"Seriously, what is your problem?" yelped Balyn as a spider slashed at his legs with long, hooked forelimbs. He danced aside, just out of reach, then flung himself forward as another one pounced at him, its rock-like head descending like a spear point. "I like spiders! You guys eat flies and all kinds of creepy bugs. Like those things with all the eyes back in Byrgenwerth. Go up there, spin some webs, and eat them!"
The spiders did not seem to accept his suggestion. They continued to scuttle after him across the surprisingly firm surface of the moonlit lake. One spat a glob of webbing at him (and come to think of it, wasn't spider silk supposed to come out of the other end?) that he only just dodged.
"Well, this isn't getting us anywhere," he decided. Balyn fired his blunderbuss at the nearest spider, the cluster of pellets knocking it twitching over onto its back, and he dashed forward through the gap, sprinting right at his real target. His saw cleaver crackled with electricity, sparks set alight by the coarse bolt paper he'd rubbed on it. He slashed the serrated blade down at the giant bug's unprotected side—
—and Rom spun, far faster than something of her giant bulk and lack of any meaningful legs ought to have been able to move, so that the blade fell onto the stone-like latticework of her head. The rock was as hard as it looked; Balyn's saw clanked off—indeed, it was almost jolted out of his hand.
The small spider that pounced on him when he staggered at last did him the mercy of taking him out before Rom flopped her full body weight over onto where his disappearing corpse had been standing.
~X X X~
"Welcome home, good hunter," the Doll greeted Balyn on his return to the Hunter's Dream.
"I'm back," he said, somewhat obviously.
"What is it you desire?"
"Is there any bug repellent around here?"
She blinked in confusion. "Bug…repellent?"
Huh. I didn't know she had articulated eyelids, Balyn thought. Out loud he said, "Yeah, I'm having trouble with that weird spider in Byrgenwerth. Though it's really more like a giant centipede or a pillbug or that kind of thing, even though all its little friends are definitely arachnids."
"I…understand? I think?" the Doll said, clearly not understanding a thing but doubtless wanting to protect herself against being given further insights into the Hunter's mind.
Balyn waved a hand.
"Eh, it's okay. That thing's just too vacuous to know when to give up. But I'm not going to quit. Rom may be stubborn, but there's no way she's as hard-headed as me!"
"You have my complete confidence in that, good hunter."
