“Yes I am! No thanks to you!” Slime blurted out.

Alex’s grip didn’t let up. His arms wrapping the Slime so tight that his body began to bulge over and under the child’s arms. When finally, his body turned to liquid and spilled out onto the ground. Alex’s eyes widened at the sight.

“Oh no! I crushed you to death, WHAT HAVE I DONE!?” Alex shouted as he threw his fists overhead.

The liquid returned to a gel like state and rolled itself back together. In a moment Slime had reconfigured his body back into its round shape.

“Kid, you’re really melodramatic. Has anyone ever told you that?”

Alex’s head shot back and looked down to the ground to see that, once again, Slime was perfectly fine.

“How did, what did, when did…?” He said as he looked up and down his body and back to the ground repeatedly.

A sigh was heard from the poor Slime.

“Okay Kid listen up.” He said as he hopped in place trying to get Alex to calm down.

“I wasn’t really planning to give you an education on monster species, but I guess maybe a crash course in Slime is needed.”

“Yes please!” Alex smiled. He sat down near Slime and was ready to learn.

“As you’ve seen slimes have the ability to do something, we call Translimeguration. Where we manipulate the properties of our slime bodies in order to change shapes, fuse together, etc. Essentially this ability allows us to go wherever moisture can be.” Slime lectured.

“Okay but…” Alex started before catching an irritated look from Slime.

“THIS MEANS we can absorb ourselves into soil, water, clothes, etc really anywhere or anything that can absorb or store liquid or matter.”

“So, when you exploded everywhere you absorbed into the ground?” Alex asked.

“Kind of. Most of my body splashed all over you and then later you rolled over the puddle of me. I basically absorbed into your clothing.” Slime said.

“Well why didn’t you just come out sooner?” The boy questioned.

“Translimeguration is still kind of new to me. Most slimes don’t even use it that much. In case you forgot I turned in a big rock, a sword, and then had to reassemble myself into your clothes. It takes a lot of out a Slime I’ll have you know. IN FACT, I don’t know if any other slime could have done what I did.” Slime boasted with an over aggerated airy laugh behind it.

“Wow! That’s so cool!” Alex exclaimed.

Slime let out a little smile as his eyes caught Alex’s.

“Anyways, once we got to this cave, I let myself off through your shoes and just reassembled myself. I thought it’d be pretty funny to give you a scare, and boy was it!” He chuckled.

“Yeah, you got me good!” Alex laughed along. “Oh, but what about that rock thingy? How do you do that?

“Slimes can also harden portions of their bodies as well. It helps us stay grounded during windstorms and allows us to manipulate gravity a little bit as well. If you didn’t notice slime bodies are incredibly light and it really wouldn’t take much for us to be picked up or THROWN in some cases.” He finished now leering at Alex.

“Aha, ha, ha…sorry about that!” His smile stretched to his ears as he placed his hand on the back of his head giving it a small scratch.

“Regardless, it’s a difficult technique to use as we have to decide when and which part of our body to do this in. We also need to be careful because if we ever fully turn out bodies to rock, then…uh…” Slime grew quiet.

Alex’s head turned to the side. His smile disappearing.

“Then what?” He asked.

Looking back up at Alex with eyes wide, Slime realizing his mouth was a little dry smacked his mouth a bit before answering him.

“Then we..uh… die and we remain as stone forever.” Slime said sadly. “Most slimes do not use this technique because its hard to control and there is usually is no reason for us to use it. We don’t die from being hit by weapons, or smashed, or splashed, or crushed or whatever else. We only really die if our molecular makeup all becomes solid. So for most slimes there is no real reason to use this technique at all.”

“They why did you do it its so dangerous?” Alex asked softly.

“Ahem…well…ya see.” Slime wasn’t prepared to discuss his feelings today and per usual, Alex caught him off guard.

“BECAUSE I’d rather hang out with you and your stupid human brain than be stuck with a bunch of stupid goblin weirdos. AND THAT’S THE ONLY REASON!” Slime yelled. His eyes closing angrily as he turned away from Alex and began to hop away.

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As he hopped towards the door, he looked back to see Alex smiling at him and he too smiled to himself.

“Okay kid, let’s get this door open and get going.” His eyes rolled to the top of his head signaling the handle above him.

Alex’s steps echoed through the chamber as he made his way to the door. The cold and damp clamminess of the metal surprised him, but he gave the old handle a turn anyway. The metal let out a loud creek as it turned. Giving a tug on the handle but to Alex’s surprise the door remained shut. Adding additional strength behind it didn’t seem to matter either as the door stayed locked in position.

“I think this is locked.” Alex spoke still heaving at the door.

“How? There isn’t even a flippin’ lock on it.” Slime said as he hopped on Alex’s shoulder to take a closer look. In a heavy sigh Alex let go of the door. He sucked in breath after breath as he bent over to regain his energy.

“Oh, I know!” Alex said as he jolted back upright.

He picked slime up off his shoulder by his head.

“Now just a bleedin’ minute!” Slime started to object as his body shrink up and down from Alex’s palm.

“TranSLIMEguration!” Alex shouted in excitement as he slammed Slime into the door before him.

