How the hell am I supposed to fight those?

My head craned back, and I stared up at the hairy creatures with glittering eyes and pincer-like fangs shining with poison.

Three of them were very, very familiar to me, and one of them, while different, was also extremely familiar. Three brown, average-looking spiders and one glistening black spider.

A shiver ran down my form. There are only two spiders any American should really be intimately familiar with, whether they’ve seen them in person or not, and that is Black Widows and Brown Recluses.

All of those spiders we fought suddenly made me shiver even more. I tried preventing it, but I took several steps back. So, too, did my two friends, both staying behind me.

Had Vincent or I gotten bitten by those spiders… Had Lawrence and I gotten bitten…

Air became slightly harder to pull into my lungs.

‘Why do you kill our kind?’ A loud and deep voice echoed out. I had the oddest feeling it wasn’t being spoken aloud.

“Oh, you aren’t dungeon monsters, are you?” I realized, feeling both guilt and terror. I could feel the cold sweat slicking my form, and I knew I was shaking. Tears filled my eyes at the thought of all the spiders I’d killed.

Sure, they were brown recluses, one of the only truly dangerous ones in America, but they were still living creatures. They didn’t deserve to die.

‘Dungeon? Monster? Is that what this place of infinite food and thought is called? A dungeon?’

I still cried over the two toads I’d accidentally stepped on when I’d just turned eighteen, a solid decade ago. I still felt guilt and misery at the thought that I’d destroyed two innocent, beautiful lives…

A cold feeling filled me, and had I not been staring up at the spiders, I certainly would have looked down and hunched my shoulders. As it was, all of my fear left me, and I just felt miserable.

I was a murderer. A killer of thousands. What sort of monster was I?

My heart twisted painfully, my throat tightened thickly, and tears fell down my face.

Now wasn’t the time to cry.

Despite my attempt to stop, I found I couldn’t as I stared up at the beautiful—if terrifying—creatures above me.

“Oh, I’m so sorry,” I said in a pained breath, the awe and guilt clear in my tone though I knew no one else heard it.

‘You thought we were infinite food as well?’

“Yes. I am so, so sorry,” I apologized again, louder.

“Wh-who are you talking to?” Lawrence asked, his voice weak, a tremor to his speech.

I didn’t look away from the beautiful creatures above me. I stared at their long legs, the Black Widow’s legs not looking hairy compared to the Brown Recluses’. Their glistening eyes were full of intelligence.

Did I kill such intelligence? Me?

They would never respawn.

A hollow feeling filled me at the knowledge.

‘Will you keep killing us?’

“Huh? No! No, of course not!” I said, stepping forward and feeling really guilty when they all scrambled back, “No, just… You know that infinite food? We’re here to make sure it never leaves these tunnels. Never goes outside. It’s a danger to everything out there.”

‘If we keep them inside, will you go outside and never return?’

“Well, yeah,” I agreed plainly, glancing at each of the spiders, “Uh, which of you is speaking, by the way?”

The entire dungeon shook. I scrambled to keep my feet, bat clattering to the floor. Lawrence fell and Vincent and I clung to each other in our attempts to stay up.

A very, very, very big leg reached down. Thicker than the four spiders that had come down and definitely bigger than the spider that had been in the boss room, each hair on the brown leg was as thick as a bus, and the leg itself almost took up the entirety of the cavern.

Lawrence shrieked, the shrill scream echoing around the cave as he scrambled back, sprinting for the small tunnels.

I just stared up and up and up, the darkness shrouding where the spider came from. Not even a glimmer of light to show where its eyes were.

“Oh, there must be a giant cave up there,” I said reasonably.

My voice was very faint, and my tone was almost wispy in how casual it sounded. I felt very dumb for saying it, though.

“Well, hello,” I greeted.

At first, I thought maybe the Boss Spider was the father of all the recluses in the caverns, but I had a feeling it was this thing.

Wow, we never had a chance, did we?

The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

‘We simply wish to be left alone.’

Well, yeah. Most recluses were called recluses for a reason, right? Because they liked to be left alone? Didn’t really want to deal with anything or anyspider else?

“Well fuck, man, so do I,” I agreed, “These random portals appeared and now Earth is being invaded and stuff? Like damn, I just want to go to sleep and maybe go back to work after gaining awesome superpowers. Now I have to deal with, like… way too much.”

“Stop having smalltalk with the telepathic spider!” Lawrence shrieked, his high-pitched tone not sounding at all masculine. Hardly sounding human, honestly. Ow. My ears.

Poor Vincent, his ears don’t even have the protection of a helmet.

I sighed, shrugging and looking up at the giant, “Fine, fine. I have a question for you before we leave! You hail from the same place we do, a place called Earth. That place is being invaded. If the time comes where the Earth is about to be destroyed, is it okay if I come back here and ask for your help? You’d have to leave the infinite food, but you could always return, or go into a bigger portal afterward.”

The entire dungeon rumbled.

‘You dare ask for help after killing so many of my kind?’

“I’m not asking for help for humanity, or for myself,” I responded plainly, “I’m asking on behalf of your kind. On behalf of every creature on Earth aside from humans. Birds, other spiders, grasshoppers. Your home. Chances are if the Earth is about to be destroyed me and mine won’t be a very common sight anyway.”

