Kumo Desu ga, Nani ka? Volume Chapter 21

These days, my life basically involves moving in and out of the Great Elroe Labyrinth.

When the Demon Lord is getting close to catching up with me, I use Teleport to return to the labyrinth, where I work on reducing the ranks of Mother’s army.

Then, when the Demon Lord gets an SOS from Mother that I’m causing trouble and comes back toward the labyrinth, I teleport outside again.

And so on and so forth.

Apparently, even the Demon Lord can’t catch up with me as long as I have Teleport and the ability to monitor her location.

Still, if I let my guard down, she’ll catch me for sure, meaning I have to use Exhaustion Nullification to stay awake around the clock.

The skill keeps my body from getting worn out even if I don’t sleep, but the lack of rest is pretty tough on my spirit.

Besides, the Demon Lord is no fool, so she’s been taking measures to put an end to this game of cat and mouse.

Specifically, the number of puppet spiders has increased.

The puppet spiders are under the Demon Lord’s command, separate from Mother.

In addition to the one that Mother already had, the Demon Lord has thrown in ten more of the damn things.

Even just one was a headache in itself, and now I have to deal with eleven?

Come on—give me a break.

Half the new puppet spiders are on guard in the Great Elroe Labyrinth.

The other five are outside pursuing me, as I found out the hard way.

The Demon Lord was returning to the labyrinth, so I teleported back outside only to find a puppet spider waiting for me.

I managed to escape with my life somehow and even succeeded in Appraising it so I could mark the thing on my map, but one wrong move and it would’ve been curtains for me.

In fact, I took enough damage that I would be dead right now if it weren’t for Immortality.

Long live Immortality!

However, the situation is getting worse by the minute.

The Demon Lord and her puppet spider tracking team are constantly on my tail, and in the Great Elroe Labyrinth, I’ve got Mother and six more puppet spiders to contend with.

Mother’s not as strong as she used to be, but at the same time, I’m running into the puppet spiders more and more often.

At this rate, I’ll eventually be backed into a corner with no more places to run.

So I have to somehow reduce the number of puppet spiders before that happens.

Right now, I could beat Mother if given enough time, but the Demon Lord is nearly invincible, and the puppet spiders all have higher stats than I do.

I’m definitely outclassed here.

But I have to do something, or I’m done for.

Who cares if they’re all stronger than me?

I’ve been fighting enemies who far outclassed me all my life here.

There’s no point in wimping out now.

Thus far, I’ve been able to beat enemies who are stronger than I am through a combination of resourcefulness and sheer guts.

The resourcefulness to make various traps using my thread and the guts to never give up, no matter how bad the situation.

It’s no exaggeration to say that those are the two things that have kept me alive all this time.

I’m just going to stick with what works.

For the moment, I can’t beat a puppet spider in a fair fight.

But I’ve come up with a trap that might do the trick.

Anyway, that’s what’s on my mind as I’m running around like crazy.

Fleeing from the Demon Lord and the puppet spiders, slowly whittling away the spider army.

And now, I’ve been chased into a dead end.

The Great Elroe Labyrinth, Upper Stratum.

I’m in a small dome-shaped room, surrounded by six puppet spiders.

To an onlooker, this probably seems like a desperate situation.

The dolls likely think they have me cornered, but what they don’t know is that they’ve been drawn right into my trap.

I’ve been playing tag in the Great Elroe Labyrinth for longer than usual in order to lure all six of the puppet spiders here into one place.

It might look like these dumb dolls have secured my escape route, which isn’t wrong, but if that same route gets sealed off, they won’t be able to escape, either.

And so: Earth Magic, activate!

I close the only way out with Earth Magic.

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Now this little room is totally sealed off.

And with that, it’s time for even more magic!

Spatial Magic: Spatial Storage!

This is basically one of those Item Box–type spells that store items in a separate dimension, but I’ve never had to carry things before, so it was basically gathering dust.

But this time, I’ve got a little something stored away in there.

A whole bunch of seawater.

I release the seawater into the little room while stashing away the air that was in there instead.

The seawater fills the entire room, submerging it completely.

Just as I predicted, the puppet spiders can’t swim, so they’re pressed against the ceiling.

For whatever reason, my body is composed in a way that makes it extremely buoyant.

Even if I try to dive underwater, I just pop right back up.

I started thinking, even if they’re not the same exact race, wouldn’t other spider monsters have similar properties?

To test my theory, I captured a single small lesser taratect from the spider army and tested it out in the ocean.

