“The swelling won’t go down. You’re seriously underestimating spider venom, aren’t you?”
“…Huh?”
“You’re dumber than you look. Then again, I guess that explains why you’re wandering around without even realizing what kind of shape your body’s in.”
What the hell is he talking about now…?
“W-Wait… Sage, what’s wrong with my body? Am I… am I in bad shape? Am I dying?!”
“Hah. What are you on about? It’s not that. …You wanted your stinger fixed, didn’t you?”
The honeybee clenched his fists and nodded madly, his eyes shining as he stared up at him like a desperate pilgrim. Seeing him like that, Shane felt the rare stirrings of pity creeping into his dried-up spider heart.
Hurel probably had his reasons for not telling him, but… so what? If it meant seeing that bastard get screwed over, Shane would throw himself into fire without hesitation. If that’s not true friendship, what is?
“You can’t fix your stinger.”
“…?!?!”
The words hit like a thunderclap. Blaine’s legs gave out beneath him, and he collapsed onto the ground, trembling.
“To be exact, there’s nothing more I can do. There’s something else lodged back there instead of your stinger, right?”
Shane’s unnervingly confident statement landed like he could see through walls. Blaine, now looking like a frantic believer clinging to hope, nodded helplessly.
“If cramming some toy in there was all it took to save a bee’s life, then there’d be no bees dying from ruptured abdomens, would there? Try using your damn brain.”
“……!”
He wasn’t wrong. Anatomically, honeybees differed from wasps or queens; once their stinger detached, it ripped out their internal organs, leading to a slow, painful death. No one ever survived that by just jamming something else in.
But then again, experience often trumped logic—and Blaine was living proof of that.
“Since ancient times, spider fluids have been used as both deadly poison and miracle cure. That’s how I’m able to keep playing doctor like this.”
“Uh…?”
“Depending on the dosage and the herbs it’s mixed with, it can become a paralytic, anesthetic, potent aphrodisiac, or even a cure-all.”
Why was he suddenly giving a self-intro in the middle of all this? Blaine couldn’t care less about spider fluids. Practically lunging, the distressed honeybee grabbed onto Shane’s leg.
“That doesn’t matter! We were talking about my stinger!”
“Ugh, seriously. If you’re that dumb, the least you could do is shut up and listen.”
Brushing off the spots where Blaine had touched him, Shane finally delivered the deathblow, utterly devoid of emotion.
“What’s in your abdomen right now is spider semen. Got it?”
“……?!?!”
That doesn’t even make sense! You had to say something remotely believable for it to be shocking. Blaine just blinked, dazed.
“You’ve been walking around with a belly full of cum all this time. That’s probably what kept you alive.”
“T-That’s bullshit…!”
It’s not like Blaine hadn’t seen Hurel’s semen before, but did this freak really think he’d believe such garbage just because he said it? He wasn’t that stupid.
“I’ve never heard of spider cum solidifying—”
“That’s because it was mixed with silk and beeswax.”
Silk… and beeswax…?!
“The spider fluids allowed your body to accept a foreign object without rejecting it. And since it needed to be something your body wouldn’t reject, beeswax made the perfect component. It helped it blend in.”
Blaine had no idea. So all this time, buried deep where his stinger used to be, he’d been carrying a lump of foreign matter made of Hurel’s and his own semen, solidified with silk and wax?
Beeswax, which was used to build hives and make candles, came from a gland in a worker bee’s penis.
“Anyway, point is—I can’t do anything more. Hurel already did everything that could be done.”
“But…”
“Be grateful. If he hadn’t acted quickly, you’d have ended up just like all the other bees who lost their stingers—dead.”
…Though judging by how this played out, whether or not Blaine felt grateful was another story. Shane held that thought to himself and glanced at the bee with something resembling pity.
“Blaine, I’m sorry! I take it back! I apologize for saying anything bad about your boyfriend!”
General, the rhinoceros beetle, came barreling in shouting tearfully—but then he saw Blaine, eyes vacant and wobbling like he was teetering on the edge of a cliff, and froze in his tracks.
What the hell happened in the five minutes I was gone?!
“I-I mean… maybe he’s not wicked after all…”
He forced out the words he’d meant to say from the start, and the ghostlike face slowly turned to look at him. A chill ran down his spine.
