3rd - Escaping Web Hell

{Me, the narrator}

("I've had it!")

Sandy threw her front legs up; a solid object flipped in her mind. She was so frustrated with the non-progress she has been making these past few days that she's almost about to go back and smash the chest into the ground. A very tempting course of action, but not adventurous enough for her. She wanted to open the chest the 'true adventurer's way', no cheating by smashing the chest or using forged keys. 'A true adventurer will never walk the shortcut', her words exactly, a bit too stubborn in her old human judgement.

She has explored the dungeon for a couple of days, but the only thing she has discovered was the loot from day one. Other than monsters that tried to hunt her for food, she hasn't found a single soul, sign, or object that can be qualified as loot for that matter.

Finishing the day of exploring with a ring from her biological clock, she stormed back to her new 'base of operations' which is more of a bedroom than anything. The web in her room shakes from her furious moving-about, covering more of the walls of which she claimed as her's. The room was found near the entrance of the supposed old dungeon, the only room big enough to fit her size and everything else. Her first hunt rewards her with three keys and a single test, the main source of her frustrations, stringed from the ceiling. She doesn't know why she did it, hanging the chest like that, but she guessed it was her arachne instincts.

("I need to calm down. Don't want mother to throw me into a goblin nest to 'cool me down' again.")

Counting to ten, a habit from her human life, she crawled in circles.

("...seven, eight, nine, ten.")

"Always a peculiar one, aren't you?"

Standing in the way of the only exit from the room was a human male, head covered with dark brown coloured hair with a decent enough face for girls to fall in love with, but coincidentally a face Sandy's mother fell in love with. With a slightly bigger than normal human body in a blue set of what Sandy describes as 'adventurer's outfit', stood Alexander, Sandy's father, at least, she thinks so.

She never knew how an arachne can reproduce with a human, nor does she actually have the ability to ask since she can't exactly speak except for making a few clicking spider-y noises. But some of the times, he seemed to understand her telepathically. It must be a father's sense, she thought.

"Your mother is calling you for dinner, the big one this time, so you better go before it's gone."

Her father walked in, eyeing all over the room she made as her own. He was used to this scene of messy webs all about after being with his wife for years. He even thinks it was a bit more tidier than his wife's handiwork, a thought not to be told in her face or else he'll regret. His eyes spot the keys on the floor, feeling slightly happy that this child took up his sense of dungeon crawling without being taught.

Then he froze at the sight of the chest. He looked at the keys again and seemed to be holding back a laugh.

"Good luck, little one. I hope you'll survive."

He than walked out, leaving Sandy confused.

("Survive? Survive what? Is there something here?")

Hanging a question mark above her head, she followed the back of her father, walking back the way he came, laughing. She never notice the solemn gratitude sent from the chest behind her.

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{Our Captured Mimic}

Mentally thanking the second human I've seen in my time here, my determination was revived!

("Whoever you are, I promise I will survive!")

I don't care if I get eaten anymore! I will escape this hell!

("...But how do I do that?")

I racked my non-existing brain hard for an answer, but the answer came unexpectedly.

Suddenly, I fell to the ground. I looked up to see where I was hanged and saw a tiny knife stuck close to the strings that was supporting me. Half of the string seemed to be cut while the other half was torn from my weight. I tip my hat to you stranger, you proved an escape and led the monster away!

Seriously though, if it wasn't for him, I would be stuck in here until the spider thought of smashing me open or something. Good thing she's just a spider.

I crept slowly towards the exit and out that hell. Three days, the longest three days I've ever had in my life, and I'm finally escaping. I'm not going to question why I'm still alive without food, but that can come later. Right now, I need to disappear before that monster comes back.

Scouting my surroundings outside of the room, I saw a cave-like area through a large gaping hole on the other end of the corridor in what would be a giant door. Some of the rocks outside were so soft that I could see some heavily imprinted marks on the ground, the monster's marks.

Trusting my logic again, even though it failed me last time and led me to the monster in the first place, I went the other way, deeper into the corridor of bricks and torches.

("I hope I don't go through that again.")

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{Sandy}

Ah, dinner as usual was delicious. At first, I was skeptical of the food when I first saw it as a spider since I didn't realise what was happening and it was literally just a monster corpse. But after the first bite, I was in heaven. If I realised just how good fresh raw corpses can taste as a spider back when I was a human, I would die the moment I heard it. My favourite right now is the giant lizards' skin, crunchy with a hint of many variety of flavours from their preys' blood. It reminded me so much of the potato chips from my old world, but better.

My dad has to cook a part of the food for himself; he is a genuine human after all. I tried eating a cooked meal, but with me being a spider, it tasted absolutely horrible. It was like the taste was all burned away, leaving a chunk of tasteless meat. My mother has ate his cooking before, be she didn't say it was horrible or anything the like. It seems an arachne's tongue is a combination between a human's and a spider's. Unfair I say!

I quickly took a chunk out of the fresh ogre meat laid for the whole family to eat. My siblings are all eager to consume the whole thing for themselves, so I always have to move fast during gatherings or else I will be left with nothing. But I'm not so heartless, or brainless like them, that I would leave them hungry, so I always only take at most a quarter of the food.

My siblings are mostly small spiders no bigger than about twice of my dad's big hand, exceptions including me and a dozen others. These big spiders are the ones who were under the teachings of our parents, intelligent enough to evolve into arachnes, though right now we are still considered to have the intelligence of a human child. I'm recognised as the smartest one out of the group, not surprising with my human memories.

You have a bad feeling.

("Hmm? What's this?")

...AH! I forgot to close my room off using the fake wall! I made a fake wall panel using my spider web to hide it from the greedy other-worldly dungeon raiders. I only started using it on the first day when I just thought of it, but I still haven't made it a habit yet.

Quickly racing towards the dungeon again, I ignored my parent's call. I hoped nothing has happened to my stuff!

...

("NOOOOOOOOOO MY CHEST! WHY DIDN'T I SMASH IT INSTEAD?!")

...Meanwhile...

*A cold shiver ran down the irons of the wandering chest*

Author's Notes:

Once again, I have returned after... how many months now, three? I don't even know, just a long time. Can't even be bothered to check the time difference.

I can't believe it's been that long since I came back to writing this story. I must have been so down in a slump that I can't even write one sentence without thinking it's the worst one yet. However, the moment I start writing that again, I just instantly typed a page-full of a chapter and more. What the heck brain?

But I hope that continues, cause if not, I will be milling around the forums reading too much stories for my own sake and forget about this story again, not something I can morally do now: leaving something good behind because of laziness. I seriously need to change, and my school work has been a bit hectic as well, due dates and all.

Anyway, enough self-depriving ranting. I hope you enjoyed the chapter as much more than I have been writing it.

It would also do me much favours to point out any errors in spelling, grammar, or even things I got wrong about, like how I accidentally typed how the mimic was hanging with the lid open but the spider was trying to open it. That was kind of stupid of me to not realise that.