So I'm a Spider, So What?, Vol. 2 Page 6

  Hold on a second. Wouldn’t someone lucky avoid flirting with death so many times in the first place?

  Hmm?

  …Forget it. I shouldn’t think about this anymore.

  Really, I escaped by the skin of my fangs that time. It’s a good thing I’d already been about to leave.

  I haven’t quite shaken this streak of bad luck yet.

  Yeah, let’s go with that.

  Please, someone tell me I’m right.

 

  Hey, nobody asked you!!

  What’s with the too-perfect timing?!

  Were you waiting for your chance to jump on me like that?!

  You think you’re some kind of comedian, do you, Divine Voice (temp.)?!

  Whew. Okay, I got a little worked up over nothing there.

  Yeah. I’m just gonna ignore the absurdly ominous beginning and start slowly working my way through the Middle Stratum.

  I definitely want to put as much distance between me and that earth dragon as possible.

  Anyway, let’s check in on the current situation.

  I’m surrounded on either side by boiling hot magma. The ratio of land to magma is more or less the same.

  Still, I kinda just charged ahead in a panic. I wonder if I’m going the right way?

  Well, I have no way of knowing, so I may as well just carry on like this.

  So thanks to the aftershock from the earth dragon’s attack and the fact that I kept running far past my limits, my HP’s been reduced a bit.

  Not by very much, but because the heat around here’s constantly causing enough damage to cancel out my HP recovery, I don’t think I can expect to rebound anytime soon.

  I was able to acquire Fire Resistance by traveling back and forth between the Middle and Lower Stratum, at least, but it’s still only level 1.

  As of now, with Fire Resistance at level 1 and HP Auto-Recovery at level 5, I can break even with the heat’s drain on my HP.

  Which is great, but it also means that if I incur any additional injuries, it’ll be hard to patch myself up.

  My only options are either making a full recovery by leveling up or raising one of these skill levels so my healing outpaces the rate of damage I receive from environmental hazards.

  But since the magma is so close by now, there’s also the dreaded possibility that the heat damage may get a leg up, instead.

  I’d like to avoid such hot places if possible, but what can I do?

  Judging by the stratums I’ve visited so far, it’s probably best to assume the Middle Stratum is also pretty massive.

  This is the biggest labyrinth in the world, after all.

  It connects two continents and everything, so it could easily take days to traverse the Middle Stratum.

  I’ve got a long ways ahead of me, but I was forced to start this journey in quite a rush. Not a good sign.

  Oh well, guess I better keep going.

  Whew. Sure is hot, though.

  Ever since I was reborn as a spider, I’ve lived in a pretty comfortable temperature. It was never too hot or too cold, y’know?

  Having the environment suddenly change on me like this is a huge downer.

  It’s not so bad that I can’t bear it, since I practiced coming here to get the Fire Resistance skill and all, but still…

  I can barely even stand the thought that the entire Middle Stratum is probably gonna be like this. Ugh.

  Especially for my poor feet.

  I mean, magma’s flowing right there!

  Of course the ground’s blazing hot.

  Asphalt heated by the summer sun doesn’t even compare.

  Forget frying an egg on the ground. In this place, it’d burn right up.

  And I’m walking barefoot out here!

  It’s so hot, it’s actually quite painful.

  I wouldn’t be able to do this without Pain Mitigation and HP Auto-Recovery.

  Oh, hey, a monster.

 
  Status: HP: 159/159 (green) MP: 145/148 (blue)

  SP: 145/145 (yellow) : 116/145 (red)

  Average Offensive Ability: 83 Average Defensive Ability: 81

  Average Magical Ability: 79 Average Resistance Ability: 77

  Average Speed Ability: 88

  Status Appraisal Failed

  >

  Heh-heh-heh. Now that Appraisal’s leveled up more, I can even see the enemy’s attack power and stuff!

  Ahhh, this rules!

  Although, the success rate still isn’t very high…

  That’s the same kind of monster I saw when I first arrived in the Middle Stratum.

  The sea-horse-looking thing.

  Just like the one I spotted on the first day, my quarry is swimming in magma. Unreal.

  It doesn’t seem to have noticed me yet, so I’m kinda tempted to just ignore it, but I have to pass right by it.

  What should I do? Hmm…

  Oh. While I was busy worrying about it, I guess it noticed me.

  Like last time, a fireball launches from the magma.

  Yaaah! I dodged it.

  Hmph. That isn’t fast enough to hit me.

  There was a time when I couldn’t even dodge those frogs’ spit attacks, but I’m way stronger now—my speed’s gotten much higher, and I have the Evasion skill and everything.

  Now I have godlike agility that would be the envy of any game character!

  Even if a single hit would reduce me to cinders with my paper-thin defense, that doesn’t matter if I never get hit!

  Still, though…

  Neither of us has the upper hand at this rate.

  I mean, those fireballs aren’t gonna hit me.

  But since I can’t use my threads here, I have no way of attacking him.

  It’s a stalemate.

