The use of webbing as 'rails' proved its utility immediately. The winds of the canyon swept the webbing back and forth, even though it was at least somewhat sticky, and the base was wide, the thick gossamer-like strands bent with the billowing and battering of the winds which carried sand away far beyond what their eyes could see. Even for them, retaining balance was no easy thing.
It was almost a dance, holding the two sticky rails that bent out with the air and placing one foot in front of the other. 'I suppose we could use blood magic, and she could use her insects, but it seems like it would be aggressive to present ourselves like that and just ignore their protocols to burst in.' Inta considered, and seeing as Entoma remained two paces behind him and followed step by step across the deep ravine, she must have reached the same conclusion.
Inta looked down below, the city was rapidly coming to life, 'How ironic, they really are like ants from up high.' The walk from end to end of the temporary bridge took several long minutes, and just for effect, he pretended to struggle more than he did, and minded the posture of the ones waiting for them both on the other side.
A scorpionman standing on six legs was in the center, in front of him were three spiderwomen, curiously, they were more like centaurs, with human torsos and spider bodies.
The spiderwomen were a curious trio, each looked to be nearly identical to his eyes, with bright red hair that tapered down their backs, at a glance one would have thought them to be quite shapely figures, their breasts were bared, though clusters of red hung down over their shoulders which may or may not have been intentional covering. Their faces were ordinary, save that they each had eight eyes… but the eyes looked human. Their bodies were onyx dark, a stark contrast to the broad shouldered scorpionman, whose entire body seemed to be a hybrid and was a pale brown shade from head to tail tip.
None of those on the other side were moving, nor did they wave or offer any attempt at greeting as Inta and Entoma drew close.
"Who are you? What do you want here?" The scorpionman spoke, his arms were tipped with giant claws, while below them two smaller arms were clenched like fists. His face it seemed, could not change expression, but his words had all the warmth of a winter storm.
The spiderwomen seemed less hostile, only stepping back behind the scorpion and watching Inta with intense curiosity.
Inta stood aside and allowed Entoma to pass by, she gave a polite bow to them and said, "I am Entoma, ambassador for the Sorcerous Empire to the west," she ignored the way they sucked in their breath at her words, "and this is my bodyguard, I am here to negotiate free passage through your country to the lands of the Devorian Empire to the east."
This took the 'welcome party' aback, such that all four stared from one to the other in dismay.
"You want to get to the Devor?" He asked, aghast. "Are you crazed? Have you suffered brain damage on your long trip here? Nobody wants to go to the Devor lands… and an army? Are you planning on serving them a feast?" He chortled at his own joke, and the spiderwomen laughed along with it, all seeming to find it quite funny.
When neither Entoma nor Inta joined in the laughter, their welcome party stopped laughing.
"You're serious?" The scorpionman asked.
"Just take us to your leader, let them decide how serious we are." Entoma said and stood stock still while Inta took position at her back left.
The scorpionman's mouth clicked from side to side, which Inta took to be a kind of grunt of acceptance, and he turned around with a simple order, "Follow."
The spiderwomen moved aside and allowed them to pass, the spider legs tapped rhythmically on the hardscrabble stone of the high plateau as they went back out of view. On the other hand, the scorpionman guided the visiting pair to the far side of the plateau and there he revealed a stone staircase carved out of the rock itself. No rail was present to guard against a fall, though the staircase was wide enough that one figure could go down, but it would not be a large figure, it was suited to Entoma or Inta, but anything wider would have almost certainly fallen.
"Why are your stairs so narrow?" Inta asked as he set foot on the stone, and the scorpionman answered by beginning to walk along the wall of the plateau itself as they wound their way down the curving steps.
"We don't need them." The scorpionman answered, "It is only for visitors favorable and not."
"But, what if someone falls?" Inta asked.
The scorpionman answered, "They die."
The clicking jaw followed and Inta contemplated what the heteromorph had said. 'Favorable and not… oh.' He looked down at the long drop and the relatively narrow steps, the beastmen were big creatures, going down this would be slow going at best, and neither the spiderpeople nor the scorpionpeople would have any need for it at all. For a moment the vision came to mind, a beastmen army inching down the sides, maybe supported by magic, but with the winding stairs and thick stone most of the army couldn't be supported. The birdmen kept at bay by web shooters and missile fire, and the beastmen pressing their backs to the wall to inch down the steps, the hasty falling as they lost their balance, the arachnid people swarming on the walls, engulfing the beastmen from above and below, webs pulling them away to their deaths… 'It's happened before.' Inta thought when he noticed the gashes in the stone best explained by beastmen claws.
As defensible positions went, even with his lesser military experience, he understood two things. The best defenses are either deep below or high above, a place like this, you have both options. It would have been a nightmare to conquer the arachnids, to supply an army over their desert, to take their settlements, and what would you get for it if you won? 'A lot of great gashes in the ground where nobody but them wants to live anyway.'
His was not the only view rising in estimation, as Entoma followed her bodyguard down the winding steps, she saw more and more of the city come into view, the enormous stone walls of the canyon were riddled with holes, and the rich scent of countless pheromones gave her more information in a minute than she got at the academy in her years of work.
The plateaus had various elevators in place, each one secured by webbing and raised by a conveyor system on which ants the size of grown wolves walked steadily. As the ants walked, the webbing ropes spun on a wheel and wound the elevator up… but there were no passengers. Only baskets of goods piled high.
Pedestrians it seemed, were the norm, they walked up the walls themselves, but always in a neat and orderly fashion, it took several seconds for her sensitive receptors to catch it, but she did. They were following an invisible road of pheromones that were two persons wide, and which took them to their given destinations.
The many holes in the canyon walls seemed mostly to be homes, but here and there she saw the carrying of goods, almost all of which were done by ants. Those seemed to be the preferred pack animal, as she saw no evidence of anything else.
The canyon walls around the homes were each laced with pheromones of their own, which at a guess meant that it served as an identifier of the resident or resident family. Of further note was the brilliant rainbow of colors and the shocking smoothness of the stone, brilliant greens and sunny yellows, radiant purples that would have put any royal robes outside of Nazarick to shame. Layer upon layer, it was a hidden masterpiece of natural art hidden by the rough sands above, and smooth as glass, polished by the wind and the sand it carried over countless eons.
In short, it was beautiful.
And when Entoma set foot on the ground floor of the canyon and the scorpionman descended from the wall to stand in front of his escort, he had no idea, no, not even a hint of one in his mind that at his back, Entoma had already made up her mind.
'I will make this place see reason, and save it as one of the brightest jewels in the chest of them that Lord Ainz once spoke of. This will survive, and it will be his.' She told herself, and followed their escort through the invisible streets of the hidden city.