Chapter 13: Slime demise

They walked, with three balls of water levitating around Felix. He touched a tree, and then a fourth ball of water joined the rest.

"Do you want some water, Edward?" Felix offered, as Edward barked a laugh.

"Do you honestly want for me to drink this much water, or do you just not want to balance a fifth ball?" Edward asked, and Felix hummed.

"I just want for you to be healthy," Felix told him, and then touched another tree. A fifth ball of water ended up levitating around him. He was just about to tell Edward that he could go for a sixth, when he heard something like a slithering sound.

Edward made a sign for Felix to remain quiet, and then went further ahead. Felix remained in the clearing, with his balls of water circling him. For a couple of tense moments, he just stood there. But then, Edward came back, and Felix relaxed, when he saw the grin on the cat shifter's face.

"Right, we found the slimes. They are small, and you can probably take them down," Edward took a hold of Felix's hand, and began to lead him to where the slimes were.

"Take them out how? I just began to learn how to manifest the water balls?"

"I was thinking, dear bunny. For you to learn blood manipulation, you have to practice. When one thinks that the goo which courses through the slime is no thicker than blood, then, well, why can't you just use them to practice? Think about all the good you will do, once you begin to be capable of stopping bleeding with just a spell."

"Right! I can do this," Felix was warmed by the fact that he finally got the chance to pull his weight. As they reached a small pond, he saw the slimes. They had ice on their caps, and no eyes. Seemingly harmless enough, but the grass under them seemed dead.

Felix remembered the details from the posters, then. These slimes attacked herbalists when they caught them. More than one had managed to escape them, but with severe burns on their body. As soon as the slimes felt their vibrations on the earth, they got out of the water, and began to bounce and wiggle towards them.

Felix focused on the water inside the slimes, and took in a deep breath. He knew that Edward would step in if things ended up too dangerous. But he didn't want to rely too much on his soulmate. He focused, and the world bled from around him. The only thing that remained, was the slimes, and the water in them.

The first water ball got out of the slime nearest to him with such force that Felix felt the goo splatter on his boots. The rest were easier. When he opened his eyes, he saw the goo balls levitating next to the water balls.

"Right, time for some jell-o! Good job, Felix," Edward said, beginning to dig for the fire pit. "I think we caught them all."

"Right," Felix felt something he had never felt before. He was just a bunny shifter, but now, that he had defeated the slimes, he felt a warmth spreading through his chest. "I need to practice some more."

"Don't go far," Edward told him, not pausing in his digging. "Stay where I can see you."

"Don't you worry, Edward. I will," and so, Felix began to merge the water balls, and the goo balls. When he saw that there was something like a stone forming in the new balls, he stopped.

"Edward, how are slimes created?" Felix asked, as he poured the goo and water in the pot, so Edward could make the jell-o.

"What do you mean, how are they created? They appear around bodies of water, and nobody knows how they pop out," Edward then took out a slime core from the pot, and looked it over. "Felix, did you create this?"

"I think I did," Felix had just been playing around. He didn't understand why Edward was suddenly on edge.

"Don't do it again," Edward said, his voice barely above a whisper. "What do you know about the Mother of Monsters?"

"Not much? Just that she died 3,000 years ago, but her blood and bones still create monsters," and that she had been hunted, until her dying breath. But that was not something that Felix wanted to voice out loud.

"If you have her ability, then you should keep it hidden," Edward didn't want to believe that a bunny shifter could have the ability of the Mother of Monsters, but the proof was in his hands. If he didn't keep this information for himself, then the fear that was around the ability might be the reason for Felix's death.

"Right, I will be more careful," Felix told him, and then took out a ball of water from a tree. "I'll just try to use the water, and not any biological material."

"Yes, do that," Edward added the crushed mint to the jell-o, and then began to steer the mix. All the while, Edward couldn't get it out of his head, that this could mean trouble. The Mother of Monsters was still feared, and all it would take, is for Felix to not be careful once, and then everything would end up in flames.

Not that Edward wouldn't protect him. He knew, from the bottom of his heart, that he would protect his bunny. His dear bunny, who was currently making grass grow from the water. Edward blinked at the sight, and then cleared his throat.

"How are you doing that?" Edward asked, and that seemed to have the effect of breaking Felix out of his concentration.

"I just took some soil as well," Felix said, looking at the grass, which was balancing on the top of the water ball. "Do you think I can grow my own herbs, this way? From seeds?"

The idea had merit. If they could get the seeds for some hard-to-get herbs, then Felix would be able to make more potions.

"I thought that you will be earning the rune license?" Edward asked, to which Felix grinned.

"Well, yes, but there is no requirement about selling herbs. No license needed for that, and the market isn't even watched all that closely," which was the truth, and Edward didn't see any danger in making plants grow. Plants were not monsters, even if some of them could be poisonous. Nobody would try to hunt down Felix, for some herbs.

"Right, I have some seeds you can practice with, if you'd like?" Edward had looked for some herbal nurseries, in the Emporium, which could grow him the herbs, and then they could split the profit. But if Felix was the one to grow the herbs, then things would be different.

For one, Edward wouldn't need to wait as long as he would have, if he actually waited for the herb to grow the old-fashioned way. For the other, this could serve to keep Felix's nose clean, and out of danger.

"Sure, give them to me," and Edward paused in his steering long enough, to take out the bag with the Dragon's tongue seeds. He handed them over, and then went back to his jell-o. From the corner of his eye, he watched as Felix began to grow clusters of the stuff, pausing only to harvest them, when there was no space left over the water ball.

Felix must have seen the error in his ways because he made ten other water balls, and then proceeded to plant them all. By the time the jell-o was done, Edward could see 100 gold coins worth of herbs on the ground by a very tired, but smiling, Felix.

A smile Edward knew to cherish because with each such smile, he knew that Felix was beginning to believe in himself more and more.