Robert was betting the slimes had at least a central nervous system. His reasoning was that if they didn't have one, split portions would move on their own. So, when he cast his most powerful spell, he expected it to stop the slime from wrapping around his head.
What he got instead was a mouthful of living alien gel. Robert dropped his sword and clawed at the slime, who decides to be acidic on the inside and slippery on the outside.
His right arm was bound strongly by the slime pseudopod, which hardened. His hair melted first, then the outer layer of his skin.
Robert fell to his knees. He could feel the acid on his tongue and the inside of his cheeks, slowly sizzling toward his throat.
Then the slime popped like a balloon, losing cohesion, and becoming acidic dirty water. Robert took his spatial water bottle and poured gallons on himself to wash the acid off.
Then he fell down, gasping for air. It was more reflex than need since his body functions halted in the liminal void.
Robert activated reconstruction, burning stored biomass to heal himself. Natural quality healing soothed his pain. The clarity led him to remember he also has a spell to suppress pain. He used it.
Fully in control of himself and lying in a puddle of water, Robert used diagnosis and winced. The sleeve of his coat and uniform was ruined, and so was his head and face. He looked like a third-degree burn patient, sans bandages.
He focused on reconstruction and slowly guided the spell to fix the most critical issues first. Most healing spells could be targeted and directed except for supreme healing. The latter fixed all of the body's issues at the same time, diluting the effect and increasing the costs of healing the specific issue that prompted the patient to seek such an exquisite form of healing. Some said it could even reverse the effects of aging.
Now he had to admit. With this undeniable proof, he could affirm that slimes were utterly mindless. He decided to ask the brain spirit trapped in his Ethercosm.
Entering the Ethercosm now was as easy as breathing. He only needed to think about it and the cosmic landscape would reveal itself. His four-color star was huge, domineering. The four colors rotated in a spiral pattern, making it look like a tricolor galaxy, because the black of the Void mixed with the backdrop. The shells of his abilities were tiny spheres, opaque in contrast with the star's luminosity. They spun in their orbits like tiny planets.
Looking at his star increased the pressure he felt and made it sear him from the inside like heartburn. The star was begging to ignite, to give birth to its sister and grow into a constellation. He averted his gaze and focused on his goal.
Robert approached the glittering silver sphere of runic bands that served as a cage for the spirit gifted to him. As he approached, the spirit focused its floating disembodied eyes on Robert.
"Did you feel anything from the mind of the creature I just fought?" He asked.
"No. I didn't even know you were fighting something." The brain construct Cerebelon bestowed upon him replied. "I just felt you calling upon my powers."
"Do you usually sense the minds of those under the effects of Mind Blackout?"
"Yes. If you let me, I can even hear their thoughts," the floating brain preened with hunger.
"Okay, see you soon," Robert departed with haste.
He knew the spirit couldn't do anything he didn't order it to do but it was still creepy. If Cerebelon could track the cursed grimoire, what was stopping the eidolon from tracking the spirit he gave Robert? So far it hadn't come to collect the accrued interest from their forced bargain but eventually, it would.
Opening his eyes, he put those considerations aside. A powerful entity could come for him anytime. All that he could do was to get strong enough to keep them from killing Robert or someone he cared about. Cerebelon, Titania Samson, the Cult of the Pail Priestess, and many others. It was useless to spend time worrying about them but his brain didn't get the memo.
He was still laying in the puddle of water. Two feet away from him, the water froze in time, which made Robert raise an eyebrow. Wasn't his range bigger than that? Why was his talent considering the water two feet away as "not touching" him? Was it because it was a fluid? Robert extended an arm toward the frozen water and it started to flow again. Next, he tried to extend his will toward the water. He tried to concentrate on the thought that the water was important to him. He got a few inches of it to unfreeze. Then he did the inverse by no longer caring about the water. It had no effect. The minimal distance for fluids was about two feet, period.
He went back to healing himself. While reconstruction did its job, he worked on his mind palace.
Before he returned, Robert checked his essence stores. Lower than he expected. And dripping down as he measured it. Reconstruction had a low essence cost but that was compared to normal healing spells. He regretted giving in to his panic and popping his most expensive spell. All he had to do was to endure the acid and essence drain would've killed the slime anyway.
He had enough in the tank to cast essence drain three times. The spell returned slightly more than it cost, for the slimes. Robert needed to find a way to improve that efficiency. Maybe if he could find a vestige with the leech, absorption, or any related concept, he could make the curse stronger. Since its initial cost depended on the strength of the target, making it stronger would reduce the cost. Or perhaps efficiency.
The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.
He had to ask Noah. Taking his notebook, he jotted down a reminder.
The clockwork timepiece chimed. Robert scanned the battlefield, positioned himself, and waited the last few seconds, ready to fight again.
*
*
Right off the bat, Robert cast essence drain on three slimes in the middle of the pack. Since they were truly mindless, they would not understand where the curse came from. He then selected one closer to Amanda and started to hack it apart.
Amanda grew two thorny bushes that reminded Robert of the Mollusk realm. She stood in the gap between the bushes with her sword, ready to hack any incoming slimes. Freddy stood a few feet behind her, ready to lift any sneaky slimes back into the river.
The slimes he cursed went berserk. They attacked their own kin, triggering a chain of retaliatory strikes. But a slime wasn't strong enough to damage other slimes and soon a writhing tangled mess of pseudopods and congealed ooze in slightly different hues of blue and green clogged the tunnel.
