Slime 6

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The pain from his crystal was numbing his slime body and he couldn't move. He looked up and saw something he thought he would never see again: the blue sky. Even though he could only see through his three-sixty vision, he somehow was able to see it. He never thought such a sight would be so beautiful.

This vision must've been from the light exposed to his life-crystal because as his numbing pain faded, his slime consumed his crystal again and the sky became lost to him.

I'll be watching over you.

Pretentious bastard… He refused to believe that man was God. If the pseudo-god knew about his monstrous thoughts and issues with his slime body then he purposely left him in this world to suffer.

Something happened to him in the cave. It wasn't like he was the shining example of human morality in his past life but he at least respected his fellow human beings and didn't kill everything he saw because he felt like it.

However, his intention was there. He wanted to kill all the humans along with everything and every one no matter how unreasonable it seemed. Were those soldiers that were near him at the cave entrance still alive after that pressure explosion? That was questionable.

Regardless, they were surely chasing him so he had to move. He had the advantage of the thick terrain. After most of his soul-crushing pain went away, he started to roll further from the cave entrance.

He began eating leaves and broken branches to regain his lost slime mass. He made sure not to leave a trail and kept his volume to a minimum so he could roll by stealthy. He was only the size of a small squirrel. For now, since he had some time, he wanted to reflect on a few things and what to do next.

The first thing he had to address was his sanity. Admittedly, he was never the most stable person. His parents even threatened to send him to a physic ward. He wasn't suicidal but they believed he needed help to 'cure' himself of his identity issues.

He believed himself to have good judgment and self-awareness. He knew what he needed but they didn't trust him enough to make decisions for himself.

Their advice was as useful as someone trying to 'pray the gay away.' In this sense, the pseudo-god was correct in asking, 'why him?' However, if the pseudo-god was thinking he killed himself, he was mistaken.

He was murdered.

When he experienced that dream world as a human girl, he knew that having a human body was key in keeping his sanity. He didn't want to lose to those monstrous dark thoughts again.

He never wanted to spiral down that path again. No matter what, he needed a human body to keep his humanity and sense of self. Killing someone, he felt very afraid of the prospect of it. The act itself seemed counterproductive to his goal but it was something he had to do to survive.

The slime needed to know the extent of his abilities so he began to experiment. He had the ability to dissolve organics and crystallize his slime. He was also able to separate hydrogen ions from carbohydrates. How far could this go?

He discovered that he could ingest a leaf or a rock and recover it from his slime as if nothing happened. Given enough material, he could also use the items he ingested as templates to replicate an exact copy.

To see how this was possible, the slime had to look within his slime with his three-sixty vision and see his own cellular structures working. Things he chose not to be dissolved went through this pathway of being broke down and stored into vesicles similar to endosomes and tagged so they could assemble back together.

Using these tags, the slime could bring back all the cellular vesicles together and have the material stitched back together, whether organic or inorganic. He could also replicate the tags themselves to create an identical assembly, a replicate.

These two abilities would allow the slime to store a human body and replicate the template within his own slime to preserve the body's integrity. Of course, this should apply to anybody, human, animal, or monster.

To test his hypothesis, he needed a volunteer. After a while of rolling around the forest floor, he spotted a brown hare in the bushes. He pounced on the rabbit.

He swallowed the rabbit whole and it dissipated inside his blue slime. Instead of dissolving the flesh to incorporate into his slime mass, he stored it in his vesicles.

Now, commanding the body of the rabbit to reassemble, it was built back together in his slime and he released it to the ground. It was dead. Of course, it was. Its 'light-of-life' was extinguished as soon as he began to break it down to store. Taking the rabbit into his body again, he needed to experiment.

Removing its organs in the torso, he separated the flesh at different cross-sections to store them as different items in his storage. Separating them into legs, arms, head, and two torso sections would improve manipulation.

He was going to make a meat suit. This way, the flesh would be easier to wrap around him. He didn't know if this was possible but this seemed like the only way to obtain a human body and therefore, keeping his peace of mind.

He sealed himself into the torso of the rabbit meat suit. It wasn't bloody because cutting and reassembling the body was cleaned with his slime. Tucking his slime inside, he manipulated his slime mass volume to be the smallest it's ever been. The crystal to slime volume ratio was probably two to one but it was necessary to fit inside because of his larger crystal.

Now, he was inside the dead body of the rabbit. Well, there went the last of his human shame. He didn't find this gross at all. He was indifferent to climbing into the body of a dead rabbit. He sighed.

He could manipulate the things in his slime on the molecular-level and so he made a connection to the nervous system of the creature. He replaced all the somatic nerves with his own slime which would send the electrical impulses and move the body. The autonomous and sensory nerves were rerouted to his slime so the real brain of the body, his life-crystal, could sense things.