Redrump discreetly checked Blaine’s condition. Luckily, he wasn’t going into shock or fainting. Earlier, even touching the bee had seemed to make him uncomfortable, but now Redrump was even patting his shoulder gently in consolation.
“Cool your head a bit, then come inside.”
Well, yeah—he’d just been told that if he didn’t stay near that horrible spider, he might not survive. Of course he’d be shaken. If it were Redrump, he’d be biting his tongue and ending it all by now. He felt a bit bad for the guy. Honestly, even the grudge he’d held over Blaine pummeling General into the dirt felt like it was starting to fade.
So the White-Striped Redrump left the hollow-eyed bee behind and headed back inside, having no idea what was about to happen next.
***
Disaster always begins with a momentary choice. But life is made of a series of big and small decisions, and people forget that, making careless choices all the time.
Shane sighed, standing amid the wreckage of what had once been his sleek, modern suite. Now it looked like a bomb had gone off. The furniture and antiques were all overturned or in completely different places.
“…So do I bill you for the repairs?”
“If you’re gonna bill me, might as well include the price of your fucking life, asshole.”
The voice that snarled back was cold enough to raise goosebumps. Behind the sofa, now standing upright like a wall, the massive beetle crouched and trembled as he let out a shaky whimper.
“Look, I hate to say it… but technically, this isn’t really my fault, right?”
Why, Sage?! Why would you say that?! Why pour gasoline on a wildfire—and then throw in the gas can too?! General shoved his head between his knees and clawed at his thighs with hands as big as pot lids. If he didn’t, he might piss himself every time the spider opened his mouth.
“Hahaha.”
God, he wished Hurel would just yell at him. Anything but that icy laugh. General’s eyes burned with tears. That calm, eerie chuckle, born from too much fury, chilled him to the bone.
“Then whose fault is it, I wonder? Oh, maybe it’s the fault of that loose-lipped idiot who couldn’t keep his damn mouth shut. Should I rip his mouth open? Cut out his tongue?”
“If we’re being technical, isn’t it your fault for keeping such a massive secret until now—”
“So what you’re saying is, you’d rather not die peacefully.”
No logic was going to work here. The Redrump clicked his tongue in frustration. With a face like death, the Whitey approached slowly, his pitch-black eyes promising destruction—just like that stool wedged up in the ceiling.
Yeah. The Redrump had underestimated things. He never imagined that Blaine would be so shocked he’d run away. Or that the moment Hurel found out, he’d snap.
“Calm down. It’s a dangerous place—Blaine couldn’t have gotten far. Once he cools off, he might come back.”
Honestly, when he found out the bee had bolted, the Redrump had felt… relieved. For about one minute. Exactly one minute later, the silver in Hurel’s eyes had turned jet black. Within three minutes, he’d trashed the entire house. And in under five minutes, he looked like he was about to emit a deathly cloud from his body and kill everything in sight.
The Redrump had only wanted to see that bastard get his comeuppance—but this? This had gone way too far.
“If anything happens to Bee-Bee, you and that damn beetle are getting torn into twenty-six pieces and reunited in my stomach. Understood?”
“Shit—can’t you at least leave General out of it?”
“Huh?”
When Hurel turned, eyes crazed and laughing like it was the most absurd suggestion in the world, the Redrump grimaced, and General clung to his own legs, weeping.
Blaine, why did you run?! If you were going to leave, you could’ve at least taken me with you!
The heartbreak overwhelmed him.
“This bastard. Still acting like the victim, huh? Look, the truth would’ve come out eventually. Maybe I was a little blunt, but—”
Is that really worth this much rage? Shane raised his hands and stepped back as the tarantula approached with slow, deliberate steps.
“If I get hurt, I won’t be able to make your meds, you know?”
Hurel stopped, his blackened eyes narrowing. The fury was so intense that it wrapped back around into chilling calm. Slowly, his gaze ran from Shane’s face all the way down to his feet.
“Sh-Shouldn’t we be looking for Blaine instead? If we wait, the Sage might end up in pieces at the hands of that evil spider!”
Putting his life on the line, General finally shouted. His vocal cords squealed with the effort, but embarrassment didn’t even register anymore. The fear of death drowned out any shame.
“Yeah… You. I’ll deal with you later.”
Why me…? General wanted to bawl.
