What in the gods above?! Masami yelled to herself in the darkness between lives. I was having a good life!
Masami’s internal grumblings over her ill fate continued on for a long time while she waited to be reborn. And, after an interminable period passed, she began wondering what the holdup was: she was getting hungry.
Wait? Hungry? While Masami still did not sense anything outside herself, she turned her focus inward and noticed two things. First, she was, indeed hungry. And second, she appeared to know what and where all of her internal organs were.
This was quickly followed by the realization that she didn’t recognize most of her organs.
Status! She cried out mentally.
> Name: [ ] (Level 0)
> Other Names: Amelia, Masami
>
> Race: Slime (common) (Level 0)
> Unspent Experience: 0
>
> HP: 9/9
> MP: 230/230
>
> CON: 5
> STR: 3
> DEX: 1
> INT: 18
> WIS: 17
> CHA: 0
> Free Attribute Points: 0
>
> Traits: [Reincarnator], [Studious], [Ucarhi – Creator of Written Ucarhi], [Touched by a Cursed Blade]
> General Skills: [Cooking 10], [Cleaning 9], [Ostesh 40], [Planning 20], [Learning 27], [Eating 11], [Ucarhi 27], [Fishing 12], [Butchering 9], [Natural Leader 12], [Claws 7], [Improved Dark Vision], [Nimble Health]
> Class Skills: [Fireball 9], [Fire Manipulation 5], [Improved Mana Pool], [Mana Finesse]
> Unspent Skill Points: 0
> v. 0.80a
I’m a slime! Masami cried internally, then, as her mind caught up to what she was seeing, Holy shit that’s a lot of MP! Where did that come from?
She started going through her Traits and Skills reading them carefully, until she found it:
> [Studious] (rare): You were born to learn and one of the best ways to do so is by studying. +3 WIS, +3 INT at each birth.
The System wasn’t entirely infallible. Or, at least, how it interacted with Gods’ Creation wasn’t. Since the System had to interact with each person individually, that meant lots of different languages, and different means—visual, auditory (heck, she’d even heard of one person with a tactile interface). And because of that there were sometimes very slight variations which one might reasonably call mistakes.
And one of them was the [Ostesh] language version of [Studious]. When she was still at the Academy as (well) Amelia—jeez, maybe I should start numbering these lives—she had read one scroll discussing WIS and INT enhancing Traits. The author—she forgot his name—had been a traveling [Mage] from a generation before her and, in his travels, had learned about many Traits from the other peoples of the Eurial continent. Among other things, he made sure to transcribe the descriptions of each of these Traits in these other languages.
One anomaly he pointed out was that in the other five languages in which he had a transcribed description, [Studious] was described as a (rare) trait which granted +3 WIS, and +3 INT at birth. But in [Ostesh], the Trait was described as effecting at each birth. Given that people are only born once, however, this was usually chalked up as some sort of mistake. Who could say which version was correct?
This slime could.
In any event, with [Reincarnator] and three lives under her belt, her starting WIS and INT were starting to get a little ridiculous. Maybe she could be a magical [Slime]?
She focused on her Race and pulled up its description:
> [Slime] (common): The lowest of the low, and roundest of the round. Slow to notice you and slower to react, you’re pretty much only in danger if you fall into one. +1 Free Attribute every level; +1 Skill Point every 6 levels
Oh, fuck. [Slime] has shitty progression. And if I already have System access, the base attributes must be crap too. If it wasn’t for bonuses, I wouldn’t be surprised if I only had a single point split between INT and WIS.
Then she turned her focus to this new Trait that had appeared:
> [Touched by a Cursed Blade] (rare): Slashing wounds heal 50% slower.
Double fuck. I guess if I can cheese my good Traits and Skills, that also means the bad ones follow too. Fuck. Going to need to avoid pointy things from now on. Or find a way to break curses. But it’s a Trait? Shit.
With that downer, Masami closed her Status and returned to reflecting on her body, which was apparently the only thing she could sense. Organs: check. Hunger: check. Hey, wait a minute… Actually, Masami could start to sense something outside her body. She mentally grasped her sensory input for several minutes before it hit her: She was tasting the outside of her body with… her entire body. Indeed, it would not have been impractical to describe herself as a disproportionately large, but insensitive… nose.
