365 Days of Starshipping (Part 2)

Spider Cave

10/14/19

On one hand, the goal of the spider quest ended up simply being a quest to place an item (a magical bomb, in this case) in the back of a cave - no boss monster, no duels, nothing seemingly in the way.

On the other hand, the cave walls were literally swarming with spiders.

"Well... if I didn't understand the quest name before, I definitely do now," Judai sighed, glancing over at Yusei worriedly, "Are you... actually gonna be okay? Because even I'm a little squicked out right now."

"Who says 'squicked'...?" Yusei snorted quietly, though the slight wince never disappeared from face as he simply stared at the sight in front of them, "I think I can do it? It's... not real."

"It's not real," Judai reassured him, biting his lip as he looked back at the cave again in thought - luckily he could do that here and not get berated for it because he wasn't actually biting his lip, "Well, I guess we just try. It's not a very big cave based off the map, so it shouldn't take long to get to the back."

"Y-Yeah," Yusei agreed hesitantly, frown smoothing out ever-so-slightly as he finally managed to tear his eyes away to look at Judai instead, "It won't take long at all."

"That's right."

"And we get to blow it up afterwards and set all the spiders on fire."

"Exactly."

Even with the little bit of encouragement and reassurance, they still were both standing in the same exact place a minute later. Judai didn't want to start moving until Yusei did, but he was starting to think that he may just have to take the lead in the end or they'd never get anywhere.

Before he could start to say anything though, Yusei spoke up again, asking, "Could you just ah... well, you remember what you did way back when, when we first went to the reactor?"

It took him a couple moments to try and figure out what he was trying to say, but then Judai remembered how he'd held him really close to him in order to make sure his energy spread out over both of them (and admittedly in part to just hold him close, he wasn't going to deny that part at all). It wasn't going to work quite as well considering the heat element wasn't quite there - the 'warmth' emitted from player characters wasn't very accurate so it was more just having that knowing feeling that you were in contact with someone, so it wouldn't be as comforting a gesture, but he could think of another way to make it work.

"I remember, but I've got a better idea now that you mention it," Judai replied, pulling him closer so he could let go of his hand in favor of wrapping Yusei's arms around his shoulders so he was getting hugged from behind, looking up and back at him with a smile, "Walk with me, it should be easier than it actually would be if we were doing this in real life thanks to how the collision is. Just bury your head down, okay?"

"I- okay," Yusei blinked, looking a little surprised but taking the opportunity anyway to dig his face down into the crook of his neck. If it'd been real life, Judai would've probably been too flustered to focus on walking because it was just the right spot where he was ticklish while being warm and distracting, but thankfully it was VR so he didn't have that issue at all.

"...I'm ready."

"Alright, let's go!"

Two steps into the cave and Judai was extremely glad he wasn't that squeamish when it came to these things because he could imagine just how awful it would be to try and walk through the cave while it seemed like the walls were moving in waves - that's how many spiders there were crawling around, and he thanked the gods above that they were apparently only on the walls and that none were going onto the ceiling or ground at all. It made it significantly easier to keep distracting Yusei with some small talk about what to make for dinner that night and how the costumes were pretty much ready to go for the tournament because he didn't have to worry about any of them dropping onto them from above; Yusei just kept his head down and eyes closed the whole time, matching his steps so perfectly that Judai knew he had to have been putting all his focus into him and his walking so he didn't think about their surroundings.

It only took three full minutes of walking and turns to finally reach the end, where it was pretty clear they were supposed to set up the magic bomb in section of the wall that was completely free of spiders. Judai ended up just guiding Yusei's hand where it needed to go to complete this part of the quest since he didn't want to risk anything when they still had to make their way back out of the cave, then he did the exact same thing as before to distract him as they walked outside again.

"We're out, by the way," Judai hummed, stopping a substantial distance away from the cave, "It's safe to look Yus." He felt arms unwrap from around him and heard Yusei do a bit of a head shake before turning around to flash him a grin, saying, "That wasn't too bad after all, huh?"

The severely unimpressed look Yusei gave him was too good not to let out a small laugh at, and though he tried to apologize afterwards they both simply ended up laughing together, mostly out of relief that the stupid quest was nearly over.

"Alright, you get to be the one to do the honors," Judai stated, gesturing towards the cave and letting out a little 'poof' sound, "I'm ready to see this cave go boom."

"I was born ready for this," Yusei said with a serious nod (though Judai could tell he was barely managing to hold the look), pulling the detonator out of his inventory as vengeance flashed across his eyes.

"Fuck spiders."

The explosion was full of color and got low, impressed whistles from the both of them, pulling a loud cheer out of them especially when a second explosion somehow went off too.

If seeing that felt that cathartic for Judai, he could only imagine just how Yusei was feeling at that moment.

...Didn't change the fact that they were both going to send in request tickets for the option to have alternate quest lines for things dealing with common phobias.