When she woke up the next morning there were sounds of excitement coming from the lounge room. Dragging herself out of comfort Rose exited her bedroom to find Oras looking proud of himself, Urgle nodding enthusiastically, and Rashoul staring in bewilderment at the television screen.
“You’ve got to dig a little deeper” the characters sung on screen.
Looking up at her in the doorway the [CAMBION] said “this device has no energy crystal. Yet it commands the talking panel which also does not have an energy crystal. How?”
It was way too early in the morning to have this conversation “the wonders of technology. I’m going to freshen up with a shower. Don’t disturb me.”
With that she made her escape. Her apartment was getting way too crowded these days. Once this ‘tutorial’ thing was over, she needed to move somewhere with more room. Upon looking in the bathroom mirror she nearly screamed. How had she not noticed? Just like Martin, Jason and Jasmine, she too had gone through some drastic changes from her [BLOODLINE]. She had known this was a possibility, but still. How had she not noticed the extra limbs she had grown overnight!? Four transparent wings now grew out of her back. They reminded her of dragonfly wings, except they were a lot bigger and shimmered in rainbow colours depending on the angle. They twitched and fluttered as she tried to figure out how to control them. She figured out that the best thing for now was to just not think about them as that method meant they stayed in a resting position. Out of sight, out of mind. Kind of. There were a few other changes as well, besides her ears and the patterns on the upper half of her body. Her irises now shimmered the same rainbow colours as her wings, and her pupils were now the same glowing white that the sclera had attained as well. Looking around properly she noticed emotions and [SPIRIT]s as they floated through the smoky ethereal that seemed to run like a waterfall. Lastly, she noticed the NEED she suddenly had to clean up her absolutely filthy bathroom. That’s weird. It hadn’t seemed all that dirty yesterday. And she’d given it a good clean just last week. But the urge could not be dismissed so easily. This was going to take some getting used to. She would have to put the cleaning on the to do list for now. She didn’t have time for this at the moment. Shower time.
Half an hour later she could think properly again so she turned on her ‘idea’ brain. “Hey Rashoul, will those that have surrendered cease trying to attack everyone if left to their own devices?”
“We are the challengers that lost. When we surrender, we submit to our new masters. This is the way of slaves. We obey orders until someone else defeats the master and then gives new orders. The Nexus is different, it can not be defeated, but we are an expendable resource that it does not wish to keep. We were ordered to kill for our freedom. If we could not kill, then we would not be free. We just die or change masters if we are too cowardly to follow the Nexus’ directive. Those that have submitted will obey any orders given. Including me.”
Oras and Urgle just nodded along as if this was the norm. “We’ll that’s depressing” she said, yet her brain was working on overdrive as her schemes began to fall into place in her head. It was time to have a chat with Larry about their so far unwelcome guests.
She talked with Larry. He seemed open to the plan, if a little unsure. “Alright everyone here’s the deal” Rose tried not to breathe through her nose due to the smell coming from the back corner. The prisoners had been given buckets to do their business in, but it was still disgusting. “If you want a place amongst our people then you need to earn it. There are several teams willing to work with your kind if you are willing to fight. If not, then you are expected to help out with chores around the building. No one gets a free lunch anymore! You have to earn it.”
This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it.
The faces that had been in despair before now lit up. “Now, who is willing to go out and fight with a team?”
All the [HOBGOBLIN]s and an [IMP GOBLIN] raised their hands. “Those who raised their hands follow Larry here to find out about the teams you’ll be assigned to. The rest of you follow me.”
“Um, M, Mistress? What about the slime? She is a good slime” one of the level three [GOBLIN]s asked.
Looking past the speaker, Rose stared at the roundish creature. It was a blue slime that seemed to be shivering. “Hmmm” she hummed while thinking to herself.
Oras and Urgle could take care of it she supposed. Staring at it Rose focused on using [HEEL TO THE REMARKABLE ONE]. Straight away the essence of the slime was connected to her, like an intangible string of sorts.
You have [TAMED] a [LEVEL 4] [BLUE SLIME]
Immediately the slime stopped shivering and leapt in joy. At that moment Rose knew, the slime was indeed female. For some reason she had been under the assumption that slimes didn’t have gender, probably due to all the fantasy books she had read. It turned out that slimes did indeed have gender. Fascinating. After bouncing around some more the slime leapt into Rose’s arms. For a moment Rose had a flashback to the giant green slime that had absorbed her which resulted in her being slowly burned alive. Flinching while catching her newest companion, she was relieved when all she felt was a cool, smooth and rubbery substance. No burning. Taking a few deep breaths, the young lady gave the order to move out.
After a quick stop at her apartment to deliver the newly dubbed ‘Shuna’ with her two wards, she led the rest of the defeated challengers to the common room. Rose had grown to adore the little, blue blob over the short trip as she could feel all the emotions the slime sent through the bond of the ability. It also gave her the realisation that Rashoul could do the exact same thing, and so could she.
Coming to the common room she walked straight up to Margaret. “Hi, I’ve organised some new helpers for you, don’t worry, they’ll do what their told.”
Margaret may have assigned herself as ‘head cook’, but in reality, she had gained much more responsibility than that title would amount to. All who stayed behind in the apartments looked to her for guidance in most things. She may have been an older chain-smoker with a no-nonsense personality, but she had a way of setting people at ease and making them feel like everything would work out if they just stuck together and followed her wisdom. She just looked at the motley crew of around twenty [GOBLIN]s and [IMP GOBLIN]s and said “Aight, I’ll put em’ ta work.”
And with that, the issue had been sorted. Another hour later Rose set out with her raid team. When Emily had been told they would be working with the [CAMBION] she had requested an immediate party transfer. She simply wasn’t comfortable working with something that wasn’t human. The wolves had been exceptions because they were like hunting dogs and she hadn’t viewed them as a true part of the party. She drew the line on working with another humanoid though. Rose was disappointed the only other woman in the party was leaving due to issues regarding race, but that was just the way things were. Rashoul had ended up officially joining the party, so he was now a fellow raid team member. Emily’s choice was not the only case. Martin had agreed to his team being one of the groups that would take on non-human fighters. This had brought up complaints and eight people had transferred out of their group, with only three people replacing them. The missing spots allowed the [HOBGOBLIN]s to join as party members as well. They now had four [HOBGOBLIN]s and one [CAMBION] in their raid team. Larry’s team and one led by a man named Zac had taken in the rest. Rose would just have to focus on the future and not worry about those that had chosen differently. Next up was achieving level fifteen and finding out what classes she could get.