‘That’s one down.’
An unpleasant stickiness clung to my boots. I rubbed the spider’s bodily fluids into the ground to wipe them off, then kept walking.
It was a dark night. The two women walked behind me.
“Is it…… all right to go like this?”
Iris’s eyes were fixed on the precariously flickering torch.
“Won’t the torch put us at risk of being discovered?”
“It’s night. Without this light, we can’t take even a single step. Even if we’re found, we have to press on.”
What mattered was not moving stealthily, but moving quickly. We had to keep walking without rest.
“By now, they’ll know our group’s size. They may know something is coming, but not who it is—or how many of us there are.”
At least until now, we had encountered only lesser ones. None of the troublesome ones had appeared.
But the closer we got to their base, the more Man-Eating Spiders would emerge, and I would not be able to cut down every last one. We did not have that much time.
We had to rescue the people bound here before they worked out our numbers and decided, ‘That’s food.’
“Whew……”
I moved forward. As expected, the sinister gazes grew more numerous.
“My lord.”
“I know.”
I could hear the snap of small branches breaking. They were moving.
“On one, two, three, we run.”
To some extent, I had no choice but to rely on instinct. I had to recall the location of the spider nest from the game.
‘Webs spread across the ground like silk…… We’ve entered the center, at least. Considering the tracks the spiders have left and the terrain—’
“One.”
‘I need to remember where the gazes are pouring in from. The place they value most. The place they would have to protect even if every one of them died here……’
“Two.”
‘And somewhere a little removed from that. Somewhere faint breathing might still be heard. The breathing not of arthropods, but of mammals—’
“Three. Run!”
The three of us began to sprint in desperation. At the same time, a rustling sound rang out.
“Th-there really are! There really are spideeers!!!”
Unable to bear the fear, Dana screamed.
“Save your voice! Don’t waste your throat on something like that!”
The situation was a complete disaster. Dana had panicked, and her stride was so short that no matter how fast she moved her legs, she could not cover much ground.
The same was true of Iris. One of her legs had not healed completely to begin with, and she was wearing heavy armor as well.
‘At this rate, they’ll catch us……!’
The spiders were drawing closer by the second.
‘……Found it!’
A place covered in more webs than anywhere else. A cozy space woven from webbing, like a cradle that put a child to sleep.
“Here we go!”
I hurled the blazing torch inside.
‘The egg chamber.’
It was the place the Man-Eating Spiders valued most. When trouble arose, they would gather first to protect this area.
The webs melted away in an instant. The sound of the spiders moving grew frantic.
“Move now! Keep following me! Don’t stop!”
But the eggs were not our objective. They were merely bait to divert the spiders’ attention.
‘Well, we’ve made it this far without a hitch……’
If our mercenary company had included an experienced hunter or a spider expert, we could have reached the hostages without such bait.
But our mercenary company had no one like that, so I had no choice but to make do by throwing a torch.
“The spiders seem angry. Won’t even more of them come?”
“Of course they will. Their eggs are in danger. Every spider out scouting or hunting will return.”
“Then perhaps……”
“But none of the spiders will be able to touch us for a while.”
No idiot would check whether the food in the refrigerator was safe while their children might be burning to death.
In exchange for drawing countless spiders in, we had bought time. Time to rescue the hostages.
“Found them.”
At last, I found the hostages bound in webbing.
“Let’s free them. Quickly.”
“Yes!”
Iris, Dana, and I each took up our weapons and freed the bound people.
“Ah, ahhh……”
“P-please save us. I don’t want to die. The spiders……”
I urged them on loudly.
“Get a hold of yourselves! If you stay like this, we’ll all die!”
I undid the last web. Inside was a human woman with a plain, rough appearance.
‘……There’s no halfling?’
My mind went dark.
If, by any chance, they had more than one ‘food storage’—and I had to search another one rather than this place—
Then the situation might be far more dangerous than I had thought. Maybe the operation had already failed—
“Sis!”
“Dana. Why are you here……?”
The stern-looking human woman gently embraced Dana.
‘Ah, so that one’s her sister.’
I let out a sigh of relief. It did not seem like we had failed.
“All right. Everyone, get a hold of yourselves and eat. Quickly!”
I gave them a few swallows of water and a few pieces of bread that I had prepared in advance.
Perhaps they were starving, because they wolfed it down.
‘They need to eat at least this much.’
They had been starving for days. This would still be nowhere near enough, but it was better than nothing.
“Once you’ve eaten, move immediately. You don’t want to die, do you?”
There was a place I had marked beforehand. We had to run and run until we reached it.
“Um, um…… Didn’t anyone else come?”
“There’s no one but us! We have to escape! If you’re done assessing the situation, run!”
I drove them hard. Even if I had to scare them, this was the time to make them move.
I could hear the busy clatter of spider legs. They were tracking us.
“Run, quickly!”
Fortunately, we made it to our destination. We entered the position I had prepared in advance.
A narrow passage flanked by enormous boulders.
“Th-that is……”
“Listen to me, everyone! The spiders are spread across this entire forest! If we don’t defeat them now, we won’t be able to escape anyway!”