Robert couldn't see Professor Actus anywhere. He was sure their teacher was watching them and ready to intervene if necessary. Right?
"Low on essence!" Robert shouted.
"What happened to your hair?" Amanda shouted back. "And your sleeve!"
"Focus!" He replied. "I'll explain it later!"
Robert's swordsmanship was better than Amanda's. She chose to act as support and didn't really commit to her studies before the reverse recognition squid incident. That massacre was an eye opener for her. And for the Samson family. Then he had an idea. Now that they would sleep and rest in the liminal void, why not train as well? Did Noah know enough about weapon combat to teach them? Heck, they could spend weeks at a time in the void, training. That would surely help Amanda polish her swordsmanship.
Robert stopped renewing the lesser haste spell on himself. He had killed three slimes already with his sword and drained another three. With the essence he received from the drain, he cast the spell on another three. He noticed that draining the slimes gave him more essence than just killing them with his sword. He conjectured that just killing something next to him wasted most of the essence. At least ninety percent of it.
It was infuriating. If Robert knew what he did now at the start of this battle, he'd have cast essence drain on twelve slimes in separate spots of the crowd, caused a mess that would make all the slimes but the ones in front stop dead in their tracks. Then, after hacking these apart, he'd just sit and watch the spectacle.
Water under the bridge or, in this case, over the cavern. Robert could extend a moment into almost an eternity but he couldn't rewind time. Not yet at least.
He took the job of hacking slimes as his new calling in life. For every ten slimes he killed, he cursed another one. When the curses he placed repaid themselves, he cursed another slime. He now placed his spells strategically, to create choke points that would neutralize the slimes. He let a few slimes move past him and toward Amanda and her bushes.
"Bored!" Freddy woofed.
"Better bored than dead or wounded," Robert barked back. "Does it mean you want to fight?"
"No," Freddy whined. "Never mind."
He had to be patient with Freddy. His lick brother was still skittish, still conflicted about accepting the Prime Vestige's power. Lie or not, that covenant he thought he had with the breeders gave him stability. He believed he was contractually granted a place to belong. Now, it was all touch and go. Now, Freddy knew he couldn't go back to the pet life. Not because Robert wouldn't support him but because he had outgrown such life. Freddy was having his coming-of-age crisis. Too bad that purple tentacle corgi didn't do much aside from teaching him a single spell and scaring the shit out of Robert.
One and a half hour passed. Amanda flagged out and sat to meditate and gather. Robert also gave himself bigger pauses to rest and let his body recover stamina as he cycled lavi flows to expedite the process. He just closed his eyes and meditated on the affinity he wanted to gather. It was hard. The place had Time, Life, and Void wisps but they were as scarce as ever. No Mental wisps in sight, because aside from the four sentient beings, everything else alive was either mindless or had the brains of a goldfish.
He had lost count of how many slimes he killed. More than a dozen, less than a hundred. He had seven ongoing curses, seven mounds of squirming slime surrounding the cursed ones that were attacking indiscriminately. And with each death he caused, his star throbbed, a sharp and sudden burst of migraine and heartburn.
He even burped as his brain interpreted the signals the wrong way and caused a physiological reaction.
"Excellent!" Noah's voice came from behind.
Robert spared his teacher a glance but kept his focus on the slimes.
"What the hell did you do to the slimes?" Noah asked as he reached Robert's side.
"Cursed them. When I fought and definitely didn't kill the cultist, I created a new Void spell. I called it Drain Essence. Turns out draining their essence causes the slimes to go berserk, and this happens." He waved a hand toward the mounds."
"I knew your aptitude with the Void was great but this is on another level. Did your curse worked on the guy who a hundred percent escaped?"
"No. The spell's cost depends on how strong the target is, compared to me. And he broke the curses easily. It only kept from being a waste of essence because it scared him."
"Yes. The affinities often form these polygonal diagrams of who beats whom. The four classic elements, for example. Water smothers fire, fire burns earth, earth blocks air, air disperses water. There are other cycles and all of them are conceptual. You can compare them to the game of rock, paper, and scissors too. Some affinities don't have counters, affinities such as Time, but also don't counter anyone. From my observations, it seems that the best affinity to fight against Void is Void itself."
"Indeed." Robert replied, then recast the drain essence curse once one of the mounds calmed down and he felt the surge of heartburn again. "I have a question."
"Shoot."
"Titania advised me to keep myself from ascending to two stars for as long as possible. But my star is full to bursting and it is getting more and more annoying as time passes. Each of these slimes I kill, for example," he paused to curse another slime on mound five. "Is giving me an ever-growing feeling of heartburn and headache."
"I see what you mean," Noah nodded. "And while Titania's advice is correct, let me ask you one thing. Do you know how will your talent evolve if you wait against if you don't wait? What's the guarantee that you'll get a better evolution? Or an evolution you are happy with? What if a lesser power fit your expectations better than an overpowered and unwieldy talent?
"Don't get me wrong. Titania's advice is spot-on. Many Archs with powerful talents felt their evolutions were lackluster. Or perhaps, as I am inclined to believe, they didn't know how to capitalize on their evolutions. Look at Amanda."
"What about her?"
"She is fighting with a farming talent. She barely uses her talent and she barely uses her affinities. Put aside the improved body an awakened person has. Is she even an Archhuman? Do you think she will fight against this feeling that's consuming you for as long as she needs, without anyone knowing how long she needs to hold it?"
"I have no idea."
"Exactly. Nobody has. All we have are theories and hunches. Search inside of you, Robert. What is the right choice for you?"