Chapter Three

City Z, the abandoned part of City Z, 510th day of training

In a small room that was located within apartment building, there was a young woman sleeping on her folding mattress with a look of bliss plastered on her face. She had been breathing hard, with her cheeks being slightly flushed while a small smile graced her face as she softly mumbled in her sleep as she was kissing a beautiful woman in her dreams.

*Smooch! Smooch!*

The young woman began to kissing nothing but the air in front of her while she was still sleeping.

*Ring Ring!*

Her blissful dream was interrupted when alarm clock started ringing loudly.

"What? Huh? Where did....Oh. So it was just a dream?" was the young woman's reaction to the dream that she just had.

She then proceeded to get up from her mattress bed and make her way to the bathroom to take a shower before she started her day.

The moment that the young woman made it to the sink located in her bathroom, she began to stare at her own reflection through the mirror located on top of her sink.

And the reflection that greeted her was that of a young woman with black hair that was cut in a buzz cut wearing a yellow shirt.

'Am I really going to become bald? It sucks that I had to cut my hair to be this short, but I'd rather have short hair than no hair at all.' the young woman thought to herself as she looked at her own reflection for a moment more before she began to wash her face.

A few minutes later

"Kyaa! Somebody help me!" a high-pitched feminine voice called out.

This, along with the loud footsteps that were being made managed to attract the attention of the young heroine-in-training, who had just finished eating her breakfast in the living room of her apartment.

"Well, time to be a hero before I begin my training I guess." she stated to herself, her voice taking on a sad tone as she went to change to her tracksuit.

Once she made her way outside the entrance of her apartment, she suddenly became intrigued by what she saw at the road a few blocks in front of her. And as she slowly started to approach her targets of interest, she was able to get a better look at what the two monsters in front of her looked like.

The first monster that she saw was a yellow slimy humanoid monster with a slender build no taller than the average human female. She had a round face with a pair of green eyes that had no irises, a small nose, and some of the slime at the top of her head had a bit of a light green colour and was shaped like straight hair that was long enough to pass her shoulders and ended somewhere around the upper half of her back.

The other monster looked like it could be mutated dog that came to be after a failed lab experiment as it looked like it was a German Shepherd with blood-red fur covering his entire body with a pair of black eyes with red irises. It was as tall as a Double Decker Bus, and had a pair of ram-shaped horns coming out of its head.

"Well, this should be interesting." the young woman stated seeing the monsters before her, as she started to feel excited at the prospect of fighting strong monsters.

'But I should put on a stoic face to intimidate the monster.' the young woman thought to herself as she continued to make her way to the two monsters in front of her.

"Grrrr! Get back here you stupid walking chew toy! Don't think that I'm going to let you get away from me!" the large dog monster shouted out as he kept chasing the slime monster.

"No way! I don't want to die as a meal plus a chew toy for a monster like you! And I'm not a chew toy! I'm a member of the slime folk species!" the slime monster girl shouted back to the monster chasing after her.

'What did I do to deserve such bad luck?!' the slime monster asked herself while she continued to run away from the monster chasing her. She then noticed a young woman with a buzz cut in a blue tracksuit walking towards her with a serious expression on her face.

The appearance of said human was also noticed by the dog monster, who had stopped running the moment he saw the human in front of him.

'Wow, the slime girl is really adorable! But should I let her live? Seeing that she is a monster and all.' the short-haired woman thought to herself as she began to feel conflicted on how to deal with the slime girl in front of her, having already decided how she would deal with the gigantic red canine monster that was standing right behind the slime monster girl.

'What the hell is she doing coming towards a group of monsters without a care in the world? Is she crazy or something?' the slime monster said to herself as she was puzzled by the fact that the human woman in front of her was walking in her direction.

'Hahaha! It looks like I'll be chewing on some human bones as a snack today! The more snacks the better!' the red furred monster thought to himself in glee as he began to drool while looking at the tracksuit-wearing woman in front of him.

