What’s that sound?”
“It sounds like…giant boulders scraping against each other? Are we next to another Digger Union tunnel or-”
“INCOMING!”
“WHOA! THAT SPIDER IS AS BIG AS TINY!”
“Wait…why am I not feeling any killing intent?”
Barreling towards the Zhen Clan with a surprising amount speed for it’s size, was a massive tarantula covered in a stone-like shell. From the way the people that we’re barely reacting to the giant spider’s presence and the sheer lack of killing intent, was a clear indicator that this was a normal state of affairs.
“Wait a minute, is that…”
“Our family emblem? Why is it…”
“Hey, it’s slowing down.”
When the giant stone tarantula eventually came to a stop, the Zhen Clan could clearly see their family emblem emblazoned on the shell.
They were rather confused as to why this was the case…until they heard a familiar voice.
“Welcome back, Patriarch Zhen Shi and esteemed elders and scions,” Miss Aranea said from atop the giant stone tarantula. “Would you like to return to the estate now or eat something first? It is breakfast time.”
Needless to say…everyone was rather stumped at this nonchalance.
