Transmigration: I Made A Deal With A Man in Yellow

One month later.

The sky was filled with dark clouds, and the air reeked of human and monster blood mixed together.

Corpses lay scattered everywhere.

Some belonged to humans, others to monsters. Some were missing limbs, some had chunks of flesh torn from their bodies, while others had large holes carved through them.

Deep inside Section 2 of the Lands of Horrors, a group of armored adventurers was fighting against giant spiders in the middle of a forest.

Dozens upon dozens of spiders rushed toward them with loud, aggressive screeches.

"Mia, retreat and go support Angela and Sharkie!" shouted a tall, broad-shouldered man with short black hair and green eyes.

Lucas drove his greatsword into a spider’s abdomen and ripped it open.

The creature collapsed onto the ground with a screech and died.

Another spider immediately jumped at him and sank its fangs toward his arm, but the fangs broke the moment they struck his skin.

His flesh had hardened like steel.

Lucas punched the spider and sent it flying backward into several others.

Mia, a girl with brown hair and blue eyes, nodded.

"Okay, Lucas!"

Mia dashed toward a woman with a crown of orange hair who was firing arrows at the spiders.

The arrows changed direction according to Angela’s will, curving through the air toward their targets.

Mia summoned a short black dagger from her inventory and jumped onto the back of a spider that had been preparing to attack Angela.

She drove the dagger deep into the spider’s cephalothorax.

"Screeeeech!"

The spider shrieked and violently tried to shake Mia off.

Before it could, Mia placed one hand against its body.

Suddenly, the spider slammed into the ground as though gravity had multiplied several times over.

Its body struck the earth so hard that its abdomen burst open, spilling pale blue blood across the ground and killing it instantly.

"Thanks, Mia."

Angela smiled before firing another arrow toward a tree.

Just before the arrow could strike the trunk, it suddenly changed direction and curved around it, piercing a spider hiding behind the tree directly through the eye.

Several spiders jumped high into the air toward the two girls.

Angela calmly loaded three arrows onto her bow at once and fired them upward.

Each arrow struck a spider directly in the head.

Their heavy bodies crashed lifelessly onto the ground beside them.

"I’ve got your back," Mia said with a nod before dashing toward Sharkie.

Sharkie wore deep red robes that matched his red hair and eyes.

He was the mage of the party.

Sharkie raised his wooden staff above his head.

Mana began gathering in the air above him, forming seven small spheres of fire.

Then he pointed his staff toward the incoming spiders.

"Go."

The fireballs launched forward, their scorching heat distorting the air around them.

The first spider they struck was immediately engulfed in flames before exploding into pieces.

Boom! Boom! Boom!

"Screech! Screech!"

The ground shook as the fireballs slammed into the earth and burned several spiders to death.

"There are too many of them! At this rate, we’re going to get swarmed!" Sharkie shouted while continuing to fire more magic.

"Mia, can you scout ahead?" he asked.

"On it!"

Mia quickly climbed a tree and reached one of the higher branches to get a better view of the battlefield.

She had expected the number of spiders to have decreased significantly by now.

It hadn’t.

They had come to this forest for a mission to exterminate giant spiders, but along the way, they had been ambushed by a group of rogue adventurers famous for killing inexperienced adventurers.

Unfortunately for the rogues, Mia’s party weren’t newbies and had easily defeated them.

However, their fight had awakened the spiders inside a nearby nest.

The creatures had been disturbed from their sleep and had been attacking them nonstop ever since.

And judging by their numbers, the spiders weren’t going to stop anytime soon.

That meant there was most likely a queen inside the nest.

And if there was a Spider Queen...

They would eventually have to face a Greater Beast.

They were only Ascendants.

Their mana wasn’t infinite, and exhaustion would eventually catch up to them.

It wasn’t worth the risk.

It was suicide.

"There are still too many!" Mia shouted from above. "I think we should retreat while we still can! As much as I’d like to get paid for this mission, our lives are more important!"

Lucas, who was fighting beside a lean man wielding a spear, nodded.

The spearman released bursts of compressed wind with every thrust, punching holes straight through the spiders.

"We retreat, then!" Lucas shouted. "John and I will slow them down!"

John twisted the shaft of his spear before thrusting it forward.

A short burst of compressed wind exploded from the spearhead and tore apart the incoming webs fired by the spiders.

Lucas hardened his skin again and slammed his shoulder into another spider, sending it flying backward.

Angela slowly began retreating while continuing to fire arrows into the air.

The arrows curved downward and rained upon the spiders, piercing their bodies.

Still standing on one of the tree branches, Mia suddenly sensed danger approaching from the left.

Her Gift, [Predator’s Instinct], heightened her instincts whenever something nearby intended to harm her.

She immediately ducked.

A spider flew past her, its open fangs snapping through the space where her head had been only moments earlier.

"Disgusting, sneaky spider!"

Mia flipped her dagger in her hand and threw it toward the spider’s abdomen.

"Screech!"

The creature shrieked in pain.

Mia threw several more daggers and finished it off.

She then jumped from the tree and joined Angela and Sharkie as they continued retreating.

Angela glanced at her.

"You almost got your head chewed off by a spider."

Mia smiled.

"Don’t worry. Nothing escapes my senses."

Sharkie simply shook his head and kept running.

