Syl

Chapter 62: A Long Overdue Discussion

Warning: Evolution will cause the body to torpor until complete.>

'Not like I have much choice. I'm locked in here with a magical skeleton who can kill me instantly with a wave of a staff... Yes.'

"Fascinating as always. I wish I still had evolutions left in me..."

I felt my core burning, swelling with power, and the world began to fade.

"... I should have offered a bucket or something... My dungeon floor..." The last words I heard before the void consumed me.

I found myself once again in the familiar infinite void and placed on a chair. While I knew Gramps could hear my thoughts, I had a neurotic concern that one day, I'd accidentally mess up talking to myself in my head and talk out loud, revealing something slime-related while disguised. So I shifted form, sitting in the chair for real this time.

"Syl, so good to see you again!" The loud and cheerful voice of Gramps erupted.

I opened my mouth to reply but was immediately interrupted, "Before we start, I need to clarify that I am not responsible for creating the elves. I even voted on putting severe population restrictions on the race and for their racial emblem to be usurpable."

"Why is their profile so ridiculous? Compared to everything else I've seen so far?"

"It's a long story... But the gist is we adopted a soul from another world as a test to see if bringing otherworldly essence would be profitable. That soul bargained to start as an elf, which used to be a simple race back then. He went on to achieve immeasurable success; he freed the elves from enslavement, stopped a demon incursion, brokered peace amongst the racial nations, and achieved absolute mastery in the arcane. When we approached him to reward him at the end of it all, he instead turned us down and asked if he could leave behind his legacy to the elves. He spent every Reincarnation Point, every bit of goodwill, every achievement and accomplishment, and the current elf is the result."

"Why don't elves rule the world then? If they used to be enslaved at one point, I'm assuming that not all of them could let bygones be bygones."

"Yes. We had to step in after the fact and set severe restrictions on them. Their race is practically infertile, and the usurping of their emblem allowed a lot of powerful competition. This did lead to some unfortunate culling of their race, but eventually, another peace treaty was brokered, and the world reached an equilibrium. But enough of a history lesson, I'm sure you have much better things to ask."

"Thanks." I replied, pausing with a big sigh and dropping my largest concern first, "Am I going to lose my mind from evolving?"

"Ha! No, not at all. In fact, that is one of the things this experiment is testing: if we should remove that evolutionary impulse from intelligent monsters."

"That's a relief. So why did I start without a class? It seems intelligent monsters are supposed to start with one."

"That was intentional! I specifically requested it." Gramps casually dropped the bombshell.

I restrained myself from facepalming, "... Why?"

"Tell me, Syl, what do you think of Traits compared to Skills?"

"I've only recently begun to experiment with Skills, but so far, my Traits feel superior."

"And the rest of the world? The goblins and humans you encountered?"

"They all seemed to think Traits are worthless. The goblins even thought evolutions were pointless."

"Exactly! I worked so hard on so many of those Traits, and the majority of the world thinks it's useless! I wanted to prove them wrong, show that they are all idiots for changing their experience distribution."

"Huh... I honestly forgot I could change the distribution."

"Well... You can't. I disabled that and nearly set your class distribution to the minimum when you went out of your way to unlock a class. However, I was overruled and told I was interfering with the test results. Bah!"

I silently thanked whoever stopped Gramps.

"Can you blame me? You were so close to your next evolution. You were going to be the first. At first, I questioned why you were protecting those goblins, but then it paid dividends. I thought it was a stroke of genius, then you went and joined the adventurers, made no progress to evolving, and then went and got a class which only further delayed it."

"Sorry... I just felt lost and confused. I had so many unanswered questions; everything was a mystery, and everyone and anything seemed to have a class except me. I didn't even have [Universal Language] till I got bonded."

"That's my fault. I forgot it gets applied to intelligent monsters via their class. And look on the bright side; you may not have been first to reach their second evolution, but you still won a bet for me."

"A bet?"

"You picked the evolution option I created. They accused me of playing favorites again, and someone else created Doppelganger to tempt you."

Stolen content warning: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

"It felt like my instincts were screaming at me to pick it. I very nearly did."

"They certainly did their research. They knew you were desperate for a class and to obtain skills." Gramps said, then paused as I heard him mumbling before he continued, "Honestly, maybe the adventurer thing wasn't a bad idea... If you evolved before getting a class, then Chimeric might not have even stood a chance."

"That's... Huh... Yeah... I probably would have thought now's finally my chance."

"And you were also the first to enter and conquer a dungeon. Gave me a real scare when Simon killed you,"

"...Is Simon the Dreadlich?"

"Yes, make sure you milk something good from him because if you didn't have [Defy Death], he would have completely ruined our test results. Just further proof how useful Traits are."

"Speaking of Traits, why can I not purchase [Prodigy]? Every time I try, it says error."

"What!?" Gramps exclaimed and then went silent. I awkwardly shifted in my chair as he began to mumble to himself. I caught a few of his words: cleaned, mistake, soul, and leftover. Unexpectedly, a notification suddenly appeared.