Sure enough, it floated on the water just like I did.

That wasn’t a guarantee that the puppet spiders would work the same way, but it looks like I won that bet.

The puppet spiders are helplessly buoyed up against the ceiling.

On top of being pressed forcefully against the ceiling because of their natural makeup as spiders, the thread they use to control the puppets’ limbs is damp, hindering their movements a little.

And I’m observing all this from the bottom of the room.

Heh-heh-heh.

That’s right. In order to carry out this strategy, I paid the high cost to acquire the Swim skill!

Now, I can more or less dive underwater.

I can’t really swim around freely, though, since the skill level is super-low.

Still, it works well enough to make this plan a success.

Now that the puppet spiders can’t move, I fire Black Magic at them.

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I figured out when I was fighting the water wyrms and dragons that dark-related magic isn’t affected by water.

Apparently, Dark Magic hits the puppet spiders with the same power it would have on land.

No matter how high their stats are, if they can’t move, they can’t put those stats to use.

And since I can move underwater, they can’t hit me with magic of their own, either.

Wait, no, I spoke too soon.

Since my Swim skill level is low, I can’t really get around fast enough to dodge all their magic.

But that’s okay.

My magic defense is high, so even the puppet spiders’ magic attacks don’t do much damage.

Wait, sorry, I was wrong again.

I’m actually taking a lot of damage.

I mean, those guys are really strong, y’know?

Even with my high magic defense, of course they’re going to cause some damage.

But that’s still all right.

Having the puppet spiders aim their magic at me is an important part of the plan.

See, stats that exceed 10,000 can cause so much damage that they could basically bring about a natural disaster.

If they tried, I’m pretty sure the puppet spiders could make this whole room collapse.

That’s why I wanted to give them a target to attack, so that thought doesn’t occur to them.

Basically, I’m using myself as bait.

If the puppet spiders calmed down a little, they would probably prioritize destroying the room.

But since I’m right here before their eyes, and attacking them at that, of course they’ll want to destroy me instead.

Especially if they’re panicking because they can’t breathe.

As I attack the puppet spiders, I take little hits of the air I stored away earlier.

That way, I won’t suffocate.

But what about the puppets?

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I doubt they can breathe underwater.

Last time I checked, spiders didn’t have that convenient little feature.

I mean, we’re not fish.

Normally, our bodies are constructed in a way that we can’t even go underwater.

Their high stats might give a boost to their lung capacity or something, but no living thing that needs air can survive without it for long.

And the more they move, the faster they run out of oxygen.

Since they’re locked in a magical shoot-out with little old me, they’ll be out of air in no time flat.

I don’t need to get rid of their HP with magic.

All I have to do is keep their attention on me and wait for them to run out of air.

The trade-off is that I have to take some hits from their magic, but between my high magic defense and my Perseverance skill, I calculated that I should be able to endure.

Even if I take more damage than I expected, there’s always the last resort of Immortality.

And even if they do manage to kill me temporarily, they should be completely exhausted by then themselves due to the lack of air.

I doubt they could muster enough strength to destroy the room then, and even if they do, it’ll just cause a cave-in.

In their weakened state, that means they’ll be buried alive.

Sure, I’ll get buried along with them, but I have Immortality, so I won’t actually die.

Worst-case scenario, it’s possible I’ll stay buried and lose consciousness permanently, but you can’t fight a far stronger opponent without taking on some degree of risk.

The puppet spiders are stronger than I am, even though I’m clearly kicking their butts right now.

In fact, I’m almost surprised that it’s going this well.

One of the puppet spiders starts flailing its arms, attacking the ceiling.

But with water soaking into its limbs and the thread that controls them, it doesn’t appear to be able to move very well.

It strikes its weapons sluggishly against the ceiling, but since there’s so little strength behind the blows, it’s not even making a dent.

Just to be safe, I fire more magic at the struggling puppet spider, hindering its movements.

Then, as the puppets drown, their resistance slows down and finally stops completely.

Since I’ve defeated six much stronger opponents at once, my level shoots up right away.

Still, I Appraise each one just to make sure they’ve all breathed their last.

All six have turned into corpses.

No matter how high your stats are, sometimes death can come for you unexpectedly, just like this.

This time, it worked out in my favor, but I also have to remember never to underestimate a foe just because it’s weaker than I am.

At any rate, I’ve successfully wiped out a bunch of annoying enemies all at once.

My opponents who still remain: the Demon Lord, Mother, and the other five puppet spiders.