She was not going to describe herself as a tongue.
Feeling as squeamish as she could for a [Slime], Masami tasted that she appeared to be on a rocky surface. She tried to follow the taste of the rock (whatever that means), and soon found that subtle variations of rock were passing beneath her body. There was no sense of touch, nor of movement, but Masami’s best guess was that she was indeed moving.
And so she did so. For several hours. And then several more hours.
Surely she would have gotten bored, but given her general state of sensory deprivation, this was about as much stimulation as she could possibly get. At one point, she pondered over her Status page to see if there were any skills that could help her, but the complete lack of external stimuli meant that every skill was either useless or dangerous.
Finally, days or even weeks later—and still hungry, though apparently not starving?? A mystery for later—Masami tasted dirt and green grass beneath her. After such a long time, she never would have thought she would be happy eating dirt and grass, and yet, here she was doing just that. Occasionally she would get an insect or other invertebrate crawling on the ground and the delicious taste of meat would flash through her.
Of course, killing such things gave her no XP and seemingly weeks later—she didn’t have any means to measure the passage of time—she still sat as a Level 0, 0 XP [Slime]. At least her time was peaceful. [Slime] life for the win!
And then a [Squirrel] fell into her.
Aaahhh!!!
Both [Squirrel] and [Slime] yelled mentally, though neither could hear the other. The animal fought valiantly to escape. But, the nature of [Slimes] is of a thick cloyingness and, before she knew it, Masami had her first XP of her new life.
Ding!
> You have killed a [Squirrel] (Level 8). For killing an enemy significantly above your level, you gain bonus experience. You gain 150 XP.
>
> [Eating] has ranked up to 12.
Huh, Masami thought, and then dumped her XP into her first [Slime] level. With the free attribute point, she put it into her DEX with the hope that perhaps it would help her roll around faster (not that she had any sense of speed). And a few seconds later, Masami confirmed that she could indeed roll around much faster.
----------------------------------------
And so, life continued for Masami, day in and day out, months and months rolling by. She would move, eat what she came across, and eat what fell into her. When winter came, she found herself slowing down and dozing off until spring came again.
The cycle continued.
Years passed, until finally:
Ding!
> You have killed a [Honey Badger] (Level 2). You have gained 220 XP.
And with that, Masami upgraded [Slime] to Level 6, and received her first general Skill Point. Opening up the [Slime] skill store, she was … not terribly impressed. Interestingly, and she hadn’t noticed this as a [Catkin], while her existing Skills and Traits could affect what Skills were available for purchase, Skills that had behavioral prerequisites appeared to be limited to what she did in her current life. Accordingly, she could purchase Skills that were homekeeping- or leadership-adjacent based on her existing Skills. Or she could select from [Slime] skills: [Improved Eating], [Calm Stomach], [Flavor Enhancer], etc. She was not terribly impressed going through that list, and was a little irked there did not appear to be any curse breaking skills. Not that she had much history with curses. Or curses that existed as Traits. But she had some future proofing in mind.
In the end, she decided that her current blindness was the biggest and best issue that she could resolve at the moment.
Ding!
> You have purchased [Skin Sight] (uncommon): Who needs eyes to see? You don’t, that’s who! Perceive your surrounding at a distance of (DEX*Rank/10) meters.
While she had been favoring DEX so far, Masami had also brought up CON to 6 and STR to 4 for balance. But now that she could see, Masami dumped her latest point into DEX, bringing it to 5.
Being able to see around her for five meters brought metaphorical tears to Masami’s metaphorical eyes. First, because it was the first time she had seen this life. Second, because the lack of the typical eye structures meant her vision was wildly unfocused. And finally, because she found herself looking in every direction simultaneously. While what passed for a [Slime]’s brain parsed the latter easily enough, it nonetheless took Masami’s soul a little time to adjust.
When she could finally properly observe her surroundings, Masami saw she was in a temperate forest, currently at the base of a tree where she had apparently killed the badger. Looking around her, it must have been old growth forest far away from any civilization and, while she had only the vaguest sense of how much time had passed since birth, agreed with herself that the lack of anything sapient trying to kill her over all that time weighed strongly in favor of her being in the middle of nowhere.
But, she could see! And now that she could see, Masami took a close look at herself.
