“Amy, really?”

“What?”

“You know what I'm talking about.”

“I'm sure that I don't, Kevin” Amy snarked back.

Clarity looked down at the robe Amy had given her. The baggy sleeves reached down to slightly below the elbows, and the hem fell down to slightly below the knees, but that wasn't the problem. No, the problem was the low cut neckline that barely covered any of the chest area. Sure, Clarity didn't have anything that needed covering up, but the robe sure made it look like she did.

“That robe is even more provocative than going without” Kevin said with a stony expression, putting Clarity's own thoughts into words.

“Wow! Big bro, don't tell me you're looking at a slime with those kinds of eyes?” Amy asked, wagging her eyebrows suggestively at her brother. He could only sigh helplessly in defeat.

“Don't worry” Esmeralda whispered from the side “Humans are weird, I don't really get most of them either, but it looks like everything will be fine now. They'll probably want you to go to the adventurer's guild so they can nag at you about the city's rules, but after that I can show you some real enchanting!”

Clarity nodded quietly while the two siblings bickered.

“Okay, okay, let's finish this up so we can get back to the training grounds. There were still a few kids who wanted more help when the guild leader called us away” Kevin announced.

“Sure, sounds good” Amy agreed. “By the way, big bro, how exactly are we supposed to deal with an intelligent monster?”

“I thought you were the bookworm, why are you asking me?” Kevin asked rhetorically.

“I'm the expert on magic. You're the expert on monsters. You wouldn't want your sister to get fired on the first day of her new job, would you?”

Kevin sighed again, turning to Clarity. “Okay, the adventurer's guild doesn't really work with intelligent monsters, per se. We work with adventurers, and clients. So the easiest way for us to deal with your identity, would be for you to become an adventurer yourself. Technically, anyone is allowed to join. You would have some responsibilities you would have to fulfill, but you'd be treated just as well as any other adventurer.”

“Hmm... are adventurers treated well, then?” Clarity asked, only half joking.

“Haha, I would sure hope so, seeing as how I'm an adventurer myself” Kevin laughed. “But I would say yes. Adventurers have a lot of freedom in our society, so long as they follow the bare minimum rules, and they are rewarded quite well as long as they're willing to work. Of course, the stronger an adventurer, the more they're likely to be paid.”

“Stronger is better, huh?” Clarity grinned “Does that mean the adventurer's guild helps adventurers get stronger?”

“Heh, that interests you, does it? Yeah, we have a lot of services designed to get newbie adventurers up to speed. Although, to be completely honest, I have no idea how much use they would be to a monster.”

“Sounds interesting. I'd like to join” Clarity agreed. 'If nothing else, I know that I can grow my core by killing more monsters.'

“Great! Let's head back to the guild and get you a status card!” Amy cheered, before practically dragging Clarity towards the door.

Clarity waved to Esmeralda as she was manhandled out of the shop. Esmeralda merely smiled and called out “Come back when you're done, I'll pull out some of my beginner's enchanting books in the meanwhile!”

“We should stop by the training grounds first, to make sure the students haven't burned themselves to a crisp in our absence” Kevin said, shaking his head.

“Hey, why do you always have to bring that up? I only lit myself on fire once” Amy snapped.

Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

Clarity noticed there were a lot more people on the road now, many of them stopping to stare at the slime girl as she walked along under Amy's bear hug.

“Why are there so many people? I didn't see anybody around earlier?” Clarity asked. 'See, it's definitely not my fault I snuck in. It's your fault for having a weird city where the entire populace disappears in the middle of the day!'

“Ah, that...” Kevin groaned as they turned a corner, the road leading to a massive building with a huge amount of mostly empty space around it. “That” he pointed at the building “is the guild hall. And that” he pointed at the empty space around it “is the training grounds, where we have training for the newbies on weekends. It was... particularly popular today, as my sister was putting on a demonstration for prospective mages.”

“And I even found some! Can you believe it? A new world with a handful of potential mages in only a single town!” Amy praised.

Kevin frowned “Did you remember to grab that practice fireball staff when we rushed off?”

“Well... it was an emergency. I'm... sure it will be fine. Surely, they won't play with it while we're away, right?” Amy muttered, sounding quite unconvinced herself.

Clarity examined the guild hall as they walked closer. It stood three stories tall, and practically looked like a fort itself, with sturdy walls and a large wooden gate that led inside where Clarity could see young men and women in mostly leather armor sitting, standing, drinking, and playing cards.

