So I’m a Spider, So What?, Vol. 3

by Okina Baba

  Copyright

  So I’m a Spider, So What?, Vol. 3

  Okina Baba

  Translation by Jenny McKeon

  Cover art by Tsukasa Kiryu

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

  KUMO DESUGA, NANIKA? Vol. 3

  ©Okina Baba, Tsukasa Kiryu 2016

  First published in Japan in 2016 by KADOKAWA CORPORATION, Tokyo.

  English translation rights arranged with KADOKAWA CORPORATION, Tokyo, through TUTTLE-MORI AGENCY, INC., Tokyo.

  English translation © 2018 by Yen Press, LLC

  Yen Press, LLC supports the right to free expression and the value of copyright. The purpose of copyright is to encourage writers and artists to produce the creative works that enrich our culture.

  The scanning, uploading, and distribution of this book without permission is a theft of the author’s intellectual property. If you would like permission to use material from the book (other than for review purposes), please contact the publisher. Thank you for your support of the author’s rights.

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  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Names: Baba, Okina, author. | Kiryu, Tsukasa, illustrator. | McKeon, Jenny, translator.

  Title: So I’m a spider, so what? / Okina Baba ; illustration by Tsukasa Kiryu ; translation by Jenny McKeon.

  Other titles: Kumo desuga nanika. English | So I am a spider, so what?

  Description: First Yen On edition. | New York, NY : Yen On, 2017–

  Identifiers: LCCN 2017034911 | ISBN 9780316412896 (v. 1 : pbk.) | ISBN 9780316442886 (v. 2 : pbk.) | ISBN 9780316442909 (v. 3 : pbk.)

  Subjects: | CYAC: Magic—Fiction. | Spiders—Fiction. | Monsters—Fiction. | Prisons—Fiction. | Escapes—Fiction. | Fantasy.

  Classification: LCC PZ7.1.O44 So 2017 | DDC [Fic]—dc23

  LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017034911

  ISBNs: 978-0-316-44290-9 (paperback)

  978-0-316-44294-7 (ebook)

  E3-20180712-JV-PC

  I’M GOING TO FIND THE OUTSIDE!

  Do we want to eat delicious food?!

  Yeaaah!

  I’m sick of eating gross monsterrrrs!

  Let this proclamation go down in history!

  I vow to escape the Great Elroe Labyrinth and eat delicious food in the outside world!

  Whoo-hoo!

  We’re with you!

  Which means that first, we have to escape the Middle Stratum!

  There’s a good reason I’ve declared my intent to escape this labyrinth so enthusiastically.

  See, the frustration building up inside me has reached a boiling point.

  Basically, the food here is god-awful.

  A lot of days have passed since I became a spider monster for some unknown reason.

  The place I was born is the world’s biggest dungeon, the Great Elroe Labyrinth.

  Unable to find a way outside, I’ve been spending all my time living in this labyrinth, but frankly, the food situation in here is unbearable.

  I mean, the only things I can eat in this dungeon are other monsters.

  Not to mention, they’re all horrendously poisonous.

  Now, the place where I’m currently situated, the Middle Stratum, actually has some nonpoisonous, tasty monsters, like catfish and eels.

  But it’s precisely because they exist that I’ve hit my limit.

  ’Cause that fire wyrm I killed, which totally looked like an evolved form of those guys, didn’t taste even half-decent!

  After all the work I put in to kill it, too…

  Then I had to de-scale it… Well, my body brain had to, at least.

  Look, it’s not like it was gross, exactly.

  But it was kinda weird. I definitely wouldn’t call it delicious.

  It was like a flavorless white fish. It probably would’ve been really good if there were some way to season it.

  The moment that thought crossed my mind, though, the appetite I’d been suppressing all this time couldn’t be held back any longer.

  Even if the catfish and eel I ate were pretty good, there’s only so much more I can bear.

  And it’s obvious they can’t measure up to food that’s actually been prepared to taste good.

  I want to eat delicious stuff like that!