I’m round. And pink! Why am I pink? Am I a girl slime? Are there girl slimes? A rumble from what could generously be called her stomach later, and the blood floating within her plasma was cleaned away, revealing her greenish-blue color. Well, assuming that she could actually sense that color and wasn’t just misinterpreting it. Indeed, she had noticed that [Catkin] could see more purples than purple, but conspicuously had a little trouble with shades of yellow.
Nonetheless, continuing her self-examination, Masami decided that she must have been about a half meter wide, and that, all in all, she could have done worse than [Slime].
Well, hypothetically. She wasn’t going to jinx it.
----------------------------------------
And so, her life continued. At least with her new vision, she felt more comfortable utilizing some of her other Skills. Many were useless still as she was a [Slime], but she found that she could use [Claws] and [Fireball] with ease. The former was weird—who ever heard of a slime with a hard cutting surface? And the latter was toastier than her slime-itude cared for. But in either case, they made her more combat effective at both a melee distance and a (fairly limited) range.
At least it was peaceful.
Until six months later. In the interim, her improved sight had allowed her to more actively hunt prey and she found herself steadily gaining experience, keeping her belly (relatively) full, and ranking up her eating-related skills. Things were going fine until one day, she stumbled across the corpse of a [Cave Bear].
The corpse was relatively intact, with what appeared to be various slashing wounds around it. What was apparently keeping any scavengers away was the fact that the corpse was covered in pus-filled boils. Masami was squeamish when she realized what she was looking at, but her slime instincts told her to shut up and eat. Turning off her [Skin Sight] so that at least she wouldn't have to look, Masami took a mental step back and let her body do its own thing.
Oh gods, why is it so delicious?!?
That… went alright, as these things go, mental trauma notwithstanding. At least, until Masami fell asleep, which, considering slimes don’t sleep, was disconcerting. When Masami did wake up, she flicked on [Skin Sight] and could tell she was half the size as before. All around her, she could see little baby [Slimes] slowly move off into the distance.
Did I just… reproduce?
Fortunately, motherly instincts for slimes were zero. And so, after recovering from that initial shock, Masami simply continued on her way, putting that barrel of concern far out of reach.
----------------------------------------
Years passed. Along the way, she picked up the [Meditation] skill.
> [Meditation] (rare): You may enter a meditative trance. When doing so, your HP Regen and MP Regen are improved by (Rank)%.
She wasn’t quite sure, but she thought that the life of the [Slime] was a slow, thoughtful, and conscientious experience that—by sheer perseverance—lead to her picking up the Skill.
Yes, that must be it. Nothing else to see here.
And, of course, Masami continued to level. Level 12 came, but Masami was uninterested in any of the available Skills and so banked the Skill Point. She reproduced again a few levels later, and that joined the other barrel of concern that she was ignoring. And soon came Level 18. Given the repetitive and simple nature of her life, the Skill list was only slightly different and she banked that Skill Point too.
By the time Level 24 rolled around, Masami was starting to get a little worried. While she enjoyed the simple life of the [Slime], she had no idea if her options would improve at any point in the future. She still remembered dying as Amelia and the frustration of losing her banked Skill Points then. Moreover, she had no idea when she would be eligible for a Class if at all. She assumed so, since it appeared on her Status, albeit blank, but she had never heard of a [Slime] with a Class.
Ultimately, after a few more days of worrying, Masami decided just to spend the Skill Points. While she had doubts they would mean much in this life or the next, you never did know what the future held. Heck, when she saw [Reincarnator], she just assumed that she would be [Human] or at least humanoid.
But nope. Already slime.
And so Masami picked up [Calm Stomach], [Amorphous Body], [Disguise], and [Slippery].
Of course, when Masami hit Level 30, she finally got the notification she was waiting for.
Ding!
> Congratulations! You are now eligible to select a Class. A Class represents who you are and what you do, and will be a defining point in the rest of your life. Classes can provide extra attribute points, Traits, and Skills. Classes may be leveled using unspent experience.
>
> Based on your Race, Level, Traits, Skills, society, and prior experience, you are eligible for the following Classes (inspect for more information):
>
> * Hunter (common)
> * Eater (common)
> * Glutton (uncommon)
> * Gourmand (rare)
> * Mimic (rare)
> * Scribe (rare)
> * Mage (very rare)
>
> Choose carefully!