  Oh, wait. The other guy’s about to run out of MP. Those fireballs apparently use a lot of it.

  So once its MP is exhausted, it won’t be able to shoot any more fireballs.

  Appraisal really is like cheating. I mean, I know all my opponent’s info while we’re fighting.

  All right, avoided the last fireball. With that, he’s out of MP.

  The sea horse’s next move will change the course of this battle, but how?

  Oh, it crawled out of the magma.

  And it’s charging me.

  What an idiot. If I ran out of MP, I’d be making a strategic retreat right away.

  From my point of view, the rush is suuuper slow, so I slip by it easily.

  Then I attach myself to the sea horse’s back, piercing it with a poisoned claw.

  Now that I mention it, this thing’s body is crazy hot! My HP’s even gone down a little! My precious HP!

  Well at any rate, the deadly poison killed the sea horse in no time flat.

  Phew. I managed to win my first match.

  Fireballs streak past me, tracing arcs through the air.

  Two at once. But even then, dodging them is simple.

  Glancing ahead, I see two sea horses.

  Apparently, this place is just crawling with them.

  They don’t flock together—they just wander around individually doing as they please. Still, once in a while, they happen to end up close to one another and attack me simultaneously.

  Well, as long as they’re not gonna swarm me like those monkeys, it’s no problem.

  I evade another pair of flying fireballs.

  They don’t cooperate very well, probably because they’re normally pretty solitary. It’s like they’re launching fireballs at random.

  If they weren’t, this might actually be a hard fight.

  All I have to do is avoid getting hit, but on the flipside, if I do get tagged…

  I’m vulnerable to fire, so if one of those attacks lands, I doubt I’ll get off with minor scrapes and bruises.

  On top of that, shuffling around the missiles is simple on its own, but I’m doing it in
the middle of a magma field.

  If I accidentally fall in, I’m sure my body wouldn’t even catch fire. It’d just melt.

  So even as I avoid the fireballs, I have to keep a close eye on the ground beneath my feet.

  It feels like I’m down to my last heart in a bullet hell game.

  Except this is my real life on the line.

  It really sucks that I don’t have a way to fight back right now.

  As soon as I produce thread, it just burns up and disappears, especially now that I’m so close to the magma.

  So while they can attack me as much as they like, all I can do is dodge. Like a fish in a barrel.

  But that’s just until they run out of MP.

  Once that happens, the sea horses climb ashore.

  That’s right. They opt to abandon their advantageous position and put themselves on my level voluntarily.

  What gentlemen. What idiots. What meatheads.

  Even now, the first sea horse has run out of MP and is ambling toward me.

  I quickly pack a claw with poison and finish it off.

  It helps that I gained the new skills Destruction Enhancement and Cutting Enhancement in my earlier quest for knowledge.

  Destruction Enhancement, as the name implies, increases my destructive power. The meaning is a bit vague, but I’m assuming it’s a skill that generally increases my attack power.

  Cutting Enhancement is the same sort of thing, just limited to slashing attacks.

  The second sea horse crawls out of the magma with perfect timing, so I finish it off the same way.

 

 

 

 

 

 

  Ooh! I leveled up!

  I’m extra-grateful for this, since my HP has gotten a bit low. After I finish molting, my HP is fully recovered.

  I can beat those sea horses pretty easily, but if I make contact with their bodies, I take damage.

  It’s not a big deal with one or two, but after I fight a bunch of them, it starts adding up dangerously.

  Since leveling up is my only way of healing right now, I’d rather not incur any other injuries, no matter how small.

  By the way, they cool down after a little while, so I wait for that to happen before eating them.

  It’d be great if my Fire Resistance or HP Auto-Recovery advanced with that last level-up, but of course, the world’s not so kind.

  Fire Resistance is still level 1, and HP Auto-Recovery hasn’t improved, either.

  Well, it’s no surprise that Fire Resistance isn’t making any progress. It seems like my species is naturally vulnerable to fire, so there’s no chance I overcome that in a single day.

  And HP Auto-Recovery is such a handy skill, it naturally takes a long time to grow.

  I mean, automatic recovery is an ability you wouldn’t normally have until near the end of a game anyway.

  I’m lucky I was able to get it without spending any skill points. It’s probably too much to ask for it to level up quickly, too.

  I have to remember that just having it at all is a godsend.

  In fact, without HP Auto-Recovery, I couldn’t have even considered a trip through the Middle Stratum.

  I mean, how could I?

  Entering an area where you constantly take damage without an auto-recovery skill would be a suicide mission.

  I’m not interested in committing suicide, so without HP Auto-Recovery, I’d probably still be puttering around in the Lower Stratum looking for another shaft to climb up.

  In the Lower Stratum with those dragons? No waaay. I’d be dead in no time.

  I’m actually making fairly smooth progress in clearing the Middle Stratum.

  I’ve run into a few other kinds of monsters besides those sea horses, but none of them were a big deal.

  If I wasn’t at a disadvantage in this terrain, I could beat all of them easily.