The rabbit then opened its eyes. Its body was now possessed by him. He could see through its eyes and see visible light, though the color range wasn't good. The cute little bunny sat up and started to run in circles. He had total control and he looked entirely normal.

He also moved like a normal bunny because the autonomous nerves were also responsible for some of the movement. From the quick movements of its body to the twitching of its nose, it was like a genuine bunny. This was why maintaining the shape of the torso and making minimal changes to the body were crucial to the disguise. The only organ he had to remove was the heart, re-routing the vascular system around his crystal and slime.

He was a monster and so what he did here was a betrayal of the human ethics he learned from his old world. Whether it be a rabbit or a human, he was a monster wearing the flesh of his victim. He didn't feel bad about it at all. Human or slime, his experience in this life would forever change him as a person.

I shouldn't think about it too much, he thought. He was thankful for the bunny for its sacrifice.

He was a cute little bunny now and unless someone had incredible detection skills he doubted anyone would find him. His plan now was to fix his ignorance about this world by finding humans to hide among while observing them. For that to happen he had to find a way out of the forest, at least to a human settlement that didn't have a lot of soldiers around.

More soldiers meant more need to be cautious and would make it harder for him to steal a person's body. However, mid-thought, a shot rang out and struck him in the head. The bunny's head exploded.

The blue slime wasn't sure what happened but suddenly, his meat suit wasn't responding. He immediately jumped out of the dying flesh and ricocheted off the tree trunks as he heard another shot whizzing past him. He spotted a group of ten soldiers and they were all aiming their rifles at him.

There were nine riflemen and a mage advancing to his position. They were wearing the same uniform and armor like the ones before. Two questions came to his mind: how did they evade his detection and how did they find him?

He should have looked like any other brown rabbit. His physical disguise was nearly perfect and unless they knew exactly where he was. There should've been no possible way they could find him. When he thought about it, the soldiers also found him fast last time.

But still, to have found him so quickly they must've had a 'tracking spell' targeted on him. It was far too specific than just detecting aura. It had to be it. The staff-arm girl must've handed the spell she used to the soldiers so they could track him.

As for their surprise attack, he didn't sense them at all. Right now, he was seeing the ten soldiers disappear and reappear within his three-sixty vision. Were they using some kind of spell to mess with his vision?

No. It had to be an effect around them because he wasn't hit with a spell yet, only the bunny meat suit was destroyed. It was more like a cloaking device. Each time they took a step forward, the invisible men and women shook the branches and made indents on the ground they passed through making them visible around the contact points. However, there could be times when they disappear completely.

He had no choice but to dodge and hide from tree to tree. This was working until his slime was hit with the freezing spell. His slime was once again being crystallized. Knowing he was in a horrible situation, the slime jumped further into the forest. Something told him that the soldiers didn't know quite how to handle him and were just shooting without a solid plan.

For now, he had to dislodge the crystallizing infection quickly. He formed a replicate bunny meat suit around his life-crystal while also coating it in a protective pearl like he did before. His life-crystal would be safer and immune to the crystallizing bullets as long as their spells didn't breach his shell.

His slime instinct didn't allow him to separate his slime from his body but he could probably do it indirectly by slicing it off. He formed the meat suit around him except for the infected slime and simply pinched his slime with the flesh and it separated.

Next, it seemed their cloaking spell only worked with his Monster Sight because he could see them with the rabbit's eyes. The soldiers were still chasing him. The slime wasn't sure how these people communicate but if they send for reinforcements, he would be in trouble. He had to kill them all quickly.

He knew what he said before about killing but also knew they wouldn't stop until he was dead. He had no way of communicating and even if he was able to talk, he doubted they'd listen.

Most importantly, he had to stay in control of himself or else he might go on another rampage. The strange urge to kill was still poking and prodding within his mind. Peeking out with his rabbit head, he saw the soldiers looking a little lost to where he was. Just then, the mage casted the tracking spell and pointed to his exact direction.

The spell took the shape of the blue circle with patterns in the center with more symbols within the layered circle.

As their eyes made contact, the mage girl directed the small squad of soldiers with her staff. It was obvious that for any sneak attack, he had to kill the mage first. The mage and crew seemed smug and confident that they'd kill him. It was almost laughable.

HoW aRroGaNt FoR a HuMaN, he thought and didn't notice the sudden shift in his thought process.

An idea came to him spontaneously. The little bunny emitted a dark aura as it hopped away. The aura grabbed the attention of the soldiers and they ran after him. The mage was following closely behind the group, probably for her protection but this time it proved fatal.

