Chapter 117: Fun

Chapter 117: Fun

Neave teleported into the sealed chamber that led to the underground magma. The moment he appeared, he paused in surprise.

The room was filled to the brim with lava slimes and golems. They turned to him, and Neave had to fend off several attacks. It was a little exaggerated to say he was ‘fending them off,' given that the attacks couldn’t even leave a red mark on his body.

His clothes, however, weren’t nearly as resilient and given that Neave had no desire to be left naked, he used the crown telekinesis to stop the attacks from reaching him.

The inside of the chamber was nothing special. It was much hotter than before, but other than that, it just looked like an ordinary cave with many fire monsters inside.

“...Hmmmm?”

There were quite a few glass bushes in the room, which was... Not good. Neave had explicitly warned the glass shrub against breaking into any of the sealed chambers.The origin of this chapter's debut can be traced to N0v3l--B1n.

Had these been planted before he sealed the chamber? Probably not. That is a conversation he would have to have with the shrub. Luckily it didn’t seem to be a problem, as the fire monsters weren’t nearly powerful enough to break off the sturdy branches.

For now, at least.

Neave shrugged. It wouldn’t be a big deal even if they grew powerful enough. Rather, it would be preferable, as the primary purpose of these glass shrubs was to feed the monsters more energy.

These creatures seemed to be progressing just fine, so Neave balled his fist and shattered one of the walls.

“Be free, my children!”

It was time to allow them to start spreading through the underground. Truthfully, Neave’s intervention wasn’t entirely necessary, as the monsters would eventually break into caves by digging out from underneath the surface.

He wouldn’t be surprised to learn they had already done it. The magma that resided in the planet's core was the nearly perfect environment for them, and nothing but time was stopping them from making it all the way to every corner of the planet.

The more pressing issue currently was something else entirely. Neave needed some creatures to feed on the fire monsters.

***

The small slime tightened its body, and eventually, it sprung, jumping into the air. Neave grabbed it before it could land and examined it.

“Hmm, pure slime, nice, nice, you’ll do just fine.”

Neave left the sealed chamber and ran for a while through the caves, where he eventually unceremoniously dropped the slime and left it alone.

The slimes would grow gradually, and eventually, they would fill the realm. As he had learned through his experimentation, it took quite a bit of effort to turn a slime into something besides a slime, and he was confident that there would never be a real shortage of them in the realm.

Once there were many, they would find a way to grow in power and quality, and voila, various monsters would be born.

The ambient energy had grown quite a bit, and by now, Neave could confidently say that it was even thicker here than it was in the real world outside.

At least, it was in the surrounding area. This was somewhat unusual but unsurprising. The density of the glass brushes was insane, and they produced immense energy by merely existing.

There likely wasn’t a single plant of this level of quality in the outside world. Well, perhaps some top sects had cultivated a few that could compare in quality, but definitely none that could come even close to the speed of growth and spread.

These plants made Neave wonder a bit. Would they... Produce anything? Like a fruit or flower. There wasn’t a real reason for them to be able to do that, but mutations were practically expected at this point.

There were already some shrubs that were growing considerably thicker than their brethren, and some were drastically more branched out.

Time would tell.

***

Neave stood in the room where he grew his plants and found it... Frustrating. It required a lot of work to maintain, and frankly, he couldn’t be bothered to keep working on these plants.

He injected the needle into the slime’s body, reaching all the way to its core. It shook and shivered for a few moments until its core crumbled under the pressure.

A violet avatar crawled into the slime's body before its goop could dissipate and spill into a nasty, incongruous puddle. It couldn’t enter. For some reason, the avatar kept bouncing off the slime’s body, and Neave slapped his forehead.

He used a tendril of liquid spirit guided by life force to ‘wash out’ the remnant spirit from the slime’s body. Once that was done, the violet avatar could enter unhindered.

The slime glowed with low, purple light as its body firmed up again. Neave grinned.

He focused and found himself manipulating the slime’s body from its perspective. Immediately, he was thrown out of focus and had to stop.

“... That is so trippy.”

This was the first time he had tried genuinely manipulating the corpse of another being, and it was a very unusual experience. And it was also one that presented a serious problem.

Neave effectively left his body whenever he entered the slime. That meant his main body was empty whenever he used the violet avatar.

That was a massive problem. One of the ability's main appeals was that it effectively added another body for him to use in combat. If he had to discard his actual body to use it, it would ruin the core purpose of the power.

Neave wouldn’t be dissuaded by something so minor, however. The dragon could use the power without issue; if it could do it, then damn it, so could he.

He kept swapping from his body to the slimes, which was a nauseating experience. Gritting his teeth, he kept doing it for a while, and gradually the process grew faster and faster. Finally, after a while of practice, he could swap perspectives instantly and change right back.

That wasn’t a perfect solution, but it wasn’t bad. With enough practice and skill, he could use both bodies in a fight.

The issue was that he could have up to seven bodies. It was unclear whether he could use that many bodies simultaneously and still show a decent degree of skill, even with ages of practice.

Despite this problem, the power was still worth using, if anything, for the scouting potential and the ability to fight opponents without risk to himself.

For now, he had to return to learning how to control the body.

Back in the shiny slime, Neave tried moving. It seemed impossible. There were no muscles, tendons, or bones, and this creature's anatomy felt foreign to him. Bit by bit, he experimented with different movements, and eventually, he felt confident he was on the right track.

The slime body tensed a bit and immediately relaxed, jiggling slightly. It tightened again, this time far more, and once it released the pressure, it hopped in the air slightly. Then it tensed greatly and jumped so fast it slammed into the ceiling, and its body suffered some damage.

Neave was thrown out of the avatar from the backlash, but he grinned. That was so thrilling! Who knew something so simple would be so much fun!? Being in the slime's body felt strangely liberating, he had to say. It was to the point where he contemplated keeping this body.

He frowned at that. Was it really worth it? The problem was that the slime no longer had a core. This meant it didn’t have any growth potential. Or... Wait. Was that really true? It couldn’t evolve, but did that mean it couldn’t grow?

For starters, adding spirit powers to the thing was impossible. The reason why was simple. He could easily melt a monster core in the slime's body, granting it a quasi-spirit. While its body was alive, there was no soul in there. It would be like melting a monster core in any other liquid.

The problem was that this would make it impossible for Neave to possess it again.

The only way to enter the body would be by purging the quasi-spirit, which would remove the entire point of doing it in the first place.

So that was out of the question.

There was the possibility of feeding it a ton of treasures, but the question was, what would that achieve? A bouncier, more resilient slime? Not a great damage dealer. Perhaps it could gain toxic or acidic properties, even without evolving? That could theoretically work.

Equipping it was... Well... It was a damn slime. How would one even equip it?

Well... Actually... There was one way to do it.

A few other ideas later, Neave had a few things he wanted to try out. Was experimenting on a slime like this worth it?

Yes.

After all, Neave knew best just how much potential could be acquired by merely having fun.