  If I stay in this stupid labyrinth, all I’ll ever have is more gross monsters.

  I’m done with this!

  I wanna go outside and eat a proper meal!

  With this newfound determination, I’ve been revising my labyrinth escape plan.

  Firstly, in order to get out of here, I need to travel from the Middle Stratum to the Upper Stratum.

  The Great Elroe Labyrinth is a huge underground structure, so in order of their proximity to the surface, it’s the Upper Stratum, then the Middle Stratum, and finally the Lower Stratum. Also, though I’ve never been there, there’s apparently a Bottom Stratum, too.

  I was originally born in the Upper Stratum.

  That should be the layer closest to the surface.

  Even there, everything was way too big and confusing, so I gave up halfway through on the possibility of escaping.

  Then, after a lot of twists and turns, I ended up falling down a huge pit into the Lower Stratum, which was packed with strong monsters.

  I somehow managed to get out of there, which is how I wound up in this fiery hellhole known as the Middle Stratum.

  I don’t know how expansive the Middle Stratum is, but if I’m not entirely off the mark, I should be steadily approaching the Upper Stratum…hopefully.

  If I keep moving forward, I’ll get there eventually.

  As long as nothing goes wrong, anyway.

  There are strong creatures like fire wyrms roaming around, so I can’t let my guard down.

  I mean, if I made one wrong step a little while back, that fire wyrm would’ve actually killed me.

  And there’s no guarantee there aren’t even stronger monsters than that lurking around.

  Like a straight-up fire dragon.

  Dragons…

  Just thinking about that word reminds me of the earth dragon Araba I encountered in the Lower Stratum.

  That was definitely more terrifying than anything else I’ve seen in this world.

  I barely escaped after it almost squashed me like a bug.

  At the time, I couldn’t even feel anger or regret.

  All I could do was tremble in fear before such overwhelming power.

  If I ever run into something that powerful again, I’m gonna run away without a second thought.

  My top priority is staying alive. Escaping the labyrinth comes second.

  I can’t forget that.

  Luckily, it’s gotten a little easier to survive now that my combat ability has increased so much.

  As long as I don’t run into anything like that Araba.

  But I seriously doubt that many equivalent monsters exist. Plus, the critters in the Middle Stratum are weaker than in the Lowe
r Stratum, so I shouldn’t have anything to worry about.

  The fire wyrm I defeated was probably the boss of the Middle Stratum! Right? Gotta be.

  Which means that as far as escaping from the labyrinth goes, my chances of reaching the Upper Stratum soon are looking pretty good.

  As long as I continue exploring the Middle Stratum, I’m sure I’ll hit the Upper Stratum eventually, and if I can train up some of my new skills like Spatial Magic, I bet stuff like teleporting will be possible sooner or later.

  Once that happens, I could theoretically warp right up to the top without having to drag my butt all the way through the Middle Stratum.

  But I have no idea how long it’ll take to improve the skill or whether that’s how it even works, so I better keep pushing ahead for now.

  So anyway, I think the Middle Stratum will be fine.

  The real problem is the step after that.

  Escaping from the Upper Stratum to the outside world.

  I don’t know how that’s gonna work.

  Unlike the Middle Stratum, which has a single main path running through it, the Upper Stratum is more like a complicated maze.

  Not to mention, it’s ludicrously massive.

  If I could learn Teleport and just pop outside, that’d be great, but I’m guessing there’s a restriction of some sort. Maybe a requirement like you can only jump to places you’ve already physically visited…

  That means I’ll have to find an actual exit.

  But given the size of the labyrinth, it feels like that could take years…

  Great Elroe Labyrinth, you’re breaking my heart here.

  But I can worry about all that when I get back to the Upper Stratum.

  Plus, even if I do manage to reach the outside world, there’s still another problem.

  In fact, that part might be the hardest issue to deal with.

  ’Cause, like…I’m a spider monster, y’know?

