Over his next few periods of wakefulness, JJ came to understand the true wonder of slimes.

Slimes were known as the garbage disposals of the magical world, as they could break down almost anything, given enough time, in order to absorb the mana inside. What JJ only recently discovered was that slimes would develop an affinity, which granted them much better control over their mana type.

The natural instincts of a slime only directed it to seek out dense quantities of mana and feed, particularly on those mana types most similar to their own affinity. This was the direct cause of their status as dangerous pests, as organic beings would naturally accumulate magic, attracting their gluttonous attention.

Thus, they were prime targets for extermination when found in areas that humans and other sentient beings frequented.

What their natural instincts didn't allow them to take advantage of was their incredible control over their own mana type. While a wild slime would only use that control to better absorb their attuned mana type, JJ could reverse the process by using its mana to create minor magical effects.

So far he had created nothing more than a few drops of water with Aqua, or a few funny looking lines in the dirt with an earth slime he'd named Rocky, but the sheer novelty of doing real magic still amazed him.

He suspected his efficiency was horrible and that he would need a significant amount of practice before becoming useful.

'Oh well, I've got all the time in the world, and what good game doesn't include unreasonable amounts of grinding?' he snarked mentally.

After a bit of testing he discovered that the slimes he possessed would behave differently than normal wild slimes. Wild slimes actively sought out better sources of mana to feed on, while “his” slimes would simply idle in place where he left them, unless a significantly denser source of mana appeared within their range of perception.

With no need or desire to figure out why, the extent of JJ's thoughts on the matter were 'That's convenient, at least I don't have to worry about my characters wandering off.'

At least, that was the extent of his thoughts until he left Rocky on the shore for a few hours and came back to find a lone goblin prying a now cracked magic core out of Rocky's rocky corpse. He felt it was rather unsporting of the creature to kill his character while he wasn't even there, but decided not to pursue the subject as he felt partially at fault himself.

JJ knew that goblins would occasionally show up and hunt the slimes around the lake for their magical cores. He didn't know what they did with the cores but it was the only thing the goblins would bother to loot from the fallen slimes.

Their spears gave them the range needed to impale the defenseless water slimes before they could jump onto and encase them. Usually. About one in three attempts would result in a goblin tripping and falling or missing his spear thrusts wildly enough that a slime would get a very good meal and JJ would get a very graphic reminder of why he didn't want to play fleshy, organic “characters” anymore.

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Contrarily, earth slimes were mostly immune to the goblin's depredations. They moved slower and more clumsily than water slimes, but the goblin's strikes would do nothing more than chip off a few pieces of their outer rocky shell as they charged over.

Rocky should have been fine against a lone goblin, but the lack of a response to the goblin's attacks allowed it to slowly break down his defenses and slay him.

Until he found a proper way to protect his characters, JJ decided to stick with Aqua for the rest of his explorations. While his astral form had a larger field of view and could move much quicker than a slow moving slime, the amount of time he could spend in that form was still very limited.

He even found himself growing to appreciate the “slime view” that was so confusing to him at first. While the slime's senses were only capable of perceiving mana in the surroundings, which could leave him blind in an area without mana, the forest he found himself in now was truly overflowing with the stuff.

Wielding Aqua's senses, he gained a truly omniscient point of view, at least within a small area around him. Rather than saying he could looking through objects, it would be more accurate to describe it as looking at, in, and around them, all at the same time.

His biggest disappointment was the discovery that he could no longer use his method of switching into and out of astral form to take advantage of two different points of view, as his exhaustion quickly mounted when he tried that with Aqua.

After a brief retreat and rest in deeper water, he resumed piloting his faithful slime to continue his exploration. He was most interested in using his new senses to find and attempt to identify new types of mana in the area.

In JJ's limited experience, most mana gave a feeling of what they were. Water would feel wet and yielding, the ground would feel rough and hard, and the sun's light would feel bright and cheerful. As he focused on several new, trace amounts of mana that he'd yet to come across, something odd began to happen.

On the outer limits of his perception, large amounts of mana began to gather. From the ground, the water, and even the sky, the unusual mana began to converge and form a new shape. The feelings he got from it were nothing more than a sense of pure awe like nothing he had ever felt before.

Only after switching back to astral form did JJ realize what was going on. This was a monster spawn. The pure mana of heaven and earth spontaneously condensed into a brand new slime, and he was lucky enough to watch it happen.

Surprisingly, this new slime had no core, and no affinity.

'I wonder what kind of abilities this character has?' JJ thought with a grin, floating towards the newly spawned slime. 'Or will it be nothing more than a useless low level character that needs to grow before it can do anything?'

He floated into the slime and attempted to possess it, before realizing that there wasn't anything for him to possess. The slime felt like nothing more than an inanimate object. It didn't move and simply sat there absorbing mana. As his headache returned, quicker than ever before, JJ realized something was very wrong.

He felt like the time he went hiking on an empty stomach and got lost in the woods for an entire day. 'Wait, it's absorbing mana, right?'

It felt like his very essence was being sucked dry as a sense of dread wash over him.

'Oh no, don't tell me, am I mana right now?'

JJ fled the newly spawned slime in terror and rushed back to Aqua, feeling nearly as worn out as when he'd first arrived at this lake.

With Aqua's mana perception, he watched the newborn slime passively absorb the mana around it, taking on the same water affinity as its surroundings, before finally forming a small core similar to every other water slime around.

'So the unattuned ones aren't player characters?' he grumbled. 'I suppose it makes sense. Slimes don't have minds like normal animals, so I must possess their magic cores instead?'

'It's time to get a bit more serious about this'

It's time... to grind'

…

'But first, one more nap'

Determined to avoid yet another close call with death, JJ moved Aqua into deeper waters to rest as he planned for his future.