A few moments later, Lucas and John caught up with them.

"Good job, guys. Now let’s get out of here."

Everyone nodded and started running.

Their mana reserves were already running low, and they had suffered several injuries, but thankfully, none of them were serious.

Mia looked over her shoulder and immediately felt chills run down her body.

The spiders were still chasing them.

"Ughhh! Can those fucking disgusting things just stop chasing us?!"

"Language, Mia!" Angela shouted beside her.

"This is definitely not the time to be worrying about language! Just run!"

"Huss... huss... huss..."

Sharkie was breathing heavily as he ran as fast as he could ahead of them.

Mia could swear that was the first time she had ever seen a mage run that fast.

Eventually, the spiders stopped chasing them.

Relief immediately washed over the group, but they didn’t stop running until they were a safe distance away.

Then Mia suddenly froze.

[Predator’s Instinct] screamed danger.

Something dangerous was extremely close.

She couldn’t see anything.

She couldn’t sense any monsters nearby either.

Still, she trusted her Gift.

"Guys! I sense danger, and it’s really close!"

"Where?" Lucas asked, his voice filled with concern.

"I don’t know, but—"

A brief whistling sound suddenly reached their ears.

Everyone stopped in their tracks.

Everyone except Sharkie.

He kept running forward.

"Hey! Sharkie, stop—"

His head suddenly separated cleanly from his neck.

It fell to the ground beside his body.

Blood poured from the stump and painted the forest floor red.

He was dead.

Everyone’s eyes widened in horror at the sudden death of their companion.

"Nooooo! Sharkie!"

Mia screamed and tried to rush forward, but Lucas grabbed the back of her collar and pulled her away.

"What are you doing?! Let me go! Don’t you see that Sharkie just died?!"

"Calm down, Mia! Look!"

Lucas wore a bitter expression as he pointed his greatsword forward.

He slowly lifted the weapon.

Then the blade suddenly stopped.

It had struck something.

Even though there appeared to be nothing in front of them.

Everyone looked closer.

A thin strand of web stretched across their path.

It was so thin that they never would’ve noticed it if Lucas’s sword hadn’t touched it.

That was how Sharkie had died.

Since he had been running ahead of them, the web had reached him first.

If the rest of them had run only a little farther...

They would’ve died as well.

Everyone was shaken by the death of their companion.

But what the web meant terrified them even more.

Only one type of spider could produce webs that thin and sharp.

A Spider Queen.

They didn’t even have time to mourn Sharkie’s death.

Something suddenly dropped from the trees.

It grabbed John.

Then disappeared back into the canopy.

"John!"

Both girls screamed.

Mia threw daggers upward while Angela fired arrows into the trees, desperately trying to save him.

They failed.

"Ahhhhhhh—!"

John’s scream abruptly stopped.

A few seconds later, only his spear fell from the trees and struck the ground.

"Stay behind me!" Lucas shouted.

He positioned himself in front of both girls and raised his greatsword.

Mia was terrified.

Tears streamed down her face, but she still gripped her dagger tightly.

Angela aimed her bow with trembling hands.

They couldn’t simply run.

There were most likely more invisible threads surrounding them.

Trying to escape blindly would only get them killed.

Then Angela was taken.

A thin web suddenly wrapped around her left leg and cut into her flesh before violently dragging her across the ground.

"Ahhhh! Help me!"

"No! No, no! I’m not letting you go!"

Mia grabbed Angela’s arm and tried to pull her back.

That turned out to be a terrible mistake.

The web around Angela’s leg tightened.

It sliced straight through her flesh and severed her left leg before Lucas could cut the strand with his greatsword.

"Ughhh!"

Angela screamed as blood sprayed from the stump.

They didn’t even get the chance to stop the bleeding.

Another strand of web wrapped around Angela’s body.

Then tightened.

Her body was sliced in half.

She died instantly, her eyes still wide with fear.

"Wahhh! Noooo! Why, Angela?!"

Mia couldn’t stop herself from crying as her old friend was killed right in front of her.

She quickly turned toward Lucas.

Only to find him lying headless on the ground. His body rested in a pool of his own blood.

Mia’s scream echoed throughout the forest and her legs gave out.

She fell backward onto the ground, landing between Lucas and Angela’s pools of blood.

Her entire body trembled uncontrollably.

She had completely lost the will to fight.

What kind of monster could wipe out her entire party in only a few minutes?

Then something descended from the trees.

A massive black spider.

It was far larger than any of the spiders they had fought earlier, and a strange symbol could be seen on its abdomen.

The Spider Queen.

A Greater Beast.

The creature stared at Mia with all eight of its eyes before releasing a loud screech.

Then it slowly began moving toward her.

Mia didn’t have the courage to fight.

She didn’t even have the strength to run.

She simply sat there defenseless, waiting for her fate.

She closed her eyes.

At the very least...

She prayed that it would be painless.

But the pain never came.

The spider didn’t attack.

Confused, Mia slowly opened her eyes.

Someone was standing in front of her.

A boy.

His back faced her, and long snow-white hair fell from a simple ponytail behind his head.

"Are you okay?"

"Ah... ahh... AHH..."

For some reason, Mia couldn’t stop the relief that washed over her at the boy’s presence.

"Don’t worry," he said calmly.

"It’ll end soon."

Then he moved.