Chapter 3. Pre Party

“Goddammit!” The captain slammed his fists down onto a panel. “Comms down, gravity is down, people are dropping one by one!” he pointed at Rose “You let that monster onto this ship! I knew something was up and yet you two defended her!”

Rose sighed “Captain, you know as well as I do that high elves are one race that follow a very strict set of rules, we have been over that, and discussing it any further will not help anyone.” Rose pinched the bridge of her nose “No one could of expected a Level 1 dungeon could birth a potential A rank. So, please sir, authorize the use of magatech weapons. Its sabotaging our systems one by one and if we don’t do something soon…”

The captain groaned, fist hitting the panel “I know!” he stood up straight, looking behind him and out of into space, the asteroid that held the dungeon visible from the command center “How am I going to explain this, A rank from a week-old dungeon, infiltrating the ship, murdering 3 of the top rankers on board, causing expensive damage to it’s systems, and to make matters worse.” He paused, turning to face Rose and Dolan “Having all this go to shit right when I reported a successful dungeon capture and ok to process!” He then slammed both arms down into the panel “And now you want me to authorize the use of magatech, if I don’t get demoted for this….hell I’d be lucky if it was just a demotion! I Might lose what left of my ship and be sent to some backwater planet monitoring a mining operation!”

“Better alive to see another day than dead in some monsters belly.” Dolan said.

Rose nodded “And as we saw before the coms were cut, The monster tanks regular attacks without caring, but it actively tried to avoid jiji’s magic arrows and stun batons” Rose walked closer to the captain “It might be an A rank because of what it’s doing to our systems, but its severely lacking in power. If we put a hard stop to it now we can save everyone’s lives”

The captain looked away only to meet the eyes of the other knights in the room “I don’t want to overrule your position captain, and I understand our rules on using those weapons only in an emergency or if the dungeon level is appropriate, but now is an emergency and if you wont give the order…”

The captain snapped towards her, then sighed “Fine, I authorize the use of magatech.” He said, prompting the knights in the room to cheer. The captain just shook his head “How the hell am I supposed to explain this to HQ…”

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Catherine, or now Catherine disguised as Jiji, strolled through the halls. Humming a simple tune as she walked. There hasn’t been any more close calls since the women she was disguised at showed up, and if stolen memories were correct, she only had to worry about Rose, Dolan, and the captain but she giggled at the thought of the captain doing anything noteworthy. “too much of a coward” she said to herself before she stopped, taking a quick glance around “Should of ran into more people by now…”

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She put her hands on her hips “Guess the finally got the coward to give the order” She tapped her foot on the ground, knowing her life was about to get a lot harder. She has been able to stay ahead of the crew so far by eating and stealing the memories of those she killed and absorbed, but ever since she cut the coms new information had been spotty. The last bits of decent information she got were that a retreat order was given, group up and protect the major systems of the ship, and that they were trying to get the captain to authorize magatech weapons, or weapons infused with magic that could become a major pain in the ass for her ‘they also decided I was an A rank’ she thought with a giggle ‘just because I slammed a few people into their machines and broke them, such a silly thing to decide by themselves’

Catherine took a moment to think about all she knew about their ranking system, she got why she was an A rank to them, but thinking about all she knew about herself, and her personal power, she wouldn’t rank herself higher than a C. ‘then again, give me the chance and I could be an S rank…new goal.’ She thought, a wicked grin spreading a crossed her face “There she is! Attack!”

Three armored knights with glowing swords came from behind and charged at her. Catherine looked behind her and groaned, readying her bow “Yup, got the A-OK” she said, firing one of the arrows and hitting a knight directly in the face, causing an explosion and crystallization of their head, killing them instantly and leaving the body to float freely. The two remaining knights charged, both slashing at her. Catherine’s body twisted unnaturally as she avoided the weapons but one of the knight’s twisted their sword causing it to shine, it’s edges flaring out and cutting into Catherine’s side, burning her.

“Fucker!” she yelled, losing her human shape completely as she sunk towards the ground, the cut still remaining and burning into it’s slimy body as it sulked away. “Don’t let it get away!” The guard leaped, taking advantage of the lack of gravity to fly towards the slime and slash, the slimes smaller body making it easy to dodge and wrap around the knight’s arm and holding it in place.

“Grit your teeth!” The other knight ran up taking out a stun baton and hitting the slime. Catherine felt a shock, electricity coursing through its liquid body as it lost control of its form, becoming nothing but a free-floating ball of white liquid.

“Is it dead?” One of the knights said, shaking his hand free from the liquid “A fucking slime? A white slime caused all this?” He cursed, readying his sword

“Give it another slash just to make sure, could just be playing dead again.” The knight nodded at the other’s words and raised his sword, but just as he was about to slash his sword he felt a sharp pain in the back of his neck and found that he could no longer swing his sword, or move any part of his body and if he attempted to do so he would feel a great pain from the back of his neck. “W-what.” He chocked out, moving his eyes over to his body, seeing he too, was motionless.

“Can’t believe I have to use my trump card this early, thankfully coms are cut, but still. Magatech can eat my ass” The knights paled, glancing from each other and back to the white slime, seeing it morph in the air to take the form of Catherine once more “It seems like you two like to party, eh?” She giggled.

“H-how are you d-doing this?” one of the knights choked out, then started to wimper as Catherine came over and remove his helmet. “W-wait, ple-“He stopped once she put a finger to his lips.

“sssshhh, can’t ruin the surprise for everyone else, right?” She smiled, her finger liquifying and forcing it’s way into his mouth. The knight gave a muffled scream, his mouth filling up with slime, dissolving his insides and all the liquid was drained from his body. After the body was drained, she ripped the top half of the knight’s head off and ate it, she then glanced over to the unmoving remaining knight.

“your turn” She said, removing the screaming knight’s helmet.