Kumo Desu ga, Nani ka? Volume Chapter 12

Man… Centipedes are scary. Seriously, what the hell? I never wanna see that many insects again in my life.

Wow. I’m exhausted.

My legs are trembling. Probably because I ran for so long after depleting the yellow stamina gauge—my immediately available energy.

It’s definitely time for a rest.

I look back one more time to check whether the centipede army is following me. Sweet, no sign of them.

I lay out some webbing to make a simple home.

The moment I finish the web to ensure my relative safety, all the strength drains from my body, and I collapse.

Wow, I might’ve gotten a little traumatized.

Those centipedes may be weak individually, but that enormous horde was a major threat.

If that many of them came at me at once, there’d be nothing I could do.

Plus, those guys can inflict paralysis. If I got bitten even once, I’d probably be totally immobilized prey.

After that, all I’d be able to do is wait for them to gobble me up.

The thought alone makes me shudder.

I should’ve thought more carefully about why there were so many centipedes in that area.

Or maybe what I should’ve noticed was the lack of other monsters around there.

I mean, on their own, the centipedes are crazy weak.

In retrospect, it was odd that there weren’t any other predators around when there was so much prey to be had. I’d considered that maybe other monsters didn’t want to eat them because of their paralyzing venom, but in a dungeon chock-full of poisonous monsters, that seemed like a flimsy reason.

More likely, the other beasts either avoided the area, knowing a swarm of centipedes lived there, or wandered in accidentally and got eaten.

Considering that even my speed was barely enough to let me escape, it may simply be impossible for slower creatures. They’d try to run but get overtaken in no time, and once they were bitten and paralyzed, tons of centipedes would swarm around them and…

Scaaaaary.

I guess even lesser monsters have ways of compensating for their vulnerabilities.

In terms of pure fighting ability, I’m on the weaker side, too, but if I make a web, I can entrap and defeat monsters stronger than myself.

So just because something seems weak doesn’t mean you can let your guard down.

Let’s just say this little encounter drummed that lesson into me very thoroughly.

I was able to stay alive, anyway, and I did make a snack of more than a few centipedes before that incident.

I earned some levels and stuff, too.

Although, despite all the level-up molting I’ve been doing, I don’t feel like I’m getting any bigger.

Molting normally helps an animal grow larger, doesn’t it?

I mean, technically I am growing in a sense by leveling up, but the size of my body hasn’t changed. After seeing my gigantic mother when I first hatched, I got the idea that I could eventually be that big, too…

But so far, there aren’t any signs of that happening.

Since this world has levels and all, maybe evolution exists, too, or something?

Oh, right, speaking of levels…

After I Appraised that whole army of centipedes, my Appraisal skill level went up.

Is this what they call a lucky break?

For the time being, I take a fresh look at my continuous self-Appraisal results. I didn’t really have time for that during my pursuit by the centipede army, obviously.

What do you mean, “Status: Weak”?! That’s way too vague!

Plus, calling me weak is… Well, I suppose I realized that already. But couldn’t you sugarcoat it at least a little?

The fact that my Appraisal said I’m weak is just more proof that I’m small-fry by this world’s standards.

Sigh… That sucks.

No, wait. Didn’t I just decide that you can’t dismiss something just because it’s not very strong?

I have my thread, after all.

Even if my body is frail, as long as I have my spider thread, I’ll never be defeated, probably. Maybe.

If you look at it that way, I’m not really weak at all, right?

I mean, I’m biased, but I would say I’m actually kinda strong…

I can trap monsters with my thread, gain the upper hand with ambushes, and bite with my poison fangs once my target is immobile.

Yeah. I have to admit, I play dirty. But I don’t have much of a choice, since I’m at such a disadvantage in a fair fight. So basically, I take any help I can get.

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I just have to make sure I’m the one setting the pace, playing to my strengths.

Man, if things went that way all the time, I’d never have any problems.

Ugh, so tired. It’s time for sleep.

I’m awake.

I don’t even feel fully rested yet. But my eyes suddenly pop open.

What’s this feeling? I don’t know why, but my intuition is waving huge red flags.

Quickly, I get up and add more threads to my web. Then I notice the source of my premonition.

It’s a massive snake.

It looks thick enough to swallow a human whole without a hitch, and its body is at least thirty feet long.

Basically, it seems strong. Not to mention, level 9.

Up until now, the strongest monster I’ve seen is a level 4. So this is a big jump.

Species-wise, the advantage is clear. That, combined with its superior level, means that if we fight fair and square, I don’t stand a chance.

