Chapter 34. A Dead Spider Catches a Live Person.

“Rally the troops! Send a request to the Mercenary Guild! Have the knights stand by!”

The lord shouted in a booming voice.

The man who had been the very picture of an incompetent ruler moments ago had transformed into a skilled commander.

‘Is he the type of person who shows his true worth in a crisis.’

That said, a man who only pulls his weight in a crisis couldn't be called a good ruler.

Still, it was better than collapsing the moment a problem arose.

“What about the evacuation of the residents outside the walls?”

“It's complete!”

“Good. Close the castle gates!”

The battle preparations were completed in perfect order.

Normally, it would be more efficient to utilize the castle walls to draw them into a defensive battle, but the opponents were spiders.

In front of foes that could easily scale walls, the castle walls were not very meaningful.

Therefore, the lord used the castle walls as a simple ‘screen’.

He hid the personnel who couldn't participate in the battle inside the walls and deployed most of the troops outside the walls.

So that all the Arachnes' attention would be focused on the combatants.

‘It's nice that I don't have to participate in the battle, but this is like sitting on a cushion of thorns.’

I looked down from atop the castle wall.

A unit composed of mercenaries was setting up a formation outside the walls.

Since I was also a mercenary, I thought I would be deployed outside the walls, but I was treated as an exception.

The reason given was that since I hadn't been active in this area, it was difficult to decide where to place me.

Indeed, the mercenaries were forming groups of three or four with people they knew, so I would have been left alone.

Judging that I could become an obstacle to the overall movement, I was positioned with the guards on top of the wall to prepare for any unforeseen circumstances.

I felt like they could have just let me go if this was the case, but my request was denied on the grounds that deserting right before a battle could affect the overall morale.

“How far are the spiders?”

“We're starting to see them!”

A swarm of spiders, covering the horizon as they approached.

The normal Arachne led the charge, and the superior individuals followed behind them.

At a glance, it looked similar to tanks and infantry moving together.

“Signal the knights.”

At the lord's command, a soldier waved a flag, and the knights who were waiting outside the walls began to move.

Three knights.

They drew their swords and walked as if to greet the approaching Arachne.

The moment they got close enough, the knights accelerated.

The roles of the knights and the mercenaries were clearly divided.

The superior individuals were the knights' responsibility, the normal Arachne were the mercenaries' responsibility.

The knights used the normal Arachne blocking their path as stepping stones and aimed for the superior individuals beyond them.

The knights began to unleash their respective sword skills.

The severed legs of the superior individuals flew in all directions.

“Charge!”

Following them, the mercenaries rushed out.

They brought repose to the Arachne that had been thrown into chaos after the knights had wreaked havoc once.

‘As I thought, they're not a big threat aside from the Queen.’

Even though there were quite a few superior individuals, the knights could handle them sufficiently.

If it came down to it, the mercenaries could also push them back with sheer numbers.

On an individual level, they were a disaster, but in front of a group composed of many humans, the monsters were reduced to mere prey.

The forces gathered in a hurry were more than enough to handle the situation.

In the end, the lord's choice not to request support from the Knight Order had been the right one.

‘He's a man with insanely good luck.’

If you considered luck to be a skill, then he had tremendous skill.

Coincidence after coincidence had overlapped, turning the worst choice into the best one.

Anyway, the tide of battle was so favorable that there was no tension.

Only a very small number of Arachne that broke from the ranks approached the castle walls.

Since it was impossible to miss a superior individual due to its size, they were all normal Arachne.

Naturally, they ended up as porcupines under the pouring rain of arrows.

“Waaaaaah!!”

“Bring it on, you can have as many as you want!!”

The soldiers on the walls were making a fuss as if they had achieved some great military feat by catching a few Arachne.

Even though spiders were being pulverized every second down below.

I soon understood why the soldiers were acting like that.

The soldiers were constantly watching the lord's expression.

They were showing exaggerated reactions to assert that they had fought hard, so as not to fall out of the lord's favor.

It was hard to call it an excessive action, as the lord really did scan the soldiers several times as if evaluating them.

If he were to show a lack of motivation and the lord's mood soured, a problem would surely arise, either immediately or later on.

‘That's why the vassals are so subservient.’

An environment where everything revolves around the lord.

It might be limited to within this territory, but it was an impressive amount of power.

‘At this rate, they won't notice if I slip away for a bit.’

The lord was busy commanding and evaluating the soldiers, and the soldiers were focused on not missing a single word or gesture from the lord.

No one was paying any attention to me.

I quietly, slowly, broke away from the ranks.

Down below the wall, to a shadow where people's gazes did not reach well.

* * *

‘This wasn't why I came here.’

I had come to report the subjugation of the Arachne Queen on Grainy's behalf, but my feet had been tied up because a horde of Arachne suddenly swarmed in.

The number of Arachne wasn't infinite, so it would be settled soon, but still.

There was a need to confirm the cause of this incident.

“Hmm.”

I took out the Arachne Queen's head and examined it again.

A head slightly larger than a human's.

It was definitely dead, judging by the stench it was emitting as decomposition progressed.

The body fluid that had been flowing from the severed neck had hardened.

No matter if it was a monster, it didn't seem possible for it to send any kind of signal to the Arachne in this state.

But in the end, the spider army had swarmed precisely towards this location.

‘Is there some kind of tracking device inside this head.’

Come to think of it, even among the ordinary animals on Earth, extraordinary abilities were occasionally discovered, such as detecting the Earth's magnetic field to determine location, reading surrounding electrical signals, or detecting prey with ultrasound.