  If I roll into a human town searching for some tasty food, I bet you anything they’ll be all like, “A monster’s attacking our homes! Kill it, kill iiiit!”

  I mean, if I were a human and a spider monster suddenly appeared on the street, I’d probably react the same way.

  Given this predictable outcome, I won’t be able to get tasty cooked food no matter what I do.

  Even if I do run into a human, I don’t think I can just go, “Don’t worry, tee-hee! I’m not a bad spider!”

  I have two ideas for how to get around this.

  One option is to evolve a bunch of times to become an arachne.

  I’d still be a monster, but if I at least have a humanoid upper half, maybe I’ll be treated with a little less suspicion than an ordinary monster.

  Plus, having that kind of body probably means I’d be able to talk.

  However, the evolutionary path to arachne is pretty long, so I’d have to be doggedly persistent.

  The second option is to obtain the Telepathy skill.

  As the name implies, it’s a skill that allows the user to converse using their thoughts, so even if I can’t physically speak, I’d still be able to communicate my intentions to others.

  Getting this skill would be a lot easier than evolving into an arachne.

  But I don’t think Telepathy would be any use in combat.

  If I ever become involved in a party, it’d be helpful for coordinating with my other party members, but I’m the definition of a loner.

  Also, like I mentioned earlier, my top priority is ultimately to survive.

  I can’t really justify spending valuable skill points on a skill like Telepathy that isn’t going to be useful in battle.

  On top of all that, there’s another very important point that poses a problem whether I go for arachne or Telepathy.

  …I don’t know the language of this world.

  The Divine Voice (temp.) speaks in Japanese, but that doesn’t mean the rest of the world will be so kind.

  I mean, sometimes in stories that have similar settings to my situation, it just so happens everyone speaks Japanese for convenience’s sake, but this is a completely different world, so it’s safer to assume no one understands my language.

  If anything, it seems strange that the Divine Voice (temp.) speaks Japanese in the first place.

  I get the feeling it’s better not to think too hard about that, so I usually ignore it.

  Most of all, even if I do speak whatever language people use, I’m really, really bad at talking to people.

  My communication skills are so lacking that I frankly prefer to avoid interacting with others entirely.

  I wasn’t ostracized into becoming a loner in my previous life, you know!

  I became a loner of my own accord because I prefer being alone!

  It’s true, okay? I’m not lying.

  So, to sum it up, even if I do make it out of the labyrinth, I’ll still have tons of problems.

  Enough worrying about that. Let’s take a look at my current status.

 
  Status: HP: 602/602 (green) +189

  SP: 622/622 (yellow)

  Average Offensive Ability: 606

  Average Magical Ability: 4,001

  Average Speed Ability: 2,680

  MP: 4,196/4,196 (blue) +437

  : 622/622 (red) +971

  Average Defensive Ability: 703

  Average Resistance Ability: 4,121

  Skills:

  [HP Auto-Recovery LV 7] [Height of Occultism] [SP Recovery Speed LV 6] [SP Lessened Consumption LV 7]

  [Destruction Enhancement LV 3] [Cutting Enhancement LV 3] [Poison Enhancement LV 7] [Magic Warfare LV 2]

  [Mental Warfare LV 4] [Energy Conferment LV 2] [Wyrm Power LV 1] [Deadly Poison Attack LV 3]

  [Rot Attack LV 1] [Heretic Attack LV 1] [Poison Synthesis LV 8] [Threadsmanship LV 4]

  [Utility Thread LV 1] [Thread Control LV 8] [Throw LV 7] [Spatial Maneuvering LV 9]

  [Stealth LV 8] [Silence LV 5] [Concentration LV 10] [Thought Acceleration LV 7]

  [Foresight LV 7] [Parallel Minds LV 2] [High-Speed Processing LV 3] [Hit LV 9]

  [Evasion LV 9] [Intimidation LV 1] [Heretic Magic LV 6] [Shadow Magic LV 7]

  [Poison Magic LV 7] [Spatial Magic LV 1] [Abyss Magic LV 10] [Destruction Resistance LV 3]