With a loud thud his palm slammed into the door and as he slowly pulled back Slime’s body reformed back into its blob like shape. As he pulled away from the door a loud wet suction release was heard. Alex pulled his hand infront of his face to look at his, now dizzy, companion.

“Hey it didn’t work.” Alex said with some disappointed.

Slime’s eyes had turned into rotating spirals with his mouth hung ajar. Suddenly he shook his body back to its sense and gave Alex the angriest look he could muster.

“YOU IDIOT! WHAT THE FLIPPIN’ HELL DO YOU THINK YOU’RE DOING!?”

“I was just…”

“THAT’S NOT HOW IT BLEEDIN’ WORKS! HERE LET ME GIVE IT A TRY!” Slime lunged to the top of Alex’s head. In a flurry of rage, he transformed into a paddle, the handle resting on Alex’s head, and the body of the paddle started slamming into Alex’s back causing him to jerk and step forward slightly.

“TRANS-HUMAN-GATION!” Slime exclaimed giving Alex a mighty strike sending the boy flying forward from his position face first into the door and with a loud thud he soon found his body against the floor.

The paddle tightened itself back into a small ball before snapping back into its normal body and then Slime plopped onto the floor.

“Oh, WEIRD it didn’t work. WEIRD!” Slime mocked.

“Ow…” Alex let out a small whimper. Tears began to form in his eyes and his face and nose warmed to red. He put his hands against the floor pushing himself back onto his knees with a sniffle.

“That was really mean.” Alex said as he started wiping tears and snot away from his face. “I was just trying to help.”

“Oh, for the love of the goddess.” Slime exhaled.

“Listen Kid, maybe that was a bit harsh of me. But you need to start thinking. You can’t just go slamming my face and body into things because you think it sounds like an all right idea, you hear?”

Alex was still sniffling by the door.

“I just thought you could squeeze through the door and maybe unlock it from the other side.” Alex whimpered.

Slime went from having his body boil to feeling an extreme amount of regret.

I shouldn’t have lashed out at the poor kid. He doesn’t know how we do and don’t work. He doesn’t know the world at all. Nice going Slime you big bleedin’ idiot.

“Hey, that’s not a half bad idea. Maybe let’s give it a shot.” Slime said warmly. He hopped over beside Alex. Forming a large hand from the top of his body he gave Alex a pat on the head.

“Maybe next time we talk about these good ideas, instead of just doing whatever we want hmm?”

Alex wiped away another stream of tears and gave Slime a warm smile.

“Yeah, sorry about that Slime. I’ll try to be more considerate about you in the future.” He said as he got back to his feet.

Just then the door handle began to rattle. Alex jumped back as did Slime who then landed upon Alex’s shoulder. A muffled sound could be heard coming from the other end of the door. Alex swore it was the sound of a big animal and as the door creaked open it slammed into the wall near it radiating a loud wooden slam throughout the corridor.

The pair soon noticed there was a small lantern shining back at them and despite Alex’s imagination he realized that it wasn’t a loud animal or beast, but an old man with a loud, but deep, cough.

In an old raspy and tired sounding voice, the man spoke to the pair.

“What are you two doing down here?” He waved the lantern back and forth scanning the area before proceeding.

The duo looked at one another but before they could answer the man began speaking again.

“I don’t know how you got down here but come on up. It isn’t safe in these old caverns.”

The man motioned for them to come and so they did. Alex grabbed his bag and slung back onto his shoulders as they walked through the doorway. As he did this, he accidentally put away his illumination spell. Alex also forgetting that Slime was on his shoulder now left the slime to fend for himself against the descending leather strap. As it came to rest on against his body Slime altered his body slightly to allow for the strap to pass through his body, like water, and then left it to rest on Alex’s shoulder. Alex noticed this happened after the fact and gave Slime a quick sorry and Slime smiled back.

They walked through the doorway into a room that was entirely made of wood. No candles or braziers were present and only the warm flame of the lantern lit the room before them. The room was small and narrow and before them was a small staircase that climbed the wall and met another and then disappeared into the darkness.

Another wooden thud came from before him them followed by the sound of locking.

“Come now, up we go lads.” The man motioned for them to follow him as he started climbing the staircase. The three ascended the stairs stretched out from the walls. One set, then two, a third, and before for long a fifth. Finally, they came to a small opening, just wide enough to climb through. The man hoisted himself up and extended a hand down to help Alex. He took the man’s hand, the warmth was welcoming, and together pulled Alex out of the hidden passage and up into the room. The latch fell to the ground with a loud thud and another locking sound came out. The old man shooed him to the side and laid down a rug over the hidden passage.

Alex looked around taking in the room surrounding him as his curiosity began to wake up. The moonlight fell through the windows onto the wooden floor. Different types of metal objects were hung throughout the room. The sound of ticking and clicking filled the air. Before Alex was a counter that was littered with small metal parts and a book.

“What is this place?” Alex asked his head cocked back looking up at everything above him, his jaw left ajar.

The man gave a warm smile, his eyes lighting up as he was about to speak.

“Welcome to Derelict’s Trinkets. The greatest trinket and repair shop in all of Castle Town – Title Pending. I’m Derelict.”