Kevin and Amy both took a detour, heading towards a handful of teens in a mix of leather armor and various colored robes huddled together in the training yard. Clarity paused, not wanting to enter the building without the two guild employees and potentially draw the agro of a mob of drunk adventurers.

“What are you lot doing?” Kevin yelled harshly.

“Where is my staff?” Amy added an instant later.

The teens looked up guiltily, holding up their hands as though to say “It wasn't me!”

At that moment, Clarity sensed a surge of fire mana from behind and turned around, noticing another young man holding up a staff with a melon sized fireball appearing above it. He was hidden from view during their approach due to a small shed, filled with weapons, sitting right next to him.

The extra fire mana Clarity was sensing seemed to radiate off of the ball of fire in waves. 'Isn't that a waste of mana, just letting it float away like that?'

“Hahaha, look at this! I told you I could do-” he bragged, raising the staff above his head to strike a pose. He looked up with a confident grin, before doing a dramatic double take. Rather than looking at the other students, or the angry guild staff whose staff he held above him, he stared directly at Clarity.

“Ghost!” he cried, instinctively lobbing the fireball right at Clarity.

The group of teens could only watch in horror as their wayward friend launched a magical attack at the creature Amy had just walked up, acting incredibly chummy with.

Kevin and Amy for their parts tried to rush back, but couldn't outrun the speeding fireball.

Clarity could tell that the mana within the ball of fire heading straight towards her was slightly weaker than the fireballs the goblin shaman had thrown around the lake all those days ago, but either by luck or skill the trainee had managed to throw it directly at Clarity's armored core.

Clarity was reasonably confident the core could tank the shot, but rather than take the risk, she threw out an arm like swatting a fly, hoping to break the spell and cause it to explode as far away from the main mass of her body as possible, in order to limit the damage.

However, as the fireball came closer and entered Clarity's range of mana perception, she found it remarkably easy to drain and absorb the chaotic fire mana within. He could feel a small amount of will imbued inside the lump of mana, directing it to fly and burn, but it had little to no resistance of its own and quickly accepted her will to be absorbed instead.

By the time the fireball reached her, it was little more than a flickering candle in the wind, snuffed out in a puff of smoke as it met the back of her hand.

'Huh, I wonder if I could get him to throw a few more fireballs at me? That was nearly half a goblin worth of mana.'

“I-I-I'm not scared of you!” he exclaimed, gripping the staff with both hands and trying to channel his mana into it once again. Unfortunately, Kevin was quick to interrupt, charging over and whacking him over the head with the hilt of his sword before he could form another fireball.

“What the hell do you think you're doing, kid?” Kevin yelled.

Clarity turned and saw Amy staring back with an absolutely gobsmacked expression on her face as the group of teens cowered behind her. Clarity wasn't sure if they were more afraid of the two angry instructors or the obviously inhuman creature standing in front of them. Judging by the scolding Kevin was giving in the background, Clarity wouldn't blame them if they chose the instructors.

Kevin dragged the young man back by the cuff of his shirt, over to the rest of the group and handed the staff to Amy.

Realizing that she needed to set them straight, Amy took the staff and cleared her throat.

“Well, creating a fireball on your first try and even hitting your target is quite impressive. And lucky. You see, this staff was created for training mages. Rather than increasing your control or holding extra mana like most magic aids, this staff uses the mana you feed it to create a laaaarge~ fireball. With enough practice a skilled mage can even learn to create one on their own.

However! You don't have that practice! No, you just created a fireball that you had almost no control over! With just a single errant thought you could have sent it flying towards one of your friends! Or even yourself! Did you think those stories of mages blowing themselves up were a joke? No! They're absolutely real!”

Her eyes gleamed as she stared the group down. “If I catch you doing something as foolish as this again, I won't teach you magic anymore.”

The group seemed appropriately cowed by her threats as they began to apologize profusely and plead for forgiveness.

While Amy was still dealing with the trainees, Kevin walked over to Clarity “Are you alright? Sorry, it seems you have a penchant for getting unfairly attacked, no? Hahaha...” he tried to laugh off.

“That reminds me, I didn't apologize for attacking you the other day in the woods either. I'm sorry about that... and for this... and for the guild master too, I guess, since he probably won't apologize himself. It's a good thing you're so amicable, I'd hate to have to worry about your revenge if you were one of the vengeful types.”

'Oh, trust me, I will have my revenge' Clarity vowed silently, revealing nothing of her inner thoughts. 'One day, when you least expect it, I'm going to make you look like a fool in front of all of your students. And then you will rue the day you stole my fireball dispenser! Muwahahaha.'