Chapter 61: Weaker than a Slime
"Hmm, this is it, Eve," I say as we stop in front of of the dungeon entrance just outside the city. It’s a somewhat isolated place, and it took us 4 hours to get here, but I’m still excited.
"Okay, I’ll double-check our supplies to make sure we didn’t forget anything before we go in," Eve says, giving me space as I see several slimes hopping around. I approach one, crouching down, and it stares at me before jumping and throwing itself at me.
"Haha, what a weakling!" In the game, this attack only takes off 1 HP, of course it depends on the slime there are many elemental slimes that inflict terrible effects, and there’s even a sinister slime that applies an internal bleeding effect.
I’ve even lost in the game because of that hellish effect. Controlling Grace, I ended up falling into a cave full of those slimes, and the effect lasted so long that her HP went to zero and she died from bleeding.
"How cute," The slime is adorable. I press it, feeling the softness of its body, and it keeps trying to throw itself at me, but it’s so weak it can’t even push my hand away.
’It’s so strange, it seems solid, but also liquid fantasy monsters are such strange things,’ I hold it with both hands and pull, flattening the slime’s "face", and when I let go, it goes back to normal.
’I can’t believe this thing has such sinister variants in dangerous places.’ I see the slime’s core without it, it dies, a weakness exposed for all to see.
While certain slimes have transparent cores, or multiple cores, just as there are slimes with a false core, a replica made to deceive enemies.
’Cores...’ I think about cores and their function. Unlike other games where monster cores are just a cluster of magic, in this world they are not just magical.
All monsters have cores, and their cores are also their means of reproduction, similar to how demons can have children using magic monsters have a similar process.
They need cores to reproduce. The magic stored in a monster’s core is usually spent when the monster has offspring it uses the core’s magic to form its progeny.
And with that, the core loses much of its power. So the longer a monster goes without reproducing, the more magic its core accumulates, and when it reaches a certain limit, the monster evolves, spending all the core’s magic and becoming more powerful, able to have a larger core and repeat the process.
Weaker monsters usually spend the power of their cores having offspring, while stronger monsters usually spend the magic of their cores to grow stronger, because weaker monsters instinctively understand that even if they evolve, they will remain weak.
So weaker monsters prefer to quickly and massively increase their numbers, while stronger monsters understand that if they become stronger, they won’t need a group, preferring to be solitary and focus on increasing their power.
This naturally makes weaker monsters easier to find, and stronger monsters rarer to encounter.
With the core, monsters can have offspring through normal reproduction, which boils down to having sex to have children, and they can also have offspring on their own, generating the offspring with the power of the core.
So monsters can have children even without having a close partner to mate with it’s something well explained in the game, which made it interesting.
"Evelyn-sama, I’ve finished reviewing everything, it seems we’re all set," Eve says, coming up to me. I let go of the small slime and stand up as it loses interest in me and starts to wander away.
Slimes are not known for having good focus they easily forget what they were doing, so they can attack you one moment and then, a second later, for no reason, ignore you and leave.
Of course, this can create situations that are actually quite unpleasant, depending on what they were doing truly unpleasant situations.
"Okay! Let’s go! I can’t wait to go deeper into this dungeon!" I say, full of excitement. Eve nods and hands me some items.
"Please be careful, Evelyn-sama, this is not an easy or safe thing!" She complains, and I shrug. I know it’s dangerous, but here at the entrance, there are only slimes, and they’re not even slimes with variants.
"Eve, there are only blue gelatinous balls here! They can’t hurt us!...ah, actually...they can if you put them on your head..." I say, looking with some fear at the slimes on the ground.
They are gelatinous and liquid, so if you put one on your head, it’s hard to remove, and it starts to suffocate you. Worse yet is if it enters through head cavities like the mouth, ears, and nose.
That’s the problem with their low focus they initially start to suffocate the enemy as an attack, but if they lose focus, they simply enter any hole they find because they think it’s their home.