The woman then proceeded to stand in between the slime girl and dog monster, the features on her face sharpening.

"So who are you?" the young hero in training asked the large, red canine in front of her.

"I am the Red Shepherd! I was once a regular dog that got experimented on by a group of scientists after the death of my owners! Their experiments led to me gaining this strong body that you see before you. And with the new strength, intelligence and speed I obtained from this new form of mine, I managed to escape my tormentors and come all the way out here, hunting the monsters of this area to feed myself. So cower in fear human, for I shall be the last creature that you'll ever see today!" the canine monster said to the young woman in front of him, while barring all his teeth.

"Oh I don't think so, you bad dog. I should be saying that to you, because these fists of mine are looking to fight strong monsters!" the tracksuit-wearing woman said in response to the monster's declaration of killing her and the slime monster while raising her fists in front of her. This response seemed to infuriate the Red Shepherd.

"Grrrrg! Foolish human! Do you think you can defeat me with your bare hands? Now you've made me angry! I'm gonna make sure that you suffer for thinking that you are stronger than me as I chew you up! And when I'm done with you, the slime girl is next!" he declared to the human in front of him, as he leapt straight at her intending to kill her quickly.

Unfortunately for the Red Shepherd, the young heroine-in-training swiftly moved to the side in order to evade his attacks. As the dog began to bite at her while increasing his speed, she continued to dodge his attacks with little difficulty.

'Stupid human, how is she able to dodge all of my attacks like that? How is she moving so fast? I was able to run faster than the cars those damned scientists used to try and capture me with despite my large body!' the blood-red canine monster asked himself, puzzled that a mere human could dodge all the attacks from his maw without fail as he was now starting to attack her with the claws of his front leg.

'Man, this dog monster sure is slow. But then again, he is pretty big, so it makes sense that he is not going to be very fast.' the young heroine-in-training thought to herself, starting to get bored of the fight that she was participating in.

'What?! How is she moving so fast? I can barely see the two of them moving, and she is managing to outmaneuver all of his attacks with such ease?' the sludge monster thought to herself, having moved a safe distance away from the fight as soon as the dog monster lunged at the young human woman.

"*Bark*Damn human! Just let me bite you already!" Red Shepherd angrily shouted out, frustrated that he could not get a single bite of her flesh.

"Now why would I do that, you silly dog?" the young short-haired woman replied to him in a teasing manner.

"GRRRRRRR! JUST DIE ALREADY!" Red Shepherd shouted out in anger as he made another lunge at her.

The young woman jumped to the back, quickly leaving the spot from the place that she previously stood. She then proceeded to throw a punch straight at his exposed forehead, as he had taken a bite out of a chunk of the ground she was standing on.

*Pow!*

The part of the monster's head that was hit by the young hero's punch proceeded to crack as soon as her fist landed the hit, forming a hole at the point of impact of the punch as he lay dead at her feet.

'Whaaaat?! The monster that was chasing me was taken out in one punch?! And by a human no less!' the slime monster thought to herself, stunned beyond belief by what she had just witnessed the woman with the buzz cut was able to do to the large canine monster.

'Whooooaaaa!!!! I made a hole in his head using my bare fists?! Daaaamn!!!! That was pretty awesome! This is definitely the first time I've been able to do this to a monster.' the bald, young woman thought to herself as she saw the damage her punch managed to deal to the monster.

The young woman and the slime monster girl proceeded to look at the dead body of the large dog for a few more seconds before facing each other.

"Please don't kill me!!!! I don't want to die!!!!" the sludge monster girl cried out, pleading for her life while she began to wobble where she stood.

"Hmm…. I don't know, you are a monster, and you might be trying to come after me in the future after I spare you. I don't want that to happen so I gotta kill you now, even if you look cute." the part-time heroine expressed her doubts about the slime monster in front of her.