I break out in a cold sweat. I’m like a frog caught by a snake. Except I’m a spider.

My body is stiffening in fear, but I force it to move somehow. Slowly, I retreat in an attempt to put some distance between us.

But the snake isn’t having any of that.

Heedless of the web between us, its head thrusts forward!

Naturally, it winds up caught in the web. But then, the snake thrashes around and breaks through!

I turn around and dart away, fast as a frightened rabbit. I make my escape through the emergency exit of my hastily built web right as the snake bursts through the first barrier and attacks where I just was.

My instincts warn me to run away. But I don’t.

I see it. The snake is tangled up in the webs.

It could rip up the threads, but it couldn’t manage to free itself completely.

The intact web and the busted one are now tangling together around its body.

This could work! This is the advantage I need.

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I latch on to the body of the snake as it writhes around.

The moment I bite down on it, I start producing more threads from my butt. Somehow I break through its hard scales and drive my poison fangs into its body! The snake thrashes more violently as the pain of the venom sets in.

As I entrap it with more thread, it struggles even harder.

The serpent slams my body against the walls and floor time and time again, but I hang on with all of my might and determination!

My yellow stamina gauge is running low. Every time I get hit, my green HP bar goes down, too.

And whenever I make thread, the red general-stamina bar decreases as well.

Once the red gauge runs out, I probably won’t be able to produce any more thread.

If that happens, it’s only a matter of time before the snake escapes its bonds.

I have to beat this monster before that happens. I pour all my energy into biting down and pumping out thread.

The snake’s resistance starts to weaken, slowly but surely.

When my yellow stamina bar is long gone and the red bar is down to only 10 percent, the snake finally lies still.

That’s what happens when you underestimate a weakling!

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Wow, that was a lot of stuff.

I guess gaining a ton of experience points when you beat an enemy that’s out of your league holds true in any world.

I even rose two levels.

The snake sure was a strong opponent. If I fought it head-on, I wouldn’t have stood a chance.

It had a strong body and had a strong defense with its protective scaly covering. Judging by the way it burst through my web, its speed was probably high, too. It might’ve even been faster than me.

Plus, snakes equal venom. No doubt that guy was poisonous, too.

Frankly, even when it was caught in my net, the odds of me winning were probably about fifty-fifty.

All my wounds healed when I leveled up and molted, but before that, my HP was dangerously low. I almost ran out of stamina, too. That was close.

But all that risk makes for great rewards.

When I was overhunting the centipedes, I figured I was getting close to level 8, but I never expected to reach level 9 in one fell swoop.

I’m really pleased about leveling up, but my skill levels have risen a lot, too.

It definitely doesn’t hurt to have more Pain Resistance, and Poison Fang is one of my trump cards along with Spider Thread.

When my Poison Fang skill powers up, that means my attack power increases by the same amount.

Or, to put it another way, Poison Fang is still my only method of attacking.

That could come back to bite me if I run into an opponent with high Poison Resistance. No pun intended.

But what caught my eye the most in this round of leveling up was the Night Vision skill.

Yeah. Come to think of it, it did make sense that I would have that skill.

That must be why this dungeon only seems a bit dim to me despite the total lack of light sources.

Now my skill level for that has gone up, and the scenery around me has become totally visible.

So 10 must be the highest level available. There’s no other explanation for this clarity.

Unless 10 just happens to be the max level for the Night Vision skill specifically and not other skills, of course.

Plus, I got a Vision Expansion skill, I think as a bonus for getting Night Vision to level 10. That’s great and all, but to be honest, I have no idea what it actually does.

Judging by the name, you’d think my field of vision would be much wider now, but that doesn’t seem to be the case.

Well, this isn’t the first time I’ve gotten a skill whose effects I couldn’t understand from the name alone.

It’d be nice if I could use Appraisal on skills to avoid issues like this, but I can’t.

One of the conditions of Appraisal seems to be that I can only get info on visible things.

So all the information I have about skills at the moment is whatever the Divine Voice (temp.) is willing to tell me.

Since I can’t see skills in any form, I can’t Appraise them, either. Since the results of my Appraisals are spelled out in my head, this information counts as being “visible,” most likely.

But if I raise my skill level further, maybe skills will appear in my status Appraisal checks, and then I might be able to check them out.

Anyway, there’s nothing else I can do about it until then, so I’ll have to leave the mystery skills alone for the time being.

Now then, since I’ve finally brought down some big game, I figure I should get to eating it.

First, I rebuild my simple home so other monsters won’t attack me while I eat.