“No……”
Dana’s sister followed me with steady steps, but the other women trembled in fear.
“Y-you, Dana’s sister! Stand behind me and peel the webs off me! You—smaller one—remove the webs, and the other two stand in front of Iris! Take the plow and the club!”
“U-us? How can we……?”
“You don’t have to kill the spiders! Just hold out! Just keep them from pushing forward recklessly!”
“N-no…… I can’t do that! You’re sacrificing me as spider feed—”
I drew my sword and pointed it at the woman who had just spoken.
“Using you? I could, if I wanted. If we need spider feed, you might be more useful dead.”
“Eek……”
“This is how everyone survives! Move!”
The formation came together, more or less. But we could not relax yet.
“I hear them. Footsteps.”
The spiders began moving toward us. The sound of countless legs scraping past the ground reached us.
“Hah……”
The battle began. The spiders came flooding in.
“Dana, sing!”
“Yes!”
The Song of the Winged Hunter rang from Dana’s lips.
The spiders began to shrink back. Only slightly, but some even retreated.
‘But……’
It had only given us a little breathing room. They had definitely slowed, but the spiders were still approaching us.
‘Still, with this much…… We can manage!’
The first spider came at me. With its chillingly numerous eyes, writhing hairy legs, and a dreadful leap.
“Hngh!”
I swung my sword. I split the body of the spider that had bounded at me in two.
I immediately readjusted my grip and stabbed dead the spider crawling across the ground. Then I swept my sword like a scythe, killing two more spiders.
“Whew……”
I drove my elbow hard into a spider hanging in midair, stunning it, then brutally stomped it again and burst its body. The revolting sensation traveled from my foot all the way to my head.
“Urk……”
From a short distance away, the spiders began firing webs. They were throwing pre-made nets of webbing.
“Tch!”
There was nothing I could do about that. The moment I went forward to punish those spiders, the formation would fall apart.
The spiders began crowding toward me again. Forcing my sticky, web-covered body to move, I cut down more spiders.
“S-save me!”
“I’m scared, I’m scared……”
Screams rang out from behind me. But there was nothing I could do.
I had to trust them. Even if the rear line collapsed and spiders swarmed in behind me, I had to hold out.
I fought and fought again. Webs piled onto my body until it became hard to move.
“Dana’s sister! Get these webs off me! Use the torch! Melt them!”
The instant we had a little breathing room, I turned to look at her.
“Yes!”
Dana’s sister scorched my body with the torch. I felt the heat through my armor.
The webs were tough and sticky, but they could not stand up to heat.
“My legs and arms too! Hurry!”
“Understood!”
Tearing webs apart by force was no easy task. Of course, with my strength, I could do it myself, but considering the enormous amount of stamina it would consume, it was inefficient.
“Whew.”
After exhaling briefly, I killed more spiders. Killed and killed again. I stabbed, slashed, stomped, crushed, and beat them back.
And so time passed.
‘Ah.’
At some point, I stopped counting the spiders I had killed. I had slain at least sixty-seven of them.
Yet they showed no sign of retreating. They continued advancing toward me.
“Aaaah! My arm! My arrrm……! No! Don’t eat me! I said don’t eat me!”
“M-my body won’t move. It hurts, it hurts……”
It was enough to exhaust even me. Even me, the finest mercenary in the finest armor.
The rear line, where two ordinary people were taking the attacks, was literally on the verge of collapse.
‘Is this impossible?’
The operation had been perfect.
Dana had sung without stopping. Her song was certainly effective.
Without it, the women in the rear line could not have held out this long. Perhaps even I would have collapsed from exhaustion by now, unable to keep up with the spiders’ quick, nimble movements.
The plan had proceeded without a hitch. I drew the spiders toward the eggs and rescued the hostages. I formed them into a formation, moved to favorable terrain, and defeated the spiders efficiently.
The hostages, too, could be said not to have panicked this much. No one had fled or broken down before the fighting even began.
Everything had gone smoothly. Except for one thing.
‘Is this impossible……?’
There were simply too many spiders.
Nothing more and nothing less. The colony was larger than I had prepared myself for. There were more enemies to kill than I had expected.
‘……’
My body was nearing its limit as well. And the rear line had collapsed.
‘What a shame.’
Soon, I would be swallowed up and die beneath the wave of countless spiders—
“My lord, they’re retreating! We’ve survived!”
The spiders were retreating of their own accord. I tilted my head.
“No……”
This was not the behavior Man-Eating Spiders showed when they ‘accepted defeat’ and withdrew.
The moment I felt something was wrong, the ground shook.
“Aaaah!”
“W-what is that? What’s happening—”
Dana’s song broke off. I could understand why.
The two enormous boulders we had relied on.
One of them slid aside.
“……”
Then the one responsible revealed herself.
An enormous spider, perhaps three meters tall, appeared.
Dozens of eyes, each larger than a human head, were fixed on me.
“Th-the Spider Queen…… How, how can this be……?”
“We’re all going to die. Painfully…… die……”
The people fell into despair. But I let out a sigh of relief.
‘Ha, I really thought I was going to die.’
Because the last possibility for me to get out alive had appeared before my eyes.