When Cuhlun woke up, he was greeted by a bizarre sight.
The massive mound of dead flies that had been on top of him was almost gone, and the one devouring it was a strange sea creature—its entire body swollen and enlarged, with a rectangular head, bulging eyes, no mouth, and instead a body that absorbed its prey directly into itself. Its grotesque form stretched all the way up to the ceiling.
Lucky for Cuhlun, it hadn't gotten to him yet.
The moment he saw it, he sprang up, fired his crossbow, then drew his dagger in his left hand and charged.
The creature immediately panicked and fled, shrinking drastically as it escaped.
But not into the darkness.
It dove into a glowing puddle of water—the very same puddle where Cuhlun and the mind eater had first encountered each other.
Cuhlun's eyes widened.
This made everything far more logical.
Back when they first discovered the glowing puddle, Cuhlun had sensed it wasn't a normal puddle and went much deeper than it appeared—but he hadn't considered something might come out of it.
And in truth, there had even been a sign. They had simply overlooked it.
Why would a random thread fall off the massive web and land in the puddle? Cuhlun had never questioned why the thread had been cut in two, or what had sliced it.
Now he knew.
The sea creature had come up to hunt, and on its way back, it had snagged on a thread.
Why hadn't he thought of that sooner? Maybe, just like the mind eater often said, Cuhlun really was an idiot.
While he stood there thinking, he heard a rumble. It was his stomach—he was starving.
The spider must currently be fighting a brutal battle in the memory realm. No matter how smart it was, a madman shouldn't be able to defeat a genius… at least, not as long as the madman stayed mad.
Which meant… while the spider was occupied, and likely about to die, all these dead flies were starting to look more and more appetizing to Cuhlun.
He had no fire with him. If he was going to eat, it had to be raw.
Reluctantly, he picked up one of the countless dead flies scattered across the floor—there were no longer enough to form a mound.
He cut off a few pieces with his dagger and stuck them onto his arrow as though skewering meat on a spit.
He tried to bring it to his mouth, but he couldn't. The disgust was still stronger.
He had eaten worse during the apocalypse. And yet…
He glanced toward the spot the mind eater had marked before leaving and headed in the opposite direction, hoping the "light source" the mind eater had trusted would turn out to be fire.
As he wandered aimlessly in the dark, he realized something unsettling: this unknown darkness behind him—untouched by the glowing light—felt safer and more comforting than before.
All the spider's years of effort… reduced to nothing in a single day.
Along with himself.
To be fair, the spider was partly to blame too. It had chosen to turn everything around it into puppets. If it had left even a few creatures alive—powerful ones—and enslaved them instead, then Cuhlun and the mind eater wouldn't have been able to use the memory realm's twisted logic against it.Even if they won, the victory would've been far from certain.
Now, Cuhlun walked with a sense of confidence—he knew he had already won.
Still, he never found a fire.
Resigned, he figured the best option was to sleep, recover, and return to controlling the spider's mind.
He closed his eyes in the pitch-black cave and activated his Avenor ability.
When he opened them again, he was in a completely dark cavern. Strangely, unlike last time, he wasn't in an ocean or a castle.
He had left from a castle… so waking up here made no sense.
As he wondered about it, a sound came from behind him. Instinctively, he used one of his old abilities—sleeping flame. The black flame illuminated the area as he spun around and hurled it toward the source before even seeing what it was.
What came from behind him… was the mind eater.
But the tattoos were gone.
The trick hadn't worked.
The mind eater had lost the battle.
When Cuhlun saw its protruding spine and the threads extending from its back, he nearly threw up, but he managed to hold it in.
He stepped back, trying to run—but this time, from the part of the cave where the light couldn't reach, the spider itself emerged.
Calling it a "spider," though, wasn't quite right.
Its face was that of an ugly, long-haired human with pitch-black eyes. It had six large legs and more than ten small ones, all unmistakably spider legs.
Its size wasn't enormous—in fact, it was probably only twice the height of the queen pill-bug.
Still, it was deadly—terrifying—and powerful.
The moment Cuhlun recognized it, he had already hit the "cancel" switch for his ability. The humanoid spider simply smiled and watched him leave. It didn't even attack.
Cuhlun only understood why once he returned to the real world.
Because the eyes that couldn't pierce the darkness could see one thing clearly:
Right in front of him—
The spider was watching him awaken.