A very long silence stretched out as I stared up at the giant leg. I grew dizzy with the time, almost feeling sick. Lawrence passed out, and Vincent was leaning heavily against me.

‘You ask too much.’

“I only ask that you fulfill the duty you owe the planet you were born on. You don’t need to keep my species alive, but abandoning your own species? Abandoning all other spiders out there?”

Determination filled me.

“Call me a greedy monster who kills indiscriminately, but I would never abandon my own species. Even now I’m not just fighting for humans. If Earth is fully invaded, spiders will perish too. I’ve taken it upon myself to fight for Earth. My beautiful, brilliant, amazing planet that has given such amazing forms of life. I mean look at you, you’re amazing! Don’t you wish to see the beauty of others of your kind flourish in the environment you were born to be a part of?”

The dizziness grew, and I found myself panting as the arms around me loosened. Vincent slumped to the ground, face pale and eyes glassy as he gasped for air.

“I don’t see why you’re so keen on refusing. I’ll only come to you if humanity, if my kind, fails to protect our home. Fails to protect your home.”

I couldn’t breathe. I staggered, tripping over Vincent. The entire world spun, and my entire body was shaking just keeping me on my hands and knees. I didn’t bother with the effort, falling and rolling to my back, staring up at the ceiling.

‘Leave. If you return, expect to die.’

Crack. A spider web of lines crisscrossed my visor.

A blur of brown and black shifted and moved, dragging upward. The dizzy feeling I felt vanished, and I could breathe easily. Taking a moment to breathe, I sat up.

“What the hell do you think I’d come back here for?” I muttered to myself, voice not leaving my helmet, “Of course I’d expect to die if I came back here. I’d probably already be dying, only barely able to gather the breath to request your help.”

What a weird thing to say. If you return, expect to die. I would only return if I considered myself already dead. Standing up, I grabbed my bat. Fiddling with it, I put it in my backpack. Grabbing Vincent, who was still awake, I slung his arm over my shoulder.

Then, with a great heave, I lifted up Lawrence.

He wasn’t very heavy, but both Vincent and Lawrence made my every step feel like the weight of the world was on my shoulders.

My newfound determination to keep the world safe came with the soul-deep pain that I wouldn’t get to rest until it was over. Not that my attempts to get rest had ever worked out, before.

Three months.

I could live for three months.

Besides, there were awesome powers!

Thud, shhh, thud, shh. The sound of my footsteps were echoing throughout the empty hollows.

Awesome powers were definitely a good reason to stay alive. Maybe one day I could leap over buildings! That would be amazing, it would feel so freeing.

I bet the air would taste oh-so-fresh if I could. Sadly, I could hardly jump three feet vertically at the moment, though my horizontal leap was quite far.

Physical and mental exhaustion paired within my form, and soon my thoughts were only focused on taking the next step. Focused on dragging these two strangers to the exit.

I couldn’t see, sometimes slamming into walls or staggering over loose stones. Eventually, though, the glowing white light that signified the outside reached my eyes.

My pace increased as I dragged myself ever onward. Cold air hit my thighs and calves, my arms not fairing much better as blood-and-filth-covered skin showed through the torn and sliced gaps.

Infinite darkness and blank white became several shades of gray and blue. Amazing, beautiful, graceful rain poured down on me, and it was frigid.

The only vehicles in front of us were military vehicles, and the only people around were soldiers.

“Oh, I recognize you,” I mentioned to a guy with dirty blond hair and muddy brown eyes. He was one of the ones at the other dungeon entrance, wasn’t he?

“Yeah, we just met earlier today,” The man said, shifting, “Is that portal gonna close a few minutes after you leave, too?”

I shook my head, reeling at the information. The dungeon closed? It was still the same day?

“No, I don’t think so. There’s a lot left in there, but the spiders are taking care of it.”

“… Spiders?”

“Yeah, the creatures inside are being farmed by spiders. It’s fucking terrifying. I’ll upload it later.”

“Oh! I saw you uploaded the first videos. Haven’t had time to check them out, but next meal I will,” The man said, gesturing, “The sergeant wants to talk to you.”

“Huh?” I glanced toward where the soldier gestured, staring at a giant bear of a man with a dark buzzcut and fierce brown eyes.

He wasn’t looking this way. Sighing heavily, I moved. Vincent was still half awake, and Lawrence seemed no closer to waking up. Blood was coming from their noses and eyes. I bet the warm tears going down my face that I felt weren’t made of salt and water.

Did the recluse poison us somehow?

No, no, he wouldn’t have told us to leave if he had. No, something else happened. Magic pressure of some sort?

Was that why I felt so dizzy?

Ugh.

At the thought of feeling dizzy, nausea filled me. I took several long, deep breaths through my mouth, breathing out through my nose. It helped, kind of, and after about half of a minute the man I was slowly shuffling toward saw me.

As I was only about halfway there, I was very grateful when he walked toward us.

Sadly, his expression wasn’t a kind one, and the rifle he held was leveled at me when he stopped ten feet away.