>
> If you encounter this tale on Amazon, note that it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.
Huh, Masami thought as she pondered the available Classes.
[Hunter] must have come from all the time I spent in the forest hunting and eating. But given that I don’t use weapons or traps, and I don’t really stalk prey so much as I chance upon them, I’m not sure what good that’ll do for me here.
[Eater], [Glutton], and [Gourmand] all seem likely to be my [Slime] Racial Classes. The attributes for [Gourmand] are very good, but given the description, I don’t see how any of its Traits or Skills would be all that interesting.
[Mimic] was an interesting one and her inner monologue spaced out as she reviewed what the System would tell her. It was a disguise-focused, rogue-type Class, but with an emphasis on inanimate objects. This confused her for a bit, because she thought that [Mimic] was a Race as well. Hmm. Not necessarily useful now, but perhaps the disguise features would be helpful in later lives?
After serious thought, Masami skipped it. While she couldn’t discount future lives as monsters, she much preferred to live in civilization, and while general disguise skills might be helpful, doing so as a large chest didn’t fit her hopefully-future M.O.
And so on to [Scribe]. Masami was confused how she had acquired it. She suspected that it was somehow related to her Trait as the creator of the [Ucarhi] written language, but she had done that before her Class as a [Catkin] and no such Class had been offered to her then. There must have been some hidden requirement met, but she was baffled what, if anything, her slime-self had done.
And so, by process of elimination. Masami was left with [Mage]. While she loved being a [Mage], she wasn’t super-hot on choosing it this time. It was becoming apparent that [Mage] would always be available to her in her future lives, and it just didn’t add that much to being a [Slime]. This life could have been an opportunity to pick up weird and unexpected skills that just might be useful in the future. But, here she was picking something so… vanilla? Masami wasn’t sure how to feel about that.
Oh well.
Ding!
> You have selected [Mage].
>
> You have allocated XP to [Mage].
>
> [Mage] is now Level 30. +60 WIS, +60 INT, +60 Free, +30 [Mage] Skill points.
What the fuck? Since when does Mage give so many Attributes and Skill Points? She focused on the Class to pull up its information.
> [Mage] (very rare): One of the most basic Classes delving into the arcane nature of magic. Well-balanced between all the fields thereof, but not specialized into any in particular. May evolve into various specialized Classes. +2 WIS, +2 INT, +2 Free / level. +1 [Mage] Skill point / level. Antae fuis kaj donis atributojn kaj lertecojn nur se gi estis malofta. Jes, jes, mi ne zorgas, ekzistas nur
WHAT. THE. FUCK?? Masami’s (metaphorical) eyes widened further and further as she read more of the description. First, the basic description had been entirely re-written. Among other things, it now described it as a “basic” Class, and suggested that it could “evolve” into other Classes. Since when do Classes evolve? What does that even mean??? Then the Attributes and Skills awarded per level had tripled. And then the text ended in something she couldn’t read, even though the System was set to [Ostesh]. Frankly, it looked a lot like the bootya loadya, but what did she know. While everyone had heard the language of the gods, no one had ever seen it written before as far as she knew.
Masami was so stunned chewing this over that two days passed without her moving. Fortunately, she was a slime.
Eventually, she returned to her senses and then the Status screen. I have 60 free points and 30 [Mage] Skill Points to spend. Let’s get cracking. She rounded off her INT and WIS, dumped a few points into her physical stats, decided she had enough to splurge a little on CHA—I’ll be a pretty slime!—and then dumped the rest again into her physical stats. When she was done, her stats looked like this.
> HP 364
> MP 4800
>
> CON 26
> STR 26
> DEX 26
> INT 80
> WIS 80
> CHA 16
> Free 0
Her MP was sitting at a staggeringly high number. And her HP was fairly respectable as well, though she was starting to see the diminishing returns of [Nimble Health] when her physical stats started getting up there. Turning her [Skinsight] to herself, she did indeed appear shinier, and possibly bluer, almost tending into purple really.
With her [Mage] Skill Points, she went all out. She picked up [Firebolt] to round out her first tier fire magic skills, then picked up [Acid Splash] which appeared to be something she gained access to as a [Slime], though she had no other acid magic spells. She had never considered it during her opposable thumb existences, but now she purchased [Mage Hand] for one point, then the upgrade [Mage Hands] for another two points. That was five points.