"W-Well...let’s go in!" I know they couldn’t kill me, after all, I’m a living puppet, I don’t even need to breathe if I don’t want to, but still, having a slime wandering around inside me is unsettling.
"Okay," Eve starts walking in front, in case there are traps or something dangerous, while I follow behind her, watching the stupid slimes hopping around calmly.
"Eve, you’re on high alert," I say, trying to focus on the cavernous path ahead. The floor is cold and tiled, while the air is damp and somewhat uncomfortable, even though it’s not that dark yet.
"Yes, Evelyn-sama, I don’t think we can underestimate this place, but don’t worry, if something bad happens, I’ll notice," She says, and I think about that.
’I called the slimes weak...but...can I even kill a slime?’ I see a slime hopping nearby, and I quickly step on it with all my might, trying to hit its core, but my foot sinks into its body, missing the core.
"..." I try to remove it, but the slime clings strongly to my foot, and soon it starts trying to climb up, but it can’t, so it gives up and just lies inert on my foot.
"DAMN IT!! Eve, look at this!! Look at this!" I say, irritated, making Eve look quickly, thinking it’s something dangerous. She looks around and then at my foot.
"What...is the problem?" She asks, not understanding.
"I can’t kill it!! I can’t even kick it away!" I say, almost with tears in my eyes. I didn’t know I was this weak.
"Damn, this is so unfair!! This slime can’t weigh more than 5 kilos!! And I can’t even kick it," Eve approaches a slime and probably to test it, she tries to kick it.
Her kick is so powerful that the slime is thrown against the wall, splattering and filling the wall with that liquid. Then she looks at my foot, and I see pity in her eyes.
"!!!"
"Don’t look at me like I’m a poor thing!! I...I’m still a genius..." I say without confidence. I thought I would at least have a minimum of strength come on, even a Rank F novice can kill slimes.
’Damn...why do I have to be so weak? The universe is messing with me! I have no strength at all, but I have a lot of life it’s like turning me into a punching bag!’ Imagine if I didn’t have Eve to defend me.
It would be terrible. I can only be grateful that I managed to become a living puppet and acquired the skills of a puppeteer.
"Evelyn-sama, I’m sorry you’re weak, but if you want to experience what it’s like to be strong, why don’t you use my body?" She offers the option of me controlling her.
"Oh, that’s right...I can do that..." I look around.
"Eve, it’s better not to do that here, maybe another time...but I’ll try! I hate being so weak!" Eve nods as she removes the slime from my foot, piercing its core with her sword.
"Maybe, Evelyn-sama, we can get relics for you when we have the money," She says as we reach a staircase.
"It’s a good idea, but I don’t like relics as if they were my power, there are ways to deactivate relics, and losing them would make me even more vulnerable."
"And I don’t want to become dependent on them either, but I’ll have some, yes! Just not for fighting, anyway, I don’t even like fighting," I say, shocking Eve, who stops completely and stares at me.
"You have no interest in fighting?"
"No?" I ask, surprised by her shock.
"S-Sorry, Evelyn-sama, I thought you liked it...seems I was wrong!" She says, and I sigh.
"I guess we never really talked much about what we like...well, shall we go down? This dungeon has 130 floors, and I want to go down to the 25th floor before leaving, that’s where the materials to create a new puppet should be," I say, changing the subject.
"Of course, Evelyn-sama, what’s in this dungeon?" She asks as we start to descend.
"Ah, it’s easy at first, there are slimes, goblins, wolves, golems, and of course some variants of them! Ah, but that’s only up to the 30th floor...after that, there’s no information."
"But don’t worry!! We don’t need to go that deep! I don’t even think it’s safe to go that deep, you know? This dungeon would need at least two to three Rank S adventurers to reach the bottom and get out alive!" I say seriously.
"Well, I guess we’ll be spending a good amount of time here," She says with a little smile as we reach the second floor, which still only has slimes, but I already see some ores in the walls.
"Haha, of course, I plan to spend a good time here. I trust you to protect me and collect materials! You can count on me to carry part of what we get!" Not that I have the strength to carry anything heavy.