NOVEL NEXT chapter 46
Yang Yi didn't even have time to shout a warning. Before the swarm of spiders could launch themselves from the shore, he was already scrambling to the ship's helm, wrestling with the wheel to get the [Nyxstar] moving. If that many of those eight-legged freaks got on board, it would be game over.
Luckily, it seemed spiders weren't big fans of swimming. They all skittered to a halt at the water's edge, a chittering, furious wall of legs and fangs, but they went no further.
And then, something even weirder happened. They started talking.
Spider A: "Smells so good!"
Spider B (the big one with the torso hat): "There's yummy food here!"
Spider C: "Soooo fragrant!"
Yang Yi froze. He blinked. He was pretty sure he was hearing things.
"Have I finally lost it? Am I hallucinating conversations with giant, man-eating spiders?"
He immediately messaged Suna.
"Get on deck. Now. I ~Nоvеl𝕚ght~ think the spiders are talking."
Suna, never one to miss out on new and exciting forms of horror, was on deck in a flash. Her gaze immediately locked onto the special specimen with its unique, human-torso fashion accessory.
"Did you hear that?" Yang Yi asked her, his voice a little shaky. "They're speaking perfect, standard Mandarin!"
Suna just frowned, giving him a look that was one part concern and two parts "have you been licking the weird fish again?". She hadn't heard a thing.
A jolt of realization shot through Yang Yi. It wasn't the spiders. It was him. He checked his Sanity—still in the high 80s. The only other explanation was the Spider's Kiss. It had a hidden perk: it let him understand the local dialect. Maybe he could even… communicate.
"Come on down, folks!" he called out, his voice booming with forced enthusiasm.
"Plenty of delicious food to go around! Don't forget to take some home to the family!"
He punctuated the sentence by lobbing the last of his poisoned meat parcels onto the beach.
Spider A: "Awesome!"
Spider B: "I'll take some back for Mom!"
Spider C: "Thank you, kind man!"
Yang Yi's smile widened. He made a point of tossing a few extra "goodie bags" in the direction of Spider B. He wasn't about to feel sympathy for these things. They were monsters. One of them was wearing a person as a hat, for Christ's sake. They'd probably killed dozens of players before he'd even shown up.
He threw the rest of his ammunition, receiving a chorus of grateful, chittering thanks. He gave a friendly wave as the giant, torso-hatted spider scuttled away, dragging a huge, web-wrapped doggie bag of poisoned meat behind it.
"Eat up!" Yang Yi yelled after them.
"I'll be back with more tomorrow!"
With his "humanitarian" mission complete, he steered the [Nyxstar] away from the island. He spent the next three days in a monotonous, gruesome routine. He'd fish for [Coral Cage Fish], Suna would brew up a fresh batch of poison, and he'd sail back to the island to play the role of the world's deadliest soup kitchen volunteer. He'd become so infamous on the world chat for buying up spoiled food that he'd earned a nickname: The Scavenger.
"What the hell are you doing?" a private message from Zhou Dai, the captain of the Aurora, popped up.
They were old friends, so he didn't see the point in hiding it. "I'm trying to poison an island full of monsters," he replied.
"Sounds like you're good at that sort of thing."
"Getting better. Turns out, if you kill them, they die."
On the fourth day of his poisoning campaign, he made his delivery, and for the first time, no spiders came out to greet him. The silence from the jungle was a good sign. It meant it was almost time.
That night, he was in the cabin, packing. Weapons, potions, rations, water. Suna walked in.
"I'm coming with you," she announced.
"What? No," Yang Yi frowned.
"Someone needs to watch the ship."
"Just bring the crystal ball. The island isn't that big. We won't be out of range."
He thought about arguing, but he knew it was pointless. If he said no, she'd just sneak off and follow him anyway. "Fine. But you do exactly what I say, when I say it."
They finished their preparations. Yang Yi had his flintlock, his [Corrupted Sea Serpent's Tooth], and his backup Chef's Knife. Suna had her bow, a quiver of poisoned arrows, and her witch's dagger. They both had potions and rations. They turned in early, trying to get what rest they could.
It didn't last. A few hours later, a violent vibration from the crystal ball on his bedside table jolted him awake. Another player.
He checked the sea chart. A ship named the Good Luck was making a beeline for the island. The name was common, a standard-issue ship. He tried his "peeping" skill, but with a dozen ships sharing the same name, he couldn't lock onto the right one.
"Forty knots… and heading straight for the island," he muttered.
"This isn't a coincidence. They have the coordinates."
He couldn't let them get there first. He'd invested too much. And he still had a date with whatever was at the heart of his spider problem. He woke Suna, and together, they steered the [Nyxstar] on a wide, intercepting course, keeping their distance.
The hours crawled by. As the first grey hints of dawn appeared on the horizon, Yang Yi saw it. The Good Luck. It had stopped a few miles from the shore, waiting. He grabbed his telescope and climbed the mast.
As the ship came into focus, he had to stop himself from laughing.
"Are you kidding me? No cannons? And it's only a Level 2 ship?" He felt like an idiot for being so cautious. It was a smaller, shittier version of Hu Wei's galleon.
He slid down the mast.
"Suna," he called out, a predatory grin spreading across his face.
"Full speed ahead. Let's go say hello!"