A crystallized blue spike launched upwards from the ground and stabbed the young woman in the chest. Her scream caused the soldiers to stop and look back at their comrade in horror.

It was truly a tragedy.

HuMaNs ArE sO lImItEd. By ThEiR sTrEnGtH aNd MiNdS.

The slime's problem all along was the human perspective. The slime didn't let his humanity go and outright refused and denied what he was from the very beginning. If the slime was just a bit more reasonable, all of this could've been avoided and he wouldn't have had such a hard time dealing with these InSeCtS.

BeInG wEaK aNd GeTtInG kIlLeD iS iNtOlErAbLe, he thought as if justifying himself. He was seeing the world as if a filter had been lifted from his eyes for the first time, a monster's perspective.

LeT mE sHoW yOu.

Through the mind of a monster, he thought of ways to use his abilities that would've been unintuitive and awkward but now they all made sense and he executed his plan with his new abilities, almost on a whim. Information from an unknown source flowed into him.

He knew that the fight would be decided in a few seconds but now, he could look comfortably down from a tree without fearing for his life. He never felt this feeling of total dominance before. It wasn't like in the cave when he just charged ahead blindly. His thoughts were clearer now. The dark aura was changing something within his mind.

The slime was a special type of monster and it wasn't because of his reincarnation. The icosahedron shape of his crystal was indicative of his ability to absorb crystals and to command them. It was clear to him now. It was as though he was touching all the mana in the world. To command crystals was to command souls, to command souls was to command mana and to command mana was to command monsters.

Separating the slime from his body, he could move and command these slime bundles. Before he wasn't able to move the slime that separated from this body and now, he could. He could also move them to absorb and to crystallize as if still attached to his body.

A part of his spirit was instilled in these slime bundles and he did it almost out of instinct. This soul perception was a unique ability, the 'light-of-life' he was seeing. This sight allowed him to see the world unfiltered and realize that all the souls of this world were connected. They were connected in a 'Network.'

The slime saw how souls of the living and dead were connected like cogs in a machine and he was the crank. This connection was visible to him as threads of light attaching to every living animal and monster on this planet. He could also see the connected souls of the dead. These connections of light threads seemed so fantastical to look at.

Spiritual magic took advantage of the Network and gave rise to the tracking spell. They were following the connection to his soul they established through the Network. Humans were probably using the Network without being aware of its existence.

Laying his slime all over the ground below him gave him all the possibilities and advantages. Ten became five very quickly. Their cloaking dissipated and the slime could see them in his monster sight again. The crystal spikes retracted and absorbed the fallen soldiers and mage. The bloodshed ended when the remaining soldiers burned the ground with a flame spell and destroying the slime underneath. It seemed like evaporating the water from the slime made them useless and dead.

The humans looked frightened and were talking, probably about whether to continue forward or not. As for the slime, he would prefer to end things quickly but with their mage taken care of, he didn't have a time limit because they couldn't track him anymore.

The remaining soldiers marched onwards after praying for their dead. They didn't pray to the bodies or took their dog tags because the slime ate them. Actually, he stored them within the slime bundles and then commanded them to return to his main body.

Five human bodies, four males and one female. This should be enough for what he planned to do next. The remaining humans weren't even considered a threat since they couldn't follow him anymore. He was contemplating letting them live but...

Whether this voice was an external or internal influence on him, he didn't trust it. As far as he knew, this could easily be the influence of the pseudo-god or some other entity on him. And if this was something that was internal and part of him, it was certainly something he couldn't listen to.

Dealing with his mental demons in the past, the slime learned to have more self-awareness. That being said, it was still hard for him to determine if these were his real thoughts or not. At least he had to capacity to realize that.

Anyway, it was better to kill them. He decided on a compromise to kill anyone who was threatening him. It was better to keep his abilities to himself. Stalking the remaining group of five, he had the patience and the high ground as he hopped from tree to tree.

Burying his slime into the trunks of trees with his acid, he waited for the group to drop their guard. They probably thought he wasn't there and got away from the group. A noise caused everyone to aim their rifles at something. Their flank was wide open as the slime in the tree trunks burst open and impaled them all with crystal spikes.

He figured it was safe to come down as he absorbed soldiers' bodies, all their souls faded away into the Network. The slime hopped down in his form of a small brown hare. The monsters who served as the distraction slowly approached the slime. They were a pack of fiendish-looking boars with spikes for fur. They looked disgusting. The slime prepared some more spikes but the hogs didn't move an inch further.

The hell are you looking at? He thought. GET OUT OF HERE!

The boars complied and left the slime alone as they retreated back into the endless forest. He wasn't in the mood. The dark aura that seized him was settling down.