The next morning, Arthur opened his eyes and stared at the entrance of his cave with a grim expression.
The fears he had pondered during the night had prevented him from sleeping well. He kept waking up whenever he heard a strange sound.
"Tsk, I don't think I'll feel at ease until I figure out the source of this danger I'm sensing."
He let out a long sigh, forced himself up from the warm pile of straw, and lazily stepped out of his den.
Then he took out the corpse of the bull he had hunted the previous day from the "Dimensional Storage" and devoured it entirely, leaving nothing but the bones.
After ranking up, his appetite had grown significantly, and his stomach capacity had expanded as well, allowing him to eat monsters larger than himself in a single meal.
Once he finished breakfast, he licked his lips in satisfaction and stored the useless remains of the bull back into the "Dimensional Storage" to dispose of them later.
He wasn't about to dirty the front of his home. That didn't feel right.
In a way, his concern for keeping his surroundings clean was pointless. He was a wild wolf, after all.
Yet it was these small, simple habits that highlighted his human identity and set him apart from other beasts.
Abandoning them would mean abandoning his true self and his origins.
Normally, Arthur followed a fixed morning routine. First, he ate whatever meat he had left.
Then he headed to the stream to drink and wash himself, and after that, he went hunting.
But since his objective was different today, he skipped the hunting part and began searching for the source of the mysterious danger.
His senses were working at full capacity as he made his way through the forest with extreme caution.
Every step he took was carefully calculated to avoid any kind of hidden or unexpected traps or ambushes.
After traveling a distance of more than two miles, he suddenly stopped. He looked around warily and wondered in confusion,
'This path looks very familiar... I've definitely passed through here before.'
It didn't take long for him to remember why the place felt so familiar.
His eyes widened, and he muttered in shock,
'Wait, isn't that terrifying spider's nest somewhere around here?'
His body trembled involuntarily as the horrifying memory resurfaced.
Without any hesitation, he turned around, intending to leave.
But he stopped, cast a quick glance back, and thought.
'Speaking of which, will I be able to see the spider's rank now that my own rank has increased?
No, I can't go there.
I barely escaped once, and that doesn't mean I can just go back and mess with it again. It must be the source of the danger I'm sensing.'
He was truly curious, yet he wasn't foolish enough to walk toward his doom. His goal was clear: identify the source of the danger. And now that he knew it was the spider, there was no reason to stay any longer.
So he turned back toward his den.
But after taking only a few steps, he suddenly froze in place. He furrowed his brows strangely, and wondered in astonishment:
'What are these smells? They're so strange, even more than that, they seem distinct, unnatural.'
He couldn't understand them, nor could he comprehend the nature of these scents that suddenly hit him.
For some reason, a shiver ran down his spine. Within seconds, he began to hear the scraping of metal and faint footsteps approaching.
His senses screamed in alarm, warning him of imminent danger. He quickly retreated, tail tucked between his legs.
He wanted to flee, but hesitated, not out of fear, but because he wanted to see what was coming, or rather, what creatures were coming.
As a last resort, he hid behind some bushes before it was too late, suppressing his presence as much as possible.
In his mind, he silently prayed that his boldness wouldn't make him someone's lunch.
'Could it be?' A single thought echoed in his mind, but he couldn't fully accept it.
He peeked at the area ahead, waiting anxiously for the approaching creatures.
His heart pounded violently, as if it might burst from the tension.
Then, about three hundred feet away, they appeared—five strange beings standing on two legs, wearing metal armor that scraped and clanked with every step they took.
"They're really humans."
His thoughts froze, and his heart stopped for a brief moment. He couldn't believe his eyes.
His mouth fell open as he quickly examined them using the "Evaluation" Skill, just to make sure his senses weren't deceiving him.
[ ??? Human ]
[ ??? Human]
[ C-rank Human ]
[…]
The abundance of question marks didn't bother him at all. The word Human alone seized all his attention.
His emotions became a tangled mess, but one thing was certain, a heavy weight lifted from his chest.
Ever since arriving in this world, he had feared he might never see his former kind again.
A small, nostalgic smile appeared on his face, and his calm returned.
He carefully observed the few humans ahead of him, and just as he had hoped, they weren't much different from the humans of his previous world.
Aside from their unnaturally strong bodies, their heavy metal armor and helmets that concealed most of their figures, and their primitive weapons—swords and axes—everything else felt normal.
Suddenly, one of the humans turned his head and looked in his direction. His clear blue eyes met the human's dark, mysterious gaze.
Arthur immediately hid, trembling as he cursed under his breath.
"Damn it. I got carried away and forgot that I'm a damn wolf. Humans would kill me the moment they see me."
He held his breath and prayed with all his heart that they wouldn't attack him.
He still wanted to keep his life and had absolutely no desire to be turned into a luxury rug or a fancy scarf.
Luckily for him, the humans paid him no attention and continued on their way.
Once they had moved far enough away, he let out a long, heavy sigh of relief.
"I'm safe for now, but aren't those humans heading straight toward that spider? Are they planning to hunt it or something?"
Despite the question, his curiosity didn't flare up. He had no intention of staying to find out.
Without hesitation, he hurried back toward his safe den, his emotions a tangled mix of excitement, tension, fear, anxiety—and most of all, happiness.
…
On the other side, unlike Arthur, who saw encountering humans as an unbelievable experience, the spider woman opened her eyes the moment she sensed their presence. This time, she was fully awake.
Her beautiful face twisted into something savage.
Veins bulged, her forehead filled with eyes, and four long, curved fangs replaced her neat white teeth.
In a rough voice, like metal scraping against metal, she said:
"Filthy humans… how dare they interrupt my slumber. I'll kill them."