Entering a butcher's shop, corpses can be seen strung from the ceiling and laying upon the countertops. The smell of their bodies is fresh as they are actively sliced. A macabre spectacle, and yet, no maliciousness or killing intent can be seen or sensed by the butcher or the shop's patrons. That's just life. Imagine if a bull or chicken were to unsuspectingly wander into the shop. My, how the perspective would be so opposite.

Similarly, the adventuring party has wandered into his dwelling place, where the cocooned bodies dangle, occasionally thrashing and letting out muffled pleas until the life escapes their bodies one way or another. The intent is barely sinister, however. Similar to a butcher shop, this is just life for a spider, and their perspective is a polar opposite of his. They are not intruders, they are merely produce.

With a calculated angle, the webs form a net on a course to snatch and constrict the life out of the party. However, if one were to stand tall and fearless, the webbing would only catch that single party member while the others could continue to make headway in battle against the adversary. If the battle goes well, they might even have a chance to survive within their tomb, completely immobile.

Who among the party will be selected as the sacrifice?

A gift for  dandragon3 that I felt motivated to color and shade. The overall theme of this piece was heavily inspired by Spider Bud from one of my favorite video games, Lobotomy Corporation. The upcoming sequel, Limbus Company, has variants of the monsters from the previous game, and that gave me some inspiration to do this. According to the demo reels, these monsters will sometimes impose a gambit, similar to the short story I wrote here, where one party member must make a significant sacrifice in order to prevent the worst-case scenario.

Suspending a character in rope/webs is something I don't do very often, but it seems I managed to get the overall look down. I'm pretty happy with the overall demeanor and expression of the figure, though!

For anyone curious about the demo reel which inspired this piece, here's a link timestamped to the English portion: https://youtu.be/0f7lGfHvemQ?t=315