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Volume 5 Chapter 3 Part 1

Chapter 3: Escape

it was a dark forest.

The distance between trees is not that narrow. There were many broad-leaved trees with rounded shades, while some of them had already lost their leaves. However, the thick white threads that stretched from branch to branch of the trees were blocking the sunlight from reaching all the way to the ground.

These were all spider’s webs. Since a long time ago, this forest was inhabited by a large swarm of giant spiders that were projections from another world. That is why it is called the Forest of Webs.

The giant spiders are said to prey on all types of animals. Of course, people are no exception from that rule, so once you were inside of that forest, you needed to proceed through it cautiously and have eyes all around your head at all times.

「I’m worried about the spiders, but at least we should be safe from our pursuers right now, right? 」

Siluca asked Irvin.

「I don’t feel any signs of anyone’s presence anywhere near us at the moment. 」

「There are no sounds either. I don’t even smell anything. 」

Irvin answered, and the twin Werewolf girls continue.

「That’s good to hear. 」

Siluca sighed in relief.
It seems that the pursuers from the Rossini family have not entered this forest after them after all. However, they already know that Pederico Rossini has an Artist who is as good as Irvin – an Assassin – in his service, so it’s still too early for them to be letting their guards down.

「So, what are we going to do now? 」

Siluca called out to Theo.

「We’re going to be hiding in this forest for a while, so let’s look for a place that’s going to serve as our base of operations for the time being. 」

「I’ve never been deep into this forest before. 」

Theo says with a clouded expression.

「Have you been here before?「

「Well… 」

Theo answered her vaguely, since he didn’t want to talk about the time that he spend on the island all that much, and Siluca was considerate enough not to pry into it. In time, he’ll tell her about it himself if he’ll be willing to.

「Let’s ask Luna and Emma to look for it. For the time being, it would be nice if there was a water source nearby so that we could make do without relying on rainwater and dew too much. 」

Siluca said while looking back at the twin Werewolf sisters.

「Leave it to us! 」

When the two nodded their heads, they transformed into their wolf forms and ran away while getting entangled with each other in a playful way.

It’d be dangerous to move blindly, so let’s wait for them to come back here. 」

Siluca proposed as she lowered her luggage to the ground. She took out a water container and passed it around to everyone.

In the meantime, Irvin quickly cooked the ingredients that he bought in the city and puts them all on a plate. He used meat, fish and fresh vegetables, since these were the products that could not be kept for longer periods of time. And once they’re going to run out of those, they’re going to have to switch to the preserved food like biscuits and cheese.

「We need to collect food somewhere… 」

Siluca muttered to herself. Now that they’ve run out of money, they can no longer go buy food for themselves anywhere, so hunting is their only remaining option.

「Most of the animals in this forest seem to be eaten by spiders. That being said, I haven’t seen a single one since we entered the forest. 」

Aishela remarked.

「Now that you mention it, I cannot even hear the chirping of birds… 」

Siluca tried to look for the birds among the trees above them, but she couldn’t spot a single one.

「But if spiders ate all of the other animals, then that should mean that there should still be some fruits or mushrooms left somewhere, right? 」

After finishing her prayer of thanks to The Only God, Priscilla looked around and asked.

「I think there might be some left here and there, but… 」
But the problem with them is that they have no way of knowing which fruits and mushrooms form this forest are actually edible and which ones might be poisonous.

She doesn’t know what kind of edible fruit trees and mushrooms there are in Sistina.

「I’ll go look for them! 」

Priscilla said so and stood up.

「It’s dangerous to move around alone, you know? 」

「Don’t worry, I won’t go too far away. 」

Siluca tried to warn her, but despite that, Priscilla continued walking forward. But when she’s taken five steps, suddenly there was something popping out of the ground before her.

「Ah…! 」

And with just that one scream, Priscilla disappeared.

A giant spider jumped out of the ground and grabbed her.

The next moment, everyone began to move.

Irvin peeled off the ground first. There was a hole in it, which was covered with a net and cleverly hidden by covering it with soil and leaves.

「So paying attention to what was above us was not enough after all. 」

Siluca studied natural history at the Magic University, but she doesn’t know the ecology of all living creatures. Moreover, projections from other worlds can have completely different ecology from creatures in this world, thus rendering the acquired knowledge useless.

Now that its trap was disabled, a huge spider jumped out of the ground as if it was angry at having its hard work undone.

like it was angry. Then it raises its front legs and made a sound that sounded like a cross between a hiss and an electric shock. It is so big that they had to lift their heads up to see it completely.

It had huge hairy fangs, eight legs, four eyes, and an ugly head. From those hairy fangs, a liquid was constantly dripping to the ground. That liquid was most likely poison.

「Moving out! 」

Aishela jumped at the giant spider with her pole weapon already in her hands… but then she came to a screeching halt while she was still in the air.

「W-What the hell?! 」

Aishela, who was now hanging upside down in the air, let out a voice of confusion.

Another gigantic spider appeared through the treetop webs before she knew it, and caught her with its threads as if it was lassoing cattle, catching onto her leg. Aishela continued to struggle, but she just couldn’t set herself free. Eventually she stopped resisting and simply hung loosely upside down.

「I’m your opponent! 」

Theo stood in front of the spider and raised his shield and sword to provoke it. The spider reacted, swinging its leg down and running swiftly at Theo.

Theo was pushed back a few steps by the giant body that he was trying to block from advancing with his shield, but his own body got pinned under the shield, and one of the legs of the spider had struck the sword that he was holding onto, making it fly to the side where he couldn’t reach it.

In other words, Theo’s attempt at attacking the spider didn’t do any damage to it at all, and with its body putting more and more weight onto the shield Theo was under, it hissed at him, ready to attack.

Theo clenched his teeth and tried to endure the growing pain and shake off another one of the spider’s legs, but she couldn’t do much with his blade so firmly out of his reach.

Siluca started imagining the Ethereal Salamanda in her head to assist everyone with her magic. But then…

「AAAAAAHHHHHHHHH!!!!! 」

An out-of-this-world scream erupted throughout the surrounding area.

The magical image that was about to be completed turned pure white, as if it had been overwritten with plaster. Concerned about the source of the voice, Siluca ran to the side of the hole in the ground and peered inside.

Crawling on top of Priscilla’s body, there were dozens of spiderlings which were about the size of a human hand.

When Priscilla got caught by a spider, she didn’t know what was happening to her, but now she managed to come back to her senses, at arguably the worst possible moment.

When she saw what kind of situation she was currently in, she screamed. And after screaming so loudly, she seemed to have lost her mind and fainted from the shock, because her entire body just went limp.

「Your Highness Bargary! 」

Siluca cried out to her own shadow that stretched out under her feet.

「The spiders have appeared! 」

「What did you say?! 」

In response to Siluca’s call the Cait Sith of Tir na Nog emerged from her shadow.