Unfortunately, at this point, all she had left was a few second tier skills. So she grabbed them all: [Flaming Sphere], [Flamethrower], [Fire Wall], and [Mage’s Shield]. With eight points spent, she was now down to 17 points. But having made those purchases, another two skills popped up which she immediately purchased: [Improved Mana Pool II] and [Mana Finesse II]. Those ended up costing 6 points combined, but the improved versions were much appreciated. With the 11 points left, she considered banking them, but she didn’t see how things would change this life to allow her access to other spells. So against common knowledge—she supposed that didn’t apply much to her anymore—she dumped them into her two old fire Skills, which were getting harder to rank up anyways.
And finally her [Mage] gains were spent.
Then she bought [Firm Purchase] from the [Slime] store.
And she was all done.
Ding!
> As a [Slime] with a Class, you may become a Named [Slime]. Please select a Name.
Oh. Amelia?
> A prior Name may not be selected for a Name.
Huh. Hmm…. Queenie?
> Congratulations! You are now the Named [Slime] Queenie.
>
> The Temples to Alldir, god of adventurers, have been alerted to your existence. Beware adventurers!
FUCK!
----------------------------------------
Queenie huddled in a cave for a week afterwards. Eventually, she realized that she had been out here for years now—or has it been decades?—and she hadn’t seen a single person out here of any type. Heck, not even a [Goblin], and she was pretty sure they counted as monsters and not people. Sure having a combined 60 levels was pretty sweet. And the slime-life was relaxing. But (not that she was keen on dying) she was starting to get a little antsy for the next life. Would she be a monster again? Or just a person? And what Race this time? She only knew a few, but a girl could dream couldn’t she?
And so, Queenie went back to her normal routine, but now with extra magic! Though her sight now improved to an impressive 26 meters, her MP was essentially bottomless for the hunting she did. And so she found that she could spend weeks at a time just firing off spell after spell. Throw a few dozen or hundred, zone out for a while to let her MP recover, maybe have a snack, then pick back up again. And while her [Mage Hands] ended up not being as game-changing as she thought it would have been—it wasn’t like she needed to build herself a house—it was nice to occasionally just pick up a shiny rock or… whatever. Plus now she could get fresh fruit from out of the trees rather than wait for them to fall.
Ding!
> [Eating] has ranked up.
Sigh. Maybe I was fit to become a slime.
----------------------------------------
Queenie had just gotten back into her routine when she tried to level up both [Slime] and [Mage] and found something peculiar. Rather than the 3,100 XP each (and 6,200 total) that she expected to spend, both were demanding 6,200 XP each. Surprised, she ignored it, as she was want to do, and continued on with her [Slime]-life until she had the needed XP. When she did, she went again to level up and
Ding!
> [Slime] has reached Level 31. [Slime] is eligible to be evolved to a higher tier Race.
>
> [Mage] has reached Level 31. [Mage] is eligible to be evolved to a higher tier Class.
Huh. So that’s what the System meant about evolving Classes. Though it’s weird that I Classed at 30 then evolved it at 31. And Races evolve too I suppose. This must be something new. Do I get a selection?
> [Big Slime] (uncommon): It’s a [Slime], but bigger! +2 Free / level; +1 Skill / 3 levels
>
> [Giant Slime] (rare): The giant bully of all [Slimes]. +1 CON, +3 Free / level; +2 Skill / 3 levels
>
> [Queen Slime] (very rare): Matriarch of the [Slimes]. [Slimes] and [Royalty] are one step more likely to treat you favorably. +1 CHA, +5 Free / level; +1 Skill / level.
Hmm. Queenie wasn’t sure what to expect about evolving a Race, but it seemed a lot like picking a Class in the first instance. Clearly all her options were based on who she was and what she did. And frankly she was a little curious whether her naming choice had somehow affected the last option.