  [Impact Resistance LV 3] [Cutting Resistance LV 3] [Fire Resistance LV 4] [Dark Resistance LV 2]

  [Deadly Poison Resistance LV 2] [Paralysis Resistance LV 5] [Petrification Resistance LV 3] [Acid Resistance LV 4]

  [Rot Resistance LV 4] [Faint Resistance LV 3] [Fear Resistance LV 7] [Heresy Nullification]

  [Pain Nullification] [Pain Mitigation LV 7] [Vision Enhancement LV 10] [Telescopic Sight LV 8]

  [Night Vision LV 10] [Vision Expansion LV 3] [Cursed Evil Eye LV 7] [Paralyzing Evil Eye LV 5]

  [Auditory Enhancement LV 9] [Olfactory Enhancement LV 7] [Taste Enhancement LV 7] [Tactile Enhancement LV 8]

  [Celestial Power] [Longevity LV 1] [Instant Body LV 1] [Endurance LV 1]

  [Herculean Strength LV 4] [Sturdy LV 4] [Skanda LV 4] [Demon Lord LV 1]

  [Perseverance] [Pride] [Gluttony LV 1] [Wisdom]

  [Conviction] [Hades] [Taboo LV 8] [Divinity Expansion LV 4]

  [n% I = W]

  Skill Points: 0

  Titles:

  [Foul Feeder] [Kin Eater] [Assassin] [Monster Slayer]

  [Poison Technique User] [Thread User] [Merciless] [Monster Slaughterer]

  [Ruler of Pride] [Ruler of Perseverance] [Ruler of Wisdom] [Wyrm Slayer]

  [Fearbringer] >

  Man, I’ve gotten really strong.

  My stats are a lot higher now, but I’ve got so many skills that you can barely even tell what’s going on at a glance.

  Most of these are pretty useful, so that’s all well and good, but without Parallel Minds, how in the world would I make sure they were all working?

  Thinking of it that way, Parallel Minds is nothing short of fantastic.

  Even if it can be a teensy bit
annoying.

  (Hey, I heard that, information brain!)

  Oh, hush.

  Still, though, it’s crazy how much my magic stats have gone up.

  At the very least, it’s the one category where I might have a chance to surpass that earth dragon’s stats I caught a glimpse of once!

  That being said, my physical stats are still pretty low. On the whole, I’ve got a long ways to go.

  Still, I was able to defeat a wyrm, which is one step away from a dragon, so I think I’m allowed to be a little confident.

  I could be on par with a dragon someday.

  Maybe I’ll eventually have my revenge on that Araba?

  Nope, on second thought, forget that.

  Earth dragons are scary. Seriously scary.

  NEW HERO

  My teacher was quick to inform my father that I had received the Hero title.

  Shortly afterward, my father summoned me home, so I left the school to return to the royal castle.

  This is my first time coming home in ages.

  But my mental state is nowhere near stable enough to spare a thought for that right now.

  Trying to calm my swirling thoughts, I meet with my father.

  Instead of the audience room, I head toward my father’s office.

  It’s a large room with documents scattered everywhere.

  Besides the two of us, several others have gathered.

  “Schlain. I’m sorry to call you here like this.”

  My father speaks gravely when I enter the room.

  Even though I’ve actually met him only a handful of times, I can tell that the tone of his voice is heavier than usual.

  It’s far more solemn than it was even at the Appraisal ceremony.

  “First, please allow me to have you Appraised to confirm you have the Hero title.”

  “Of course.”

  My father is holding the same Appraisal Stone that was used in the ceremony.

  As soon as I agreed, I felt an uncomfortable sensation begin running throughout my body, like I was being licked all over.

  This was the same feeling I had when I first met my teacher.

  It must be the discomfort of being Appraised.

  “…You really do have it.”

  My father’s voice grows even heavier.

  Then he covers his face with his hands and begins to weep.

  “Julius…”

  My older brother’s name escapes my father’s lips.