  However, the handicap I have here is pretty inconvenient.

  First of all, the magma. What a pain.

  If I’m facing a monster that’s immersed in the magma, all I can do is throw rocks.

  Since I have the Throw skill and all, I thought I’d try imitating those monkeys, but it doesn’t do much damage at all.

  Ultimately, unless the enemy comes ashore, I basically can’t do a thing.

  It’d be fine if every monster acted like the sea horses and made landfall as soon as they ran out of MP, but some simply stay in the magma or run away.

  The worst are the ones that start out on land but duck into the magma when I have them where I want them.

  And not being able to use my silk is rather stressful.

  This is right after I got the Threadsmanship skill, too, which increases the power of any thread-related moves…

  I can at least pick up rocks and toss them with my silk, but if it’s out for too long, it catches fire even on relatively safe ground.

  The real problem’s the thread that I often produce unconsciously.

  Whenever I move, I automatically spin silk, but in the Middle Stratum, it ignites.

  The lit thread acts like a fuse, until even my backside starts getting hot.

  It definitely freaked me out the first time. There was literally a fire lit under my butt.

  My HP went down quite a few points from that, and using Poison Synthesis to put it out lowered my HP even more.

  I mean, that was the only thing I could think of to put out a fire.

  In the end, my only choice is to keep severing the thread as I produce it.

  I have to do something, or it’ll turn into a real pain in the ass. Literally.

  Bedding is a problem, too.

  If I try to build a web here, it’ll undoubtedly go up in flames and take me with it.

  So I decide to make do and sleep in the shadows of some rocks.

  Not that I can really sleep anyway.

  Not in this hellscape, where I’m always passively taking damage and have to stay on the alert for monsters.

  I may be bold, but even I have my limits.

  Even so, I still have to sleep.

  I’m not sleeping very often, as you might imagine, but I’ve been trying to rest whenever I find an appropriate hiding place.

  But even though this area is worse than the Lower Stratum in a lot of ways, the one silver lining is that the monsters are much weaker.

  In terms of threat, they’re not far removed from those found in the Upper Stratum.

  There are probably some relatively strong monsters here, like the snakes that live in the regions above, but so far, all the creatures I’ve encountered have been no big deal.

  The largest difference between the threats here and in the Upper Stratum is the way they use their environment.

  That’s what makes these normally weak monsters dangerous.

  Since I don’t have much in the way of recovery options, just getting grazed by an attack could put me in serious trouble.

  Besides, they’ve all been rather manageable so far because they’re so puny, but it’s still possible that there could be some Lower Stratum–class big game here, too.

  The terrain alone is a challenge for me, so if that sort of opponent appears…

  Well, I just have to hope there aren’t any.

  Man, if only I could use magic, it’d turn this whole thing around.

  But to use magic, I have to quell Detection, which might be an even more formidable enemy than this god-awful terrain.

  In any event, I’m not likely to solve either problem anytime soon.

  Aaargh, I really wanna use magic!

  THE NIGHTMARE’S
VESTIGE

  A few days after entering the Great Elroe Labyrinth, we finally arrive at the spot where an adventurer reported seeing an anomalous taratect.

  From here, we enlist Goyef’s help searching the surrounding area to find and destroy our target.

  “Please be careful. Because the passages in this area are so wide, large monsters like earth dragons sometimes turn up.”

  Earth dragons, is it? Dragons are generally strong.

  Low-ranking wyrm species usually aren’t much more dangerous than other monsters of the same level, but the higher-ranking the species, the greater the danger becomes.

  They may even be a match for my stats, despite my hero status—or even outrank me.

  “It’s too quiet around here.”

  I nod in response to Jeskan’s remark.

  It’s good that we’re starting our hunt, but we haven’t encountered a single monster since we got here.

  And this is the Great Elroe Labyrinth, renowned for being teeming with them.

  Something strange is definitely going on.

  Suddenly, I feel a sharp prickling sensation on my skin.

  I draw my sword immediately.

  Hyrince raises his shield, and Yaana concentrates so she can use her magic at a moment’s notice.

  Jeskan and Hawkin look around warily.

  I can see cold sweat streaming down Goyef’s face.

  “The hero’s here.”

  Then a voice echoes in my mind.

  It doesn’t make a sound, reaching me like a thought.

  I whirl around.

  There, I find myself face-to-face with a giant spider monster.

  “G-greater taratect…”

  Goyef speaks in almost a whimper.

  A greater taratect can be just as strong as an upper-class wyrm.

  And there are three.

  But my gaze goes right past the three giant monsters, captivated by the sight of a small form.

  A little white creature, lurking behind the greater taratects, as if in hiding.

  “Th-there it is! That’s our target! The Nightmare’s Vestige! This is the monster said to have been left behind by the Nightmare of the Labyrinth!”

  The Nightmare of the Labyrinth. A monster that appeared some ten-odd years ago.

  It had been indescribably strong, hence its title.

  A spider that crushed humans like insects.

  And the first monster that taught me the pain of defeat.