"There we go, I fixed it for you." He announced. It sounded not entirely true, but at least I had it now.

"Any other questions? It will be a long time till our next meeting, so I will give you a few more."

I had a few questions I wanted to ask out of my own curiosity, but if I was going to be limited, I'd shelve them for now. I'd much prefer to ask questions concerning myself than an explanation of why the adventurers could utilize notifications.

"Are there any slime trait fusions, and if not, would you consider making me some?"

"Good question. Currently, there are two, but both require specific conditions that I'm sure you'll stumble upon." He replied. An image of an old man smirking flashed in my mind, "I'm always considering new Traits, so I'd say the future is bright."

"Thanks. I hope you're right. Speaking of Traits, are you responsible for the [Sub-Core]?"

"Yes! I'm glad you are finally starting to use its real potential. While using them as independent casters or creating joint spells with them seems obvious, or your defensive orders, what impressed me the most was using one to filter information and another to handle mimicking wounds." There was so much enthusiasm in his voice. If he wasn't a disembodied voice, I bet he would be enthusiastically slapping me on the shoulder.

I honestly felt a bit proud to be receiving his praise, and I easily imagined a doting Grandparent.

"I would like to know if you have any goals for me. When does this experiment end? You keep mentioning others and competition, but I'm stumbling in the dark here."

"Hmm... You're quite the paranoid individual. But very well. The experiment officially ends when you either reach your final evolution or perish. I'm unable to disclose information about the others or the various side bets going on, but you may stumble upon other monsters in a similar position as yourself."

"As for goals..." He paused. An image of an old man giving a sympathetic and reassuring smile flashed in my mind, "Just live a fun life, Syl. Your previous one ended tragically, but you seem to be having quite an adventure already. There's a huge world out there! Raid a labyrinth dungeon, investigate a floating island, and climb a mountain! Meet new races, meet new monsters, and collect slime cores! There's so many possibilities."

I nodded, "Thanks, Gramps."

He gave a friendly chuckle before responding, "Watching your antics has been riveting, and I can't wait to see what you do next."

I was about to open my mouth when the chair disappeared from under me.

"Looks like we are out of time... Good luck, Syl, I'm rooting for you!"

"Wait! When's my next evolution? How many evolutions do I have left? Can I gain-"

I heard Gramps chuckling as I fell into the void.

"Always so many questions..."

I woke up to a barrage of notifications. I felt amazing.

"Nice joke, Gramps. You could have told me it was going to combine some traits."

Freely manipulate and change your slime mass into whatever shapes and forms you desire, limited only by your creativity, knowledge, and available slime mass.

Furthermore, the characteristics of slime mass are configurable on the fly to change density, adhesion, elasticity, or even texture.

Morphing speed and maximum density greatly scale with trait level.

Compatible with other slime traits.>

'Wow. Talk about an upgrade. Although, this makes me wonder what the purpose of [Pseudopod] is now. Not only did it not combine into this trait, but my evolution also gave it a level up. I guess Gramps must have further plans for it.'

Enhances an existing trait that allows bodily transformation or manipulation and greatly bolsters shapeshifting into any creatures, or objects.

This trait level, knowledge of the targets, and practice all affect the accuracy and capabilities of the forms in an additive or substitutive manner.

Forms can be freely modified, such as changing size or making other adjustments, and can also be combined, including limitless partial transformations.

The combined level of both traits reduces any physical discrepancies between your natural form and shapeshifted forms.

While transformed, traits the targets possessed can be mimicked, provided sufficient knowledge about them and any required bodily parts are currently manifested.

The maximum level of mimicked traits are capped to [Chimeric Mimicry], but quantity restrictions have been removed and limited with a trait budget.

Trait budget: 25.

Enhanced trait: [Morph Slime LV 7].>

I had to reread this one a few times, and each subsequent completion left me dumbfounded by the improvements and possibilities. I could combine forms and cherry-pick the best traits from my forms, limited only by a budget that I assumed would grow with the trait level.

I looked around and noticed the floor around me had been elevated to form an impromptu bowl. I noticed my clothing folded into a neat pile outside the bowl. I probably should have deposited that before evolving, and was glad it had survived the process. I grabbed and deposited my outfit with a tendril.

I shifted into my elven form and sighed with relief when it perfectly matched my original form. I had some bubbling anxiety that my changed traits might have impacted my form. I tried something simple by changing my teeth to the wolves' and successfully mimicked [Enhanced Fangs]. I admired the intimidating set of pearly whites that added a rather horrific quality to my previously elegant elven form.

Since I set [Enhanced Fangs] to the maximum, it took up five points of my budget. I was curious about traits without levels, so I shifted my fake innards and mimicked [Robust Stomach] from the goblins. I was very pleased when I saw it only cost a single point from my trait budget.

While I was shifting hobgoblin claws to one hand and bear claws to the other, the room began to darken, and a familiar swirl of black shadowy energy erupted, revealing the Dreadlich.

Gamma remembered my order and I smiled when I recalled Gramps telling me to milk some recompense.