One day of travel later, the ground was now riding through a thick forest road. The thread-like road cut a line between the thick trees of the dark forest. It's usually hard to walk five yards without bumping into an oak tree, but now they can ride sprinting horses without a hitch.
Mary and Ase rode on one horse while Shin rode with the prisoner woman tied behind him. They'll release her with chains when they get close to the location of the camp so she can pinpoint it to them.
Mary looked back at Shin, "It's almost dusk, we'll camp at the first location we find."
"Shouldn't we look for monsters?" The forest was dense, it was hard to get a clear look at their surrounding. With the branches and leaves rustling, they could sneak up on a monster without even knowing it.
"There is always a risk of monsters, we can't do anything about it. But the road is safer, knights ride along each month and murder any monster they find so the beasts have learned to stay away from the roads." Mary found a large open spot beside the road where they could camp.
Looking closer she could even see the buried ash of a previous campfire, people who pass through this road have used this spot to camp several times. The nice and open space allowed them to set tents and spread monster repellent around the camp without the interference of the large trees which was nice…but this would result in one problem.
"What about bandits?" Shin looked around. They didn't get off the horses yet and he didn't want to just jump down. What if the bandits were lurking close, he wouldn't have time to ride the horse.
"It's always one or another you won't find bandits where monsters are, but where monsters aren't a problem, bandits take their place." Mary rode around the camp area while Ase sniffed the air, trying to see if anyone was here recently.
"Probably one week ago? I can't tell from here." Ase wanted to jump down and sniff the ground to find any trails, but it was indeed dangerous.
"We're safe." Arachne said as she crawled out of Ase's hair, "Can't you smell it? This woman's smell is mixed in it." She pointed at the prisoner. "It's probably her friends who passed by here. We're not in danger, we're on the right path."
Arachne then looked back at Shin, "And you, can't you sense them?"
"I can't, not with how I am now. A demon spider's senses are far sharper than any mortal human, no matter who they are." He jumped down from the horse and started pulling the tent out of the horses' bags.
"Then we'll camp here." Mary and Ase started helping him, in less than an hour the whole camp was set and Shin ignited the fire in the middle so they could cook something to eat.
As Shin finished igniting the flame with his magic, Arachne approached him, crawling on the ground in her human body. "What's for dinner?" She asked with a smile.
Shin looked at her for a second, "Wait, Char? You can control the whole body?" For some reason, Shin had expected only Arachne to be able to fully control the humanoid body, but it seemed that if she let Char have her way, she'd at least be able to crawl on the ground.
"Can you stand?" Shin sat down and looked at her.
"How do you do it?" She tried to stand on all fours but still fell on her face. She is used to moving with eight limbs but now only has four, and is asked to stand on just two, it is like asking a man to stand on one hand.
Shin helped her sit and waited until she managed to balance herself. "How does the body feel?"
"Weird, especially this breathing thing, it's annoying. Standing on two limbs is impossible and those things weigh me down." She looked at her large chest, "I'm used to my stomach and butt being the heavy part when I walk."
"Humans stand on two legs, they shouldn't bother you." Shin smiled.
"I can't do it on two legs, I was talking about walking on four!" Char waved her hands, "They are making me front heavy and I keep falling on my face thanks to that."
"You'll get used to it." He patted her back and she shifted into the demonic spider form, landing on all of her limbs. "AHH! This feels better. I can move well, balanced, and most of all, I don't look ugly." She smiled and then frowned, "What did you just call me?"
"Ugly?" Char replied to Arachne with a confused face, "You called me ugly again? Do you know how beautiful my human body is? Ask him!" Arachne pointed at Shin.
"Yep, ugly, from a spider's perspective. It's the same how we humans might see spiders as ugly, scary, or disgusting, the same applies backward." He looked at them with a grin, "To Char, we humans are ugly or scary, it's not something to get angry or worry about."
"I guess…" Arachne mumbled and Char laughed, "Ho! Ho! Ho! I'm smarter than you!"
"No, you aren't, spider!" The large spider started rolling on the ground as the two minds fought inside her head. Shin watched them with an amused grin as Mary and Ase brought some dried meat and vegetables to start cooking. Today's dinner was a pot of soup and dried bread.
"Should we set one tent instead?" Mary asked as she looked back, so far they set two tents, one for her and Ase and one for Shin and Char. But now that they rested and ate, they started thinking. Splitting the tents would make it easy for bandits to single them out.
"I don't know, we have one big tent." They brought three tents with them, two normal ones and one that was really big. When camping in this dense forest flexibility was important as no one knew how large the space they'll find. They could also be forced to sleep only in the sleeping bags if they didn't find space to set tents.
"I don't know. It'll be safer to stay together, but one must also remain on guard. We'll do three shifts…no, two. Me and Ase." He looked back at the tents.
"I'll guard." Arachne looked at them, "I've spent the whole day asleep, I can stay fully awake for days."
"Can you guard?" Mary looked at her with a worried face, "But what am I talking about? You're a massive and scary spider."
Arachne giggled, "Indeed, just imagine what would the bandits feel coming to rob us only to find me here. I'm as big as a sheep, they'll pass out of fear alone."
Shin stood and stretched, "Then it's decided, let's take those two tents down and set the large one."
"We've got a lot of work waiting then." Ase stood alongside Mary and they started working. In the meantime, Arachne and Char went out to set some fine threads all around the camp to warn them about intruders.