Chapter 465: Dodu Evolves

Adrian narrowed down his choices to the Demon Slime, Predatory Slime and Black Ooze Slime. The three of these evolutions are his best choices based on the descriptions that he read.

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Species: Demon Slime

Special Abilities: Hardened Body, Insane Regeneration, Mana Control

Height: 0.5 meters

Description: A rare species of slime that has special qualities of the first slime ever created. It has a fluid body with the properties of metal. It can also utilize mana in order to cast spells to either buff itself or cast protections on others. It also does not let go off its prey as soon as it is attached to it. It gained the name Demon Slime for its unrelenting attitude.

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Species: Predatory Slime

Special Abilities: Predate, Digest, Size Alteration

Height: One meter

Description: A rare species of slime that is said to have been influenced by the Sin of Gluttony because its ancestor has somehow managed to absorb the blood of the Sin of Gluttony. It is said to be able to eat anything and digest anything if given ample amount of time. It is said to be one of the bigger slime species that inhabit this world. It is unknown if its connection with the Sin of Gluttony is true.

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Species: Black Ooze Slime

Height: 0.5 meters

Special Abilities: Size Alteration, Fluidity, Dark Poison Body

Description: A rare species of slime that is said to be the bringer of sickness as its body is made up of a special type of poison. The special type of poison that consists of its body is unique to itself and cannot be replicated by easy means. These types of slimes are often exterminated since rumor has it that it decimated an entire country once by carrying a plague in its body.

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Adrian is picking these three because the other species either adds an elemental attribute upon evolution or makes the slime an auxiliary skills user. Adrian is focused on making Dodu his primary tank that can tank damages for himself. 

Adrian noticed that the enemies he is facing are getting tougher and tougher. Bosses like Cristobal could easily kill him if he gets focused on. The summoner's weakness would always be himself as the soulbounds would get unsummoned when the summoner dies.

He needed a pure physical tanker since Charon could tank magical attacks perfectly. Thankfully, the baby slime's evolutions enhance it rather than make it a new monster. Adrian wants to go for the traditional route of Demon Slime, but he feels that Predatory Slime and Black Ooze Slime would be better.

"If I choose the Predatory Slime then it could potentially learn skills from eating monsters, but the problem is the digestion time. It would also give him lots of chances to gain skills at a small chance as long as slimes are compatible with the skill.

The Black Ooze Slime is also interesting as its body is said to be unique like me. A special poison that can affect anything it touches. It is basically similar to a plague carrier and is great for countering short range classes that come to attack me." Adrian thought as he pondered.

The Predator Slime is powerful but takes an enormous amount of time to become strong. It also needs constant feeding from its name. Adrian did not feed his soulbounds as much because they also use mana to sustain themselves, but the Predatory Slime seems different. It needed to eat prey as large as it every day.

Adrian even heard of rumors that soulbounds would become more individual. It seems that there have finally been complaints of summoners being able to easily sweep dungeons as long as they have a great team composition. The summoners then argued that they sacrificed experience for the ability to clear dungeons by themselves.

The solo clearing of dungeons has been a hot topic since Necromancers have been unlocked as a second job advancement for dark mages. Necromancers can basically do what summoners do but in a faster rate as long as they have numerous corpses at their disposal. 

Adrian is fearing this balance patch as there are rumors that the mana of the soulbounds will disappear and would take mana from the summoner as a power source. This would not work because soulbounds are still different entities from the summoner. Adrian believed that the nerf would be soulbounds needing more maintenance.

"If my prediction is true then Predatory Slime would just be difficult to sustain. The Black Ooze slime's merit is that it has no requirement to eat in a sense. The Demon Slime and Predatory Slime have the word prey or eat in their descriptions which would mean they must be fed.

But what about the Black Ooze Slime? It only has vague descriptions that says of the victims of its unique body constitution. Descriptions are basically the game telling you what the basic concept is of the individual or thing." Adrian thought as he held Dodu in his arms.

The players of Pandemonium have started to become more studious and careful. There has even been reports of the reduction of scams or phishing because people started to read between the lines and read the lines carefully. The study shows that teens started to become more careful when it comes to text which pointed out that it could have been an influence of the game Pandemonium. 

The 'experts' in that field of study refuse to accept that as a proposition because people still view that games are just hobbies that do not affect your life. Yet, they always point to a negative stereotype that games that have battles somehow promote violence but in turn is the opposite.

Adrian finally made up his mind and decided to evolve his soulbound, Dodu. He reevaluated his choices, but he chose the thing that would help him the most in the end. He just hopes that he is not making the wrong choice because if he did then there is no turning back.

Dodu, who is currently in Adrian's arms, is placed on the ground. Adrian even went to Pann's farm just to evolve Dodu because the old man passed by him when he was contemplating. Pann did not try to pry in Adrian's business because he knows that soulbounds for summoners are like their children.

Even if the parent is raising their child to become a spoiled brat, the other parent cannot say that the way their raising their child is wrong. In the perspective of parents, they either know what they are doing or do not know what they are doing at all. But their ego prevents them from hearing the critique of other parents.

Dodu, who is only one feet tall, suddenly started to grow in size until it reached the height of one meter. Pann, who is observing from the sidelines, has his eyes glowing from excitement despite the stoic expression of his face. The cute slime started to change form from a cute round ball into a wave like body shape.

The cute size of Dodu disappeared and from it appeared a huge slime that looks like it has a huge jaw. The cute Dodu turned into a cute frightening one-meter-tall slime monster. Adrian chose the Predatory Slime as Dodu's evolution since he wants to build upon the slime's strength by feeding it different types of monsters.

[Your soulbound, Dodu, has successfully evolved into a Predatory Slime.]

Dodu still retained its cute eyes but it now has jaws that can open wide. Even Adrian could see that he might get swallowed inside of the stomach which seemed like a bottomless abyss. Dodu's attitude did not change as it is said that evolutions could sometime change the character of the soulbound.

Adrian finally checks the new special abilities that Dodu has. He can only see the name of the special abilities but not the actual function of the abilities.

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Skill: Predate

Tier: Racial Skill

Type: Active 

Effect: Able to eat the body parts (even the whole body) of the monsters or any organism that lives. Damage is dependent on the size of what is predated. Can fail if the prey manages to escape before getting bitten or locked in the user's jaws.

Cooldown: 20 minutes (Failure: 10 minutes)

Mana Cost: None

Cast Time: Dependent on the size of the prey.

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Skill: Digest

Tier: Racial Skill

Type: Absorption 

Effect: Recover health upon the digestion of the substance that is eaten (Health is recovered per second). Health can only be restored if herbs that can restore health is eaten, or monster/ monster parts are consumed. Has a 5% chance of obtaining a skill that can be learned by the Predatory Slime. Also has a 0.1 chance of learning a skill that cannot be normally obtained by any slime species.

Cooldown: Dependent on the Size of the prey

Mana Cost: None

Cast Time: Instant

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Skill: Size Alteration

Tier: Epic

Type: Body Modification

Effect: Change the size of the body of the skill bearer.

Minimum Size: 1 inch

Maximum Size: Twice the user's height

Cooldown: 10 minutes

Mana Cost: None

Cast Time: 5 seconds