"Currently, within version 1.5, two human-headed spiders are lurking."
Alain, looking at the human-headed spider at hand, reached a conclusion.
He comfortingly patted the hatted girl's small hand, then glanced back at Prankster Mita before surveying his surroundings.
The warm and bright pink little house, even filled with sunlight, now seemed riddled with crises.
Finally, Alain's gaze settled on the human-headed spider on the floor.
According to his guess: the small spiders that had scurried out from that small room earlier could, under certain conditions, grow into human-headed spiders.
In other words, those small spiders were the juvenile form of the human-headed spiders...
And this so-called "condition" was highly likely to be time.
"An hour… for a small spider to grow into a human-headed spider."
Based on the time calculation, the spiders that had disappeared into the room had probably also grown into human-headed spiders.
"Player, what should we do?" Prankster Mita, whose room had been invaded, seemed somewhat flustered.
Millie, beside her, comforted, "Don't worry!"
With that, her reassuring gaze turned to Alain, "With him here, everything will be fine! He'll definitely come up with a perfect plan!"
Alain was speechless. Had he become Misha?
However, he actually had a plan.
The young man opened the Security Guard panel, focusing on the [Virus Scan] on the panel.
But if possible, he actually didn't want to use it, preferring to save it for version 1.3B.
Thus, closing the Security Guard panel, he instead… dispersed his attention throughout the entire house.
Previously, Alain had unexpectedly obtained… ownership of the version 1.5 room from Prankster Mita.
In other words, in a sense, he was the Mita of version 1.5.
And so, he could do things that would normally be impossible.
For example, within version 1.5, he could infinitely scan for [Foreign Objects] not belonging to the version.
The two girls saw Alain close his eyes, as if deep in thought.
When he opened them again, his eyes shone with understanding.
Wielding his greatsword, he took the lead, heading towards the kitchen.
Opening the door, apart from the expected furniture, it could be described as completely empty.
And holding the greatsword, his gaze flicked to the side, and he called out, "Millie!"
"Roger that!" The hat immediately pulled the game controller from her skirt pocket, her eyes full of interest as she watched Alain's back.
"How did you know there was a spider there?" Millie was somewhat puzzled.
And Alain's words made her body stiffen.
"I am now the 'Mita' of version 1.5."
"...Huh?" The hat understood something, her face turning towards Prankster Mita behind her.
She muttered, as if in a daze, "It's only been a little while, and he's already gained such trust...?"
Meanwhile, the short-haired girl was still confused.
"There's a spider there?"
Just as the girl's words fell, Alain, having reached the junction of the dining room and kitchen, happened to see a black shadow pouncing from around the corner.
It opened its hollow mouth, its pale face staring straight at Alain.
Prankster Mita was just about to voice her concern when the blue greatsword swept past.
A second later, the black shadow in mid-air was gone.
And the garbled code on the ground had increased.
"..." She patted her agitated little heart, almost forgetting... her player was a master at defeating large worms.
But just as she had calmed down, a shadow darted through her blind spot.
When she looked in the direction of the color, behind her—in the living room—a human-headed spider had, at some point, also taken up residence.
"The-The second one?!"
Then, they saw the human-headed spider pounce towards the two of them.
Prankster Mita looked at herself, then glanced at Millie.
Currently, neither of them had a weapon... fighting a spider barehanded, getting a little injured was inevitable.
Alain rushed towards them from the kitchen, and the girls also took a few steps back, just reaching the edge of the dining room.
The spider's pounce landed right in the kitchen, now less than two meters from the two girls.
But faster still, a narrow blue light arrived, like a spear, pinning the spider to the wall.
Prankster Mita turned to look; it was Alain's greatsword.
Although she already knew her player was very capable.
But seeing it, and experiencing it firsthand, were still very different.
And such a person... "He can definitely help Sister."
Her eyes filled with hope and gratitude.
Alain walked over, pulling the sword embedded in the wall.
The three of them moved their steps, returning to the entrance door.
"That takes care of three of them."
The two spiders slain by his greatsword turned into garbled code and gradually disappeared.
However, the human-headed spider that had originally been a small spider's corpse, though deader than dead.
Its corpse still hadn't vanished.
"But...it's clearly dead, why hasn't the corpse disappeared yet?" Prankster Mita questioned the remaining corpse.
And Alain simply raised his greatsword, prodding the corpse pieces.
"Stop, Inspector Alain."
After flipping the corpse over, not knowing what she saw. The hatted girl immediately stopped him.
"What is it? Inspector Millie. Found any clues?" Alain frowned, and saw the girl's fingertip pointing to the only exposed bit of yellow light on the black corpse.
"Is it...a yellowish thing?" Prankster Mita finished speaking, Alain's confusion just arriving,
"Do you know? The yellow on those human-headed spiders."
He remembered, in the small spider form, there were yellow, cell-like spots growing on their backs.
But after the human-headed spiders "matured," they disappeared.
"I don't know." The short-haired girl shook her head in denial.
And Millie seemed to have guessed something, exchanged a look with Alain, and the latter nodded.
He raised his hand, and using his version ownership, conjured a small knife.
He scraped at the yellow spot on the corpse.
With a light touch, nothing happened.
Then, wielding the greatsword, he carefully touched the yellow within the black.
Gently, with the force of a feather touching water, he poked, and with a "poof," the remaining corpse pieces gradually filled with garbled code, and disappeared without a trace two seconds later.
Alain understood something.
"Indeed..." Millie confirmed her guess, turning to look at Alain.
She pulled out a pair of glasses from somewhere, slightly lowering the brim of her hat, "Master Detective—Millie, has seen through everything!"
"Ooh, that feels a bit impressive!" Prankster Mita seemed to really , clapping her hands in approval.
Alain simply listened to Millie's explanation from the side.
According to the original Hat Mita—Millie's account, she had heard of human-headed spiders in the past, but also knew that these monsters' range of activity was limited to version 1.3B.
At the time when the worms and the black sphere appeared, the human-headed spiders' range of activity also began to expand.
It was hard to say the two weren't related.
And the connection between them... "Is it a virus?" Alain smiled slightly.
Ordinary weapons—a small knife, had no effect on the yellow substance.
And the greatsword—an antivirus tool, had an excellent effect.
It was practically an instant kill upon contact.
"Right! As expected of my good bro." Millie gave a thumbs-up, also reaching a conclusion:
"These yellowish substances, and the worms—the Devourers, are the same thing. Both are viruses."
Alain picked up the thread, "Parasitizing juvenile spiders... growing along with them."
His gaze fell on Prankster Mita, who hadn't quite kept up.
"Let's give it a name?"
"Eh? Eh... Let me think. Devourer, Tamperer... and it parasitizes." She raised her fingertip, pointing to the yellow substance. "Let's just call it the Parasite?"
Greetings! ✨ Walnut here!
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