Considering how huge the serpent is, I probably won’t be able to eat it all in one go, so I decide to settle down in this area until I finish devouring the whole thing.

Thus, I make these webs a little more carefully than my usual temporary nests.

Today seems to be my lucky day.

My Spider Thread skill, which hasn’t improved in a long time, finally leveled up.

Maybe using it so much during my battle against the snake paid off.

Anyway, now my two main skills, Poison Fang and Spider Thread, have ranked up at the same time.

To be honest, this will probably contribute to my combat capability way more than the base stat increases that come with leveling up.

I’m in a great mood and ready to chow down.

Oh, but before that, I’ll have to get rid of the snake’s scales. They’re way too damn hard for me to eat.

Whew, descaling complete! Wow, that was exhausting. It was a lot more work than I thought it would be.

Since the scales were so hard and firmly attached, it took me a while.

The red stamina gauge, which was restored when I leveled up, dropped by a whole quarter again.

Goes to show what hard work that was.

But now I can eat without reservations! Without further ado, I dig in.

Ew, gross!

It’s crazy bitter. That probably means poison, huh?

Considering how bitter this is, the guy must’ve had some super-potent venom. It probably would’ve been really bad if it bit me, then.

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Nice. It tastes awful, but skill-wise, this is a great meal.

It’s been several days since I defeated the snake.

At least, I think so. There’s no real way of knowing how much time passes inside the dungeon.

At any rate, for a while my life was eating and sleeping.

I still haven’t finished eating the snake, and new prey keeps getting caught in my webs, so I can’t move even if I want to. I only planned on taking a short break, but things are getting dire.

At this rate, I’m going to relapse into my life as a shut-in!

I glance over at the mountain of prey I’ve caught over the past few days.

Yeah, a mountain. Mountain… In Japanese, that’s yama… Yamada. Come to think of it, wasn’t there someone named Yamada among my old classmates?

Well, that doesn’t matter now.

Anyway, my prey is piling up into a mountain.

This is the result of systematically disposing of all the prey getting caught in my web.

Back in my first home, I ate my prey as soon as I got it, but I can’t start in on these until I finish eating the snake, which is why I ended up with this enormous pile.

There haven’t been any tough guys that could break through my thread like the snake, so I was able to dispose of them easily.

One of them was a strong-looking level 6, but now it’s just part of the prey pile.

Well, a high level doesn’t necessarily mean it’ll be strong.

I’m level 9 now. Level-wise, the same as the serpent. However, the snake had an overwhelming advantage in terms of straight-up battle abilities.

In fact, without my thread, I probably couldn’t even beat a low-level monster.

I’m starting to think that the race of a creature is at least as important as its level. Even at the same level, if one species is superior, then there’s essentially no chance of an upset.

To give an extreme example, even if that giant spider, which is probably the strongest monster I’ve seen, was level 1, I still wouldn’t be able to beat it.

Regardless of our levels, with an opponent that big, no amount of strategizing would stop me from getting crushed in an instant.

So besides the difference in level, there was also a big difference in combat ability between that serpent and me.

That said, three-quarters of the snake’s body has already disappeared into my stomach. Should I look at it as being three-quarters done with the snake or still having another quarter to go? I still have the mounting pile of monster corpses to tackle after this, so it may be better to go with the latter.

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With a stockpile this extensive, they may start to rot before I can eat them.

But I do have that Rot Resistance skill, so eating rotting things probably wouldn’t bother me too much.

In fact, it may be better to make myself eat a little to raise my skill level.

Taste?

Considering all the gross poisonous stuff I’ve been eating this whole time, I’m pretty sure I can handle a little spoiled food at this point.

Okay.

Just as I thought, I can’t leave the area until I’ve finished digesting this giant pile of food. If I can just finish the snake off somehow, the other monsters aren’t terribly big, so I’m sure I could manage.

Besides, if I don’t push myself to finish all this, I’m really going to turn back into a shut-in.

I originally intended for this to be improvised housing, but I’ve spent so much time here, it’s getting to be just as big as my previous home.

As I mull over everything, I feel a vibration through my thread. Something is trapped in my web again.

Oh man. Now I’ll have even more food.

I never imagined that I’d wind up in a situation where I have too much to eat.

At any rate, I head over to my catch.

It seems to be thrashing about pretty violently. Maybe I caught some big game?

In that case, my staycation is going to be extended again.

I hope it’s something small. This is a rather ridiculous problem to have.