"Wait! I really don't want to hurt any humans at all! I was just looking to secretly analyze a certain skilled martial artist that my previous instructor told me about. I was told that he could be found in Z City, but I was only able to make it to this part of the city when that damn dog suddenly spotted me and began to chase me." the slime girl began to explain how she had come to be within the ghost town of City Z, having failed to notice the fact that she had been complimented by the young human in front of her.

"Alright, let's say I believe that you won't harm any humans you encounter, how do you plan on looking for this martial artist the way you look now? Since you are a slime monster and all." the young heroine-in-training asked the slime girl in front of her while looking at the monster girl in front of her with a skeptical look.

"Well…. I can change my appearance thanks to my previous instructor's teachings." the slime monster said as she began to slightly change her appearance. And after a few minutes of altering her body, she took on the appearance of a human female with tanned skin, long, straight brown hair, and human eyes with dark green irises.

She had also changed parts of her slimy body into a pair of yellow tanktops, blue shorts and white sneakers.

'Hmm, well she sounds like she doesn't want to harm any humans but I should still keep an eye on her just in case.' the young human hero began to think to herself as she looked at the transformed slime girl.

"Oh, I see. So you can change your appearance as well as your skin tone? Wow, that's a pretty neat ability you've got there." the short-haired headed woman replied to her, surprised that the slime monster in front of her could change her appearance to make herself look no different from a regular human.

"So I plan to learn a fighting style so that I can defend myself against others who wish to harm me, I promise that I won't harm other humans unless they try to harm me first and I don't want to kill any one as well." the slime monster vowed to the human in front of her.

'I hope that she'll actually consider letting me live alongside her. It's the best solution that I could come up with for myself right now. I must convince her that I don't have any intention of attacking or killing any humans, no matter what! Even if it means that I have to serve her for the rest of my life.' the slime monster girl thought to herself, while she began to panic as she knelt down before the young human in front of her.

"Hey now, you don't really need to beg me that much. I'll let you live, but I can't let you out of my sight, so how about you and I become roommates? I'm the only human living out here, so you don't have to worry about other humans seeing you going out and about in this part of the city. So, cute slime girl, that sound good to you?" the young woman said to the sludge monster as she put her hand on top of her shoulders while looking at her with a bit of a smirk.

'Huh?! Why did she just say that I look cute? Does she really find me to be cute?' the sludge monster began to ask herself, her cheeks beginning to turn into a lighter shade of yellow than that of her body's colour. She definitely was not expecting that the human woman she was talking to would see her as someone cute.

"Hello? Earth to Slime Girl, do you copy?" the young hero-in-training asked the slime folk in front of her.

"Huh? Um, uuh,…. W-well OK then, starting from t-today I-I will be in your care. A-And I'll have you know that I am n-not a run-of-the-mill slime girl! I-I am a s-slime woman y-you hear me?!" the slime monster stuttered out a response as she continued to blush and look away from the human who had called her cute.

"Oh, I didn't know that. Sorry if I offended you when I called you a slime girl. Anyways, let me show you around the house and we'll talk a bit on how we'll be living together." the young heroine-in-training said as she started to move towards her apartment room.

"By the way, what's your name?" the tracksuit-wearing woman asked the slime woman walking right next to her.

"My name is Sanju, what's your name ma'am?" the slime woman shyly asked the one who had saved her from the large red canine monster after introducing herself, even if she was still thinking of the compliment that her savior had given her.

"Please don't call me ma'am, It's not like I'm that old right? And as for my name, you can call me Setsuka." the short-haired woman introduced herself to the slime woman as the two continued to walk towards her apartment.

"Ok then, Setsuka." Sanju replied to Setsuka's introduction, having calmed down a bit after she was complimented by the one that had saved her.

'I may be starting to go bald today, but I at least got to take out a bit of my sorrows on that dog monster and meet a cute slime gi- I mean slime woman today, so it's all good. And I might become good friends with Sanju as well, that would be nice, even if she is a monster.' Setsuka thought to herself as she walked side by side with Selena to her apartment door.