The Spider Queen

(Hydra Star System- Lunar Colony Renoran)

(Northern Region)

Qiana kneeled down next to the terrified man who was now frozen in fear.

Dark shadowy marks travelled up the length of her body and there was a cold chill in the air despite the desert heat.

Carter trembled as he felt two pairs of metalloid cuffs snap against his body. One locked his arms in place while the other held his legs together.

He could do little more than crawl on the ground like a worm.

Qiana's cold eyes looked down on the muscular man and there was not a hint of emotion in her gaze.

A sharp knife danced between her fingertips with its edge gleaming under the sunlight.

She brought the blade closer until it was mere inches away from Carter's right hand.

Instead of asking any questions, Qiana brought down the blade and chopped off the site manager's pinky finger.

"Arghh!!" Carter screamed in pain as he glanced at the severed stump.

"Now… now… we can't have you dying just yet…" Qiana coldly whispered as she reached into her storage bag and pulled out a small rectangular device.

She flicked a button on the side of the device and a tiny flame erupted from its tip.

Carter's whimpers turned into blood curling screams as Qiana burned the wound to stop it from bleeding.

Her skills regarding torture… came from personal experience.

There were some memories that even healing serum would not wear off. Qiana resisted the urge to glance down at her wrists as a few recollections surfaced in her mind.

"Why? I'll… I'll talk…" Carter muttered in anguish as his jaw clenched together.

"Go on," Qiana bluntly replied as she stood over the immobilised figure and looked down at his helpless appearance.

This was all part of psychological torment. Breaking down your victim's psyche until they were little more than obedient tools.

First you needed to remove your victim's sense of protection with a random act of violence. An act that would strike fear and terror in their hearts.

Then you needed to purposely position yourself in a place of power over the life of your victim by either verbalising or using body language to get your point across.

Qiana reached into her pocket and pulled out a plain white handkerchief which she then used to wipe the dried blood off her blade.

She repeated the process three times in total without breaking eye contact with the man on the ground.

There was a brief moment of silence, and one could only hear the grains of sand that rustled slightly in the desert.

Carter could feel goosebumps rise up along the sides of his arms as he saw no trace of mercy or humanity on his captor's face.

She was just a spoiled rich girl… how did she get eyes like those?

"It… it was an honest mistake… I…ARGHHH!" Carter's voice was interrupted by another scream as Qiana's blade chopped off the fourth finger on his right hand.

"The truth. I want you to get straight to the point," Qiana casually spoke as if she had not chopped off the man's finger.

Carter curled up in pain and his breathing got even heavier as he stared at his injured palm. She was crazy!

This bitch was completely insane!

The reluctant feeling in his heart immediately disappeared as Carter experienced a cold chill from the young woman's body.

It was bloodlust.

Until now Qiana had kept her emotions under control but now, she allowed the injured man to experience what lurked behind her calm mask.

If Sophie's bloodlust was akin to standing before a mountain of bloody corpses than Qiana's was like staring into the deep dark depths of the ocean.

There was a peacefulness and sense of inevitability to her bloodlust as if telling her foes that they were already dead.

"I… I'll tell you… just let me live… please!" Carter muttered quietly with a slight tremor in his voice.

"A noble visited the colony three months ago and told us to slow down on the productivity for only this month."

"I don't know why… but every day we reduce… reduce… the number of raw materials extracted… another three thousand Enas are deposited in… in… our bank accounts."

"Only for this month alone?" Qiana asked curiously as she raised an eyebrow.

"Yes… yes… only for this month. We have been working hard for every single month before this... check the data…" Carter groaned as he felt the cuffs dig into his arms.

"And what about the monster that was outside my tent?" Qiana questioned sharply as she leaned forward.

"Monster? There is… is no… monster. Like I said… Olivia is a drunk… she sees things when she has too much to drink," Carter replied softly.

There was no trace of hesitation in his voice, and it did not appear as though he was lying.

Qiana strode over to the muscular man and knocked him out with a quick blow to the back of his neck.

She easily controlled her strength so that there would be no long-term lasting consequences, but he would still be out for quite some time.

Just to be safe she reached into her storage bag and pulled out a syringe filled with a clear liquid that bubbled slightly.

Qiana injected the liquid into Carter's neck, and he slipped even further into an unconscious slumber.

The young heiress to House Abazin let out a heavy sigh as she looked up at the sky and saw an endless blue.

Now she had more questions than answers.

Did the mysterious noble know that she would be assigned to visit this colony in advance? In that case the culprit must be a member of her family…

But what if it were a coincidence?

Still in either case what was happening here made no sense.

Why would you pay the workers to slow down their production levels for a single month?

There were no other orders to sabotage the machinery or attempts to poach the workers over to other mining companies or corporations.

It made no logical sense!

Qiana placed her knife back in the sheath attached to her hip and slowly rubbed her temples as she thought the matter over.

Fuck!

She had forgotten to ask Carter about the car bomb!

Qiana stared at the wreckage of her hovercar with a thin frown on her face.

Assassination attempts on her life were so commonplace when she returned home that she had subconsciously ignored the exploding car since she had made it out uninjured.

Wait… if the noble had only asked them to slow down the rate of production, then why the hell would Carter and the three security officers attempt to kill her?

There was something that Carter did not tell her…

Qiana reached into her storage bag for the antidote to the toxin that she had injected into the unconscious guard's body when something unexpected happened.

She had taken her eyes off Carter's body for less than a second but when she turned around, it was now gone.

There were no traces of his body, and the corpses of the security officers were also nowhere to be found.