So I actually caught three monsters. Ah, these guys showed up in a trio at my old home, too.

Does this monster species only travel in threes?

In any case, this may be even worse than catching a big monster. Mostly in terms of meat quantity, that is.

For now, I add more threads to further impede their movements before carrying them away, web and all.

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This is a new technique I’ve come up with.

It’s way more convenient than cutting out a piece of the web every time.

Then I build a new web and head back to the center of my home with the monsters in tow.

Oof, all three of them together are heavy. I should’ve taken them one at a time, even though that’s more of a pain.

Heave-ho! Man, this is annoying.

My body hurts a little bit now. In fact, my HP has even gone down.

Dammit! Good thing I have these guys to take out my anger on. That seems a little irrational, but I don’t really care.

And so: Chomp! Chomp! Chomp!

…What was that?

As I level up, I receive some really mind-boggling information.

Evolve, it said? Does that mean what I think it means? Like in a certain game series where you raise pocket-size monsters?

Wh-whoa. Okay, give me a minute here. Wait just a moment.

Let me think about this. This can be a huge turning point in a person’s life. Although I’m a spider, not a person.

At any rate, I can’t make this choice lightly.

Evolution, huh? Well, that’s cool. Since this is such a gamelike world, it isn’t that surprising to encounter something like this, I suppose. If I start making cracks about that now, I’ll never stop.

So if I’m evolving, doesn’t that mean I’ll power up, too? If the choice to evolve is available to me, there’s no sense in not jumping on the chance.

So. Lesser taratect or small taratect.

Based on the names alone, there doesn’t appear to be that big of a difference. So which is better: “lesser” or “small”?

Oh, if only Appraisal could be used on the Divine Voice (temp.)! Then I could understand the differences easily.

Hmm. Well, maybe I could take a guess?

My guess is that a lesser taratect would be an adult.

It would take small out of my name, after all.

So the flip side to that is that small taratect removes the lesser part. Would I become a superior species?

But since small is still attached, I’d probably still be an immature specimen.

That must be the difference, I think.

In that case, it’s easy to pick one. Small taratect should be the way to go, right?

I don’t want to evolve and stay as an inferior species, after all. Besides, doesn’t small taratect imply that there are more evolutionary steps beyond that? Like losing the small and simply becoming a taratect, for instance.

I don’t know how much I would change by evolving, but at the very least, I’m confident it would make me stronger. In which case I should probably choose the one with more potential for further growth.

A lesser taratect might be able to evolve, too, but I don’t want to choose it on the basis of that uncertain hope.

Besides, I don’t know how big my body will get if I choose to become a lesser taratect, which is scary.

If I evolve into an adult, that’ll probably mean getting a lot bigger.

I don’t think I’ll suddenly have a huge growth spurt as soon as I choose my next form, but I can’t say for sure.

This is a fantasy world, after all, so I can’t rule out the chance of something like: “I’m evolving! BOOM! Now I’m gigantic!”

And if that is a possibility, I don’t want to risk it.

I doubt I would suddenly swell up to the size of that giant spider, but if I get too big to fit in the passage I’m currently in, that would undoubtedly be a problem.

I did see that huge finjicote monster before, but it nearly filled up the ten-foot-wide passageway completely.

It seemed a little difficult to move around like that.

I’m guessing that monster normally lives in a bigger space, and that particular individual happened to go astray into a narrow passage.

So being too big to move around freely is a real possibility here. In which case, it would be best to stick with my current size. That’s another reason to pick small taratect.

Okay. That settles it, then. I’m going to evolve into a small taratect!

Oh, okay. My evolution started pretty quickly.

The Divine Voice (temp.) is always very abrupt, but I wish it would give me a little more time to emotionally prepare for these things.

I mean, this is my big e-vo-lu…tion…

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Wha—?! Huh? What?!

Did I fall asleep?

No, it was more like my consciousness suddenly slipped away for a moment or was interrupted for a second or something?

That had to be the effect of evolution, right?

Excuse me, Divine Voice (temp.), if I’m going to pass out when I evolve, a little warning would be nice!

Huh? Am I finished transforming, then?

As far as I can tell, I don’t look very different…

Oh, my self-Appraisal stopped.

Okay, time to examine myself to see what’s what.

Oh! O-oh? Wh-whaat?

My species name changed, so the evolution seems to have been successful.

But level 1? So your level resets when you evolve? Uh, my stats didn’t go down or anything, did they? My status hasn’t changed from “weak,” so I can’t tell. Wait, still weak? Aw, man…

The most worrisome thing is that my red stamina bar looks nearly empty now.