Perhaps more interesting though was being able to compare the different rarities of Races and Classes! She’d never really paid all that much attention to the subject as Amelia and then, when it came to it, she hadn’t Classed before she died. Then Masami had always known she was going to be a [Mage] (very rare). She was the only (very rare) Class holder that she knew of and her Attributes and Skills were the same as the (uncommon) Class holders, which were admittedly better than (common) Class holders. Really, it was only just now that she started to understand that the higher rarity Classes were very much overpowered. And starting as a (common) [Slime] and now having the option of evolving into an (uncommon), (rare) or (very rare) variant, it was quite clear how the rarity mechanic worked.
Hmm, better look at the [Mage] selections first.
> [Fire Mage] (very rare): Magic is good for only two things in this world. Fire and flame. +2 WIS, +2 INT, +2 Free / level. +1 [Mage] Skill point / level. [Fire Immunity] Trait.
>
> [High Mage] (very rare): Not quite an [Archmage], but they’re pompous rats anyways. +2 WIS, +2 INT, +2 Free / level. +1 [Mage] Skill point / level. New areas of magic are 50% easier to learn.
Hmm. Given her predilection to fire, Queenie really shouldn’t have been surprised by the first choice. The specific Trait awarded was interesting and, given [Reincarnator], something she could hold onto even if she never went down this road again. The second choice seemed like a generic evolution. Branching out into new magic was high on her list of medium term objectives, but she would need civilization for that. If the Class bonus was a Trait, she could grab it for the future lives, but in juxtaposition, the failure to note it as a Trait suggested it was not. Well, she had made up her mind.
Ding!
> You have selected [Queen Slime].
>
> You have selected [Fire Mage].
>
> You are now Named [Queen Slime] Queenie, [Fire Mage].
>
> The Temples to Alldir, god of adventurers, have been alerted to your evolutions. Beware adventurers!
Oh bother, she thought and blacked out as the evolutions hit her.
----------------------------------------
When Queenie came back to, she found that she had ballooned in size. It was hard to say, but she was pretty sure she was the same size as the hut she grew up in as Masami. Which was the biggest change she found.
The irritating change she found was that the XP scale continued to be much more expensive. She wasn’t super keen on the exact calculation, but she was pretty sure that the “new” 30+ scale was double the “old” 30+ scale. Level 32 for either of her Class or Race would take 6,200 XP. That was enough to take you from Level 0 to Level 10 just starting out!
Queenie grumbled for a while, but then settled back into her routine again.
The decades passed…
Ding!
> [Queen Slime] is now Level 40. [Fire Mage] is now Level 40.
Ding!
> [Queen Slime] is now Level 45. [Fire Mage] is now Level 45.
Ding!
> [Queen Slime] is now Level 50. [Fire Mage] is now Level 50.
Her Skills ranked up as well, both from general use and these surplus Skill Points from [Queen Slime] she was accumulating due to the lack of Skills to purchase. She began to wonder what really high level people did. Funnily enough, she realized that her General Skill points received from her Race could be spent on any rankable General Skill, whether originally a [Slime] Skill or not. So she took the time to round out some of the Skills that had been lagging.
When she did cross paths with other [Slimes], she did find that they seemed slightly more … deferential? Slimes weren’t exactly much of a social species so it was hard to say. Lack of lips and all. And she hadn’t run into any [Royalty], so she wasn’t sure about that.
What she did know was that she had CHA 40 and looked as fantastic as she felt.
----------------------------------------
One day, Queenie was traveling through the forest when she heard voices.
Voices! she thought redundantly. And for all that she was wary about adventurers, it was something new to interest an old [Queen Slime].
And so, Queenie crept quietly through the forest following the voices—or at least as quietly as a hut-sized slime can. And as she crept around a stony ridge, she saw them seated by a river, taking a quick break on their hike.
They’re so small! Queenie thought, though she supposed they were actually full-sized. It was a party of five, all humanoid. Two were definitely human, but the other three she was doubtful of. Two were taller, and had pointed ears and delicate features, while the fifth was very short and hairy. But, she couldn’t understand what they were saying. Darn language barriers.
Queenie continued trying to observe them when one of the taller ones whipped around quickly and fired an arrow at her. It did nothing, but she found she was a little annoyed at this impudence. She let a little rumble out through her plasma and moved out from her "hiding" spot. They continued speaking among themselves, but she still couldn’t understand them.
> “[Monstro-Analizo]. Ho aĉaĵo. Ĝi estas Nomata Monstro.”
>
> “[Nomata]? Kio?”
