Ugh… Did I black out? Where I am? Where is the black spider? I looked around to get a better grip on my situation, but I couldn’t see a living soul in my vicinity. For some reason I could see a stairs going up, as if I have already cleared the floor.

But I did not. I just randomly passed out in a den of a giant spider, so why was I here? Did he bring me to the stairs? But why would he do so? I didn’t even know him and yet, he bowed to me for some reason and now brought me to the end of the floor.

I don’t know if I want to go further now, or go back and farm exp on this level because next floor might be too dangerous for me. Deciding that my life was more important than my progress I turned back to find a monster to defeat, but then my blood froze.

[Sphinx]
[Lvl: 1000]
[Status:]
{
HP: 100000; MP: 1000000;
Strength: 100000;
Intelligence: 100000;
Agility: 100000;
Vitality: 100000;
Defensive ability: 100000;
Offensive ability: 100000;
}
[Abilities:]
{  }
[Titles:]
{ [Gatekeeper] }
{A monster that usually guards entrances. It is said that this monster is unbeatable in a fight, and to get past it you need to answer one of it’s riddles. Avoid fighting if possible and if you don’t answer it’s riddles properly try to run away, because they can’t move far from their posts. Danger rank: S}

The appraisal result was probably the function of my greater appraisal translating the monster’s strength into numerical value, but seriously why would be something like that on a third floor of random dungeon?

I give up, I’m going forward, if I die, I will die fighting, not getting one-sidely slaughtered. When I turned around again, I saw a puddle of blood with a single translucent crystal, and a monster body next to it, but the blood definitely didn't belong to it.
I remembered this crystal, because the ones that gave me skills looked exactly the same.

As for the monster, I had no idea what it was, but food is food so I decided to eat it anyway. It was another disgusting meal, but I could bear with it if I ate it fast enough. Maybe I could find something edible on higher floors?

When I finished eating I finally touched the crystal.

[Obtained skill [Thread control lvl. 1] ]
[Conditions fulfilled. Gained title [Thread user] ]

Now that’s some useful stuff. I recently started my adventure with thread as a weapon, so getting this title was like being acknowledged for it, and the skill that made me obtain the title was even more delicious.

It wasn’t like I knew what it did, but it sounded good so I was going to try it. I made a single string and tried controlling it as the skill said and it was a success. Well, for the most part. The tread really did move according to my will, but it wasn’t on the level that I could fully change direction of my swing midway.

Still it would be useful in confusing enemies when I use my weapon on them and it suddenly starts moving in a weird fashion and if I think long about it, I might find some other uses for this skill. I could for example try making clothes for myself. I didn’t need them of course but the idea seemed appealing.

Okay, enough celebrating, let’s actually move on. Because the stairs were right before my face it would be a waste of time to keep staying on the same floor. The stairs were a nice change for me, because they returned to being wood, while this whole floor was made out of cold stone.

>>>

Were they always this long? Previous ones took me about ten minutes each to traverse, but this time I was going for about half an hour and still had no end in sight. Since I was climbing quite fast, the stairs must reach the heights that I had no idea were possible.

I heard a slight cracking sound and then suddenly the stairs under me flattened into a ramp. Normally one would slip and fall down, but since I was a spider I just clung to the floor. It surprised me, but it was a trap meant for those who walked on two legs, not for ones like me that used eight.

I continued climbing upwards, and then heard a loud rumbling. This time something was rolling down from the summit, and it certainly was something heavy. Ignoring the sense of dangers, I climbed onto the ceiling using the walls and continued my stride.

After a couple of seconds a huge round rock passed by me and I descended onto the flat ramp again since climbing it was less draining than having to additionally stick to the ceiling. I was strangely composed, avoiding everything thrown at me, but shouldn’t I be more worried?

Weren’t the stairs supposed to be safe points? Or these were special? They certainly were much longer than normal and could be the part of the previous floor, but since it seemed like there wasn't a lot of things that could be called a danger for me here it shouldn’t be bad at all.

Another rumbling sound, I again climbed onto the ceiling and avoided the rock. This was getting pretty boring and I would need a break if this continued any longer. A bit later I heard the sound of something running. It was kind of loud but I prepared my thread anyway to confront it.

Since the stairway was pretty wide I had enough room for swinging and I wasn’t afraid of hitting the walls. Soon I saw a single rabbit running towards me at astounding speed, but I reacted in time and fired of a single [Slash] that decapitated it.

The rabbit disappeared into mist, and I didn’t level up. Okay now I am worried that something might be wrong with this stairway.