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That’s probably why I feel so sluggish and hungry. I must’ve used up a ton of energy mutating, right? Good thing I have such a huge stockpile of food.

In the end, my evolution was successful, but it turned out to be risky business.

I passed out and nearly ran out of energy, after all.

If I get a chance to do this again, I’ll have to make some preparations.

Since I lost most of my stamina thanks to my evolution, I turn my attention to eating.

First, what’s left of the snake.

The large creature took so much work to eat before, but now it goes into my belly with ease.

As I finish off the snake, my Poison Resistance skill levels up.

That makes two levels I’ve obtained for that skill thanks to this snake. Yum, yum.

Before I evolved, that much food would’ve left me full and bloated, but now it has so little effect that I wonder if it vanished into a hole somewhere. It’s like everything I ate just now disappeared.

In exchange, though, my red stamina gauge has recovered steadily.

So even after finishing the snake, my stomach isn’t bloated. In fact, I’m still pretty hungry. My red stamina bar is far from full, too.

Fortunately, I have a whole mountain of monster meat in my current abode.

Before my evolution, I’d been seriously worried about how I was going to eat it all.

Surely this much food would be enough to satisfy even the extra dimension my stomach apparently has now.

So I start to dig in.

I eat. And eat. And eat.

I scarf it down like there’s no tomorrow.

In my previous life, I generally didn’t have much of an appetite, but I guess it wouldn’t be so bad to be a glutton in this world.

I feel like I could take on a competitive eater now! Seriously, though, what’s going on with my stomach?

I’ve obviously eaten more than my entire body mass at this point, yet I can still fit more?

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For real, though. My stomach isn’t actually connected to a separate dimension now, is it?

I know thinking about it won’t solve anything, but you can’t help worrying when your own body is involved.

I won’t figure out what’s going on no matter how much time I spend fretting about it, and it’s really starting to bug me…

Argh! Don’t think about it! Don’t think about anything, just keep eating!

I eat. And eat. And eat.

And ea… Oops, there’s nothing left.

Huh? Did I seriously eat all that food I hoarded?

…I did, didn’t I? I mean, it’s all gone.

For real?

My belly is still only 80 percent full. That’s what my red stamina gauge says, anyway. So that still isn’t enough to fill me up completely?

Evolution is scary. Mostly in the sense of energy consumption.

If my next one also occurs at level 10, I’ll probably have to start preparing once I hit level 9.

I’m lucky that I happened to evolve under the perfect conditions this time, but normally, it probably won’t go this well if I don’t prepare.

Man, for real, though—I’m so glad I could beat that snake.

If it weren’t for that, I wouldn’t have made a new home and saved up all this food.

Thanks, snake!

Well, anyway, I’ve recovered for the most part, but my stomach still isn’t full. And since I’ve munched through my entire store of food, there’s no reason to stay here any longer.

Time to escape from being a homebody!

And so I set off once again to continue my aimless journey.

Thank you, second home.

You were only supposed to be a temporary rest stop, but I ended up staying a lot longer than I planned.

Farewell!

I set off in high spirits.

Now, my first order of business is finding more prey to fill me up. After that, well, I’ll probably just roam around randomly as usual, but I do want to try to find the exit of the dungeon if possible.

If I do get a chance to evolve again, I’ll probably wind up getting bigger.

Even this evolution, which didn’t change my appearance much, still had a huge effect on me. This makes it seem all the more possible that with my next step up, I might suddenly turn huge or something.

In which case, I’m a little worried about fitting through these small passageways.

If possible, I at least want to move into a bigger area. So the best thing would probably be to get outside. For one thing, if I stupidly make myself enormous inside this dungeon and the exit turns out to be tiny, I may not be able to leave at all.

The only problem is that if I reach the exit, there’s a good chance that I’ll run into humans passing through it.

But in the end, I don’t really want to spend my whole life in this dungeon.

That gigantic spider I saw when I was born was probably around a hundred feet tall, estimating based on my own size, so it could probably barely go anywhere in this dungeon, let alone outside.

If I keep evolving from one form to the next, I’ll probably wind up like that eventually, so I really have to get out of here before then.

That being said, the gigantic spider seemed like a boss monster. Will I really reach the same size someday? I wonder how many evolutions that would take. By that point, I could probably defeat humans without breaking a sweat, huh?

But if I do that now, I won’t be able to get outside!

Part of me is excited at the idea of becoming so enormous, and part of me is deeply alarmed by it. This is a complicated feeling.