>
> “Queenie. Tuta nivelo 100. [Queen Slime] e [Fire Mage].”
Queenie stood there, staring down at them as imperiously as she could. Then she realized she really had no eyes and that the overall effect was probably less royal and more monstrous than intended. Four of the adventurers readied themselves to attack, but the fifth started yelling at them.
> “ATENDU! Ne ataku!”
>
> “Kio nun [Princino]? Ĝi estas Nomata Monstro. Ĝi ne estas besto.
>
> “Ŝi ne atakas! Ŝi devas havi altnivelan Kapablon, kiu influas karismon kaj reĝecon. La princino estas tuŝita.”
They kept talking at each other for many heartbeats, before the four aggressive ones launched themselves at Queenie to attack. Their attacks, though cutting, were laughably weak and she quickly torched one, then blocked the two others with [Fire Wall] and [Mage’s Shield]. The fourth attacker had disappeared from Queenie’s senses, but she disregarded the matter as the first attacker fell and she turned her offensive power against the second. Just as the second attacker fell (well-roasted), Queenie suddenly felt a burning, itching sensation on her far side and found the fourth attacker carving into herself with daggers and flinging powder into her plasma through the cuts. She reacted instinctively and [Clawed] at him, shredding his meaty flesh, before grabbing him with [Mage Hands] and swallowing him up. The third attacker chose her distraction as the time to go all out and he hacked into her several times before he too roasted before the royal fire.
As the last of the attackers fell, Queenie turned her attention back to the tall female, the one who argued with the others before they attacked. The woman seemed to notice that Queenie was focused on her and slowly approached deferentially. As she did so, Queenie suddenly felt a loss of energy and her body deflated significantly. Pulling up her Status, Queenie saw that her HP was low and plummeting quickly. Darn, forgot about that slashing wound curse. I… I’m dying. Again.
With that thought, Queenie let out a low keening rumble. The woman continued to approach, and rested a hand on Queenie’s outer membrane, gazing at her carefully, even as her colleagues lay dead around her.
> “Iru nun en paco, Reĝino de la Arbaro.”
Urgh. Stupid language barrier, Queenie grumbled to herself. As her last points of HP drifted away, Queenie used [Mage Hands] to grab some mud from the riverbank, formed it into a flat tablet, and then began carving into it, first in [Ostesh], then in [Ucarhi].
> Here lies Queenie, [Queen Slime] (L50) and [Fire Mage] (L50).
>
> As her penultimate act, she remembers Amelia, daughter of Connor, of Kingsheart of the Osmond Kingdom, student at Panmore Academy, future [Mage].
>
> As her ultimate act, she remembers Masami, daughter of Naomi, of the [Catkin], first [Mage] and leader of the [Ucarhi], inventor of written [Ucarhi], conqueror of the [Orcs].
>
> May all history remember these three.
Ding!
> You have died.
----------------------------------------
> Name: Queenie (Level 100)
> Other Names: Amelia, Masami
>
> Race: Queen Slime (Level 20), Slime (Level 30)
> Class: Fire Mage (Level 20), Mage (Level 30)
> Unspent Experience: 5,200
>
> HP: 0/3,280
> MP: 5,280/19,600
>
> CON: 80
> STR: 80
> DEX: 80
> INT: 140
> WIS: 140
> CHA: 40
> Free Attribute Points: 4
>
> Traits: [Reincarnator], [Studious], [Ucarhi – Creator of Written Ucarhi], [Touched by a Cursed Blade], [Fire Immunity]
> General Skills: [Cooking 10], [Cleaning 10], [Ostesh 40], [Planning 20], [Learning 30], [Eating 36], [Ucarhi 27], [Fishing 12], [Butchering 10], [Natural Leader 12], [Claws 15], [Improved Dark Vision], [Nimble Health], [Skin Sight], [Meditation 10], [Calm Stomach], [Amorphous Body], [Disguise 15], [Slippery], [Firm Purchase]
> Class Skills: [Fireball 18], [Fire Manipulation 18], [Improved Mana Pool II], [Mana Finesse II], [Firebolt 12], [Acid Splash 12], [Mage Hands], [Flaming Sphere 12], [Flamethrower 12], [Fire Wall 12], [Mage’s Shield 12]
> Unspent Skill Points: 0
> v. 0.80a