In a moment, he moved up and around the spiders rapidly, his blade striking all over its body in a frenzy.
While he wasn’t as fast as lightning, he was undoubtedly incredibly fast.
5 seconds
That’s how long it took him to completely map out the body of the spider with his blade, and from that, he made his deductions.
’Just like Aubrey said, the underside and predicel are two weak points. The issue is that its body is too thick for my sword to cut through with my current output. I could use Ice Breaker again, but that will take too long to pull off. The best I can do is create an opening–"
SPLASH
Suddenly, a thick green liquid shot at Xabder from an angle. Thankfully, one of the ice disks that had followed him blocked most of it and he avoided the rest, but his eyes narrowed as he saw the disk start to sizzle and melt.
’Acid, figures.’ He clicked his tongue as he began his retreat.
Several more globs of acid spewed from the spider’s mouth, and it used mana to control them to fly towards Xander. Luckily, they were easy enough to blow away using some wind.
Xander soon returned to the group and relayed his findings.
At this point, people from other squads were starting to reach the spider, and ranged attacks began to smash into it from different sides, making it screech in anger.
Seeing this, Aubrey frowned.
"It’s doing something again, but I’m not sure what. Be careful." Seeing this, the squad immediately went on guard, and sure enough.
The spider lifted its rump, but instead of releasing more children, a massive web of silk erupted and spread out like a massive net.
Naturally, it wouldn’t be able to move that way, normally, so it was clear that magic was once more at play here.
’Spider webs are sticky, so slicing through them with my blade alone won’t be wise.’ With that thought, he used a skill.
Solar-Edge
Not thrust, just solar edge.
The edge of his blade immediately turned turned red hot, and at the same time, Aubrey was instructing Curtis on what type of spell he should cast while Falael was watching warily.
Soon, the webs fell over the field like a net, and some students were able to cast defensive spells and protect themselves. Those who weren’t, though, were covered in the webs, and Xander watched in slight horror as he sensed their mana getting drained forcefully.
Then he watched the leg he’d blown off, as well as the several shallow cuts he’d inflicted with his onslaught previously, start to heal at an absurd speed.
That said, none of the webs actually landed on their squad. Curtis managed to block some and Xander cut away the rest, leaving them unscathed, but Curtis winced.
"I can’t keep up this many constructs." He admitted. To avoid going over the output threshold, he compensated defensively by casting many smaller defensive spells. However, they still caused a strain on his mental energy to keep active at once.
’Tch, fair enough.’ Xander was about to tell Curtis to cancel some of the spells when Aubrey suddenly exclaimed.
"Look out!"
The spider that had now healed most of its wounds suddenly moved.
Its legs raised, and then like a toddler throwing a tantrum, they utterly shredded the ground beneath and around it. And as Xander’s squad was the closest to the spider, they unsurprisingly bore the brunt of such an attack.
Dust flew everywhere, and the few remaining students watched as dust was thrown everywhere from the violent attack.
"Damn, they were right next to that."
"Are they okay?"
"Does it matter? Let’s take advantage of the situation while they are stunned!"
As some voiced out their sentiments, the dust cleared, and Alya, who had been watching silently, smiled faintly.
’Oh? Perhaps he wasn’t lying about being a defensive mage.’
Where the squad had been, a dome of ice had formed. However, it wasn’t a single construct and was instead made up of smaller ice constructs.
Its surface was cracked all over, but it had withstood the attack.
Slowly, the parts peeled away and revealed the group.
"Ugh!" Curtis fell to a knee, his teeth gritted as a powerful electric current ran through his body painfully.
He managed to block the attack, but he’d had to increase his mana output to maintain the integrity of the barrier, leading to him crossing the threshold and activating the mechanism.
"Beautiful job, Curtis." Xander exhaled as he glanced at the spider coldly.
The creature glared at them in turn, its limbs clicking as it reared for another attack.
"Three slams from the left followed by a perpendicular strike from the right, an overhead stab downwards..." Aubrey, who seemed slightly dazed, just started mumbling subconsciously, but every word was clear, and Xander took note of each one.
He stepped forward, sword raised.
The spider attacked again, but this time, the result was wildly different.
Using Aubrey’s words, he managed to perfectly evade every attack the spider threw out, not even relying on his movement skills, and in a moment, he had positioned himself right beneath it.
He aimed his sword upwards and thrusted.
Solar-Edge Thrust.
A thin beam of raw heat slammed into its underside dead center, and the spider screeched as the attack burrowed into its abdomen.
Its eyes filled with rage, and it seemed ready to go berserk. However...
While it had been distracted by Xander, another person had calmly walked underneath it and aimed their wand at the spot Xander had breached.
"... Starlight Magic:..." Falael closed one eye as they precisely aimed their wand at the opening.
’Just saying. I think it’s cool.’ The memory of Xander’s compliment entered their mind, and their lip curled.
"... Star Burst."
A tiny with sphere condensed at the tip of their wand and shot upward like a bullet. It borrowed into the opening, and for a moment, nothing happened.
Then...
SHINE
Light burst through every opening of the spider’s body, and its midsection swelled obscenely before exploding violently, spilling chunks and green blood everywhere.
Xander quickly coated his body in mana to avoid getting ’showered’, and he glanced at Falael who also looked at him.
No words were exchanged. Then, Falael fell face first to the dirt, and Xander exhaled before mumbling.
"Subjugation complete."