For the bizarre creatures of this world, it wouldn't be surprising if they had even stranger abilities.

‘Should I check the inside first?’

It wasn't like I would be able to understand the function of its internal organs just by looking at them anyway.

But just in case, there might be something that looked strange at a glance.

‘Cutting it in half would be best.’

Although the neck part was open, trying to pull out the contents through the narrow hole would obviously turn it into a pulp.

To at least check its shape, it was better to cut it in one go so that the cross-section would be visible.

‘Just swinging my sword probably won't even scratch it, right?’

Even a simple Arachne superior individual's exoskeleton was hard for a sword to pierce.

Let alone the Arachne Queen, which was surely several times tougher than that.

Since it was already dead, it might have weakened due to some chemical reaction, but the denaturation of its contents would likely happen more quickly.

I shouldn't forget.

Decomposition was progressing in real time.

A day had already passed, and the inside of the Arachne Queen's head (literally), which had been subjected to some shock while I carried it dangling all the way here, probably didn't have much time left.

“Alright- then.”

I placed the Arachne Queen's head on the ground.

With the ‘Sudden Rain’ I used to cut down the superior individual.

This time, I was careful to control my strength so as not to leave an unnecessary sword mark and cause problems.

And yet, preparing for it to be much harder than a superior individual, I put all my strength into it.

I swung the sword down.

Thwack-

An ominous sound rang out.

* * *

“Victory is ours!”

The lord raised his sword high.

Not a single Arachne had died by that sword, but such a trivial detail didn't matter.

The Arachne that had swarmed in as if to cover the fields were annihilated.

Countless Arachne corpses were left where the battle had taken place.

“It is all thanks to the Baron's fantastic command!”

“Hooray! Hooray! All hail the Baron!”

This time, it was not an exaggerated reaction concocted to flatter the lord.

They had successfully defended the territory from a crisis where a horde of monsters had attacked.

It was nothing short of an ‘achievement’.

“Everyone has worked hard.The soldiers who fought bravely will be given leave and rewards,and the mercenaries will be paid according to their performance. And I will make today, the day we protected the territory from the Arachne swarm, a holiday. From now on, every year, we shall hold a Spider Festival.”

The lord had at some point climbed onto a platform and was looking down at everyone as he spoke.

The residents and soldiers all cheered at the lord's magnanimous decision.

He felt as if he had forgotten something, but since he couldn't remember, it probably wasn't important.

* * *

“Is it all over?”

Judging by the incessant cheers, the battle seemed to be over.

Whether it was or not, it didn't have much to do with me.

What was more important was-

‘There's something inside?’

I had tried to split the Arachne Queen's head in one go.

Although the Arachne Queen's exoskeleton was harder than that of an Arachne superior individual, I definitely felt it being cut.

However, the sword stopped, embedded in the Arachne Queen's head.

There was something hard inside the Arachne Queen's head.

Splitting it in one go had failed.

The exoskeleton was so hard that if I tried to twist the sword to break it open, there was a high probability the sword wouldn't be able to withstand it.

I couldn't gauge the size or shape of the unidentified object inside.

“Tsk.”

Now that it had come to this, there was only one way.

Like cutting an avocado, I had no choice but to cut the exoskeleton while turning it this way and that, avoiding the hard thing in the middle.

It was a pain, but what could I do?

“……Hmm.”

After swinging the sword several times, I succeeded in splitting the Arachne Queen's head.

Inside the Arachne Queen's head…… where the brain should have been, there was a fist-sized crystal.

Judging by how it withstood a sword strike imbued with mana, it was likely not a simple crystal.

A few similar objects came to mind.

What was called an inner core of a spiritual beast in martial arts novels, and what was usually called a magic stone in fantasy novels.

However, I had never actually heard of such things existing in this world.

Usually, what one obtained from killing a monster was meat, leather, bones, teeth, and the like.

No different from a normal animal.

Did the Arachne have an ability to grow gems inside their bodies like pearl oysters?

But there was nothing inside the heads of the normal Arachne.

The same went for the superior individuals.

‘Did the Arachne sense this?’

In any case, seeing as it was embedded in the Arachne Queen's head, it was no ordinary object.

I extended my sword and poked the crystal a few times.

For now, all I could tell was that its physical strength was beyond imagination.

‘This is unsettling.’

The crystal itself just looked like a smooth gem,but it was entangled with the Arachne Queen's unknown organs, making me reluctant to even touch it.

But I couldn't just leave behind an object that might have the power to gather Arachne, could I?

I suppressed the rising feeling of disgust and picked up the crystal.

At that moment, I realized a terrible truth.

Thump.

A pulse felt from the crystal.

In other words, it was a living being.

The first thing that came to mind was ‘the Arachne Queen's egg,’ but its location was strange for an egg.

No matter how unique a monster was, was it possible for it to incubate an egg inside its head?

With my common sense, I couldn't even guess what this was.

For a long while, I examined the crystal from various angles, feeling its ominous pulsation.

As if my question had reached the heavens, a revelation was heard.

[You lowly human bastard! Where do you think you're touching with those filthy hands?! Can't you take your hands off me right now!?]

From the crystal held in my hand.

-----------------

Rate and review this novel at novelupdates.

( 3 chapters free per review and 1 chapter per rate )

CLICK HERE

Readers can get 3 extra chapter if they rate and review this novel.

If you find any errors ( broken links, non-standard content, etc.. ), Please let us know < report chapter > so we can fix it as soon as possible.