After successfully bankrupting myself at the auction yesterday, I decided that now would be a good time to try and evolve Emett with the effigy I bought.

He was currently a tier 1 summon but bordering the minimum requirements of a tier 2, and has very little capability in his current blob form aside from throwing projectiles at enemies.

My hope is that by becoming humanoid he would be able to use his hard earthen body to his advantage and actually fight monsters. Not to mention that with limbs he would be able to learn some basic fighting skills eventually, though I doubt that will happen anytime soon considering how low his intelligence currently is.

It'll likely take one or two more evolutions before he gets to that point, and if he continues to grow larger it likely won't matter at that point. He'll become an immovable wall of stone capable of grappling or stomping on anything in his path.

That was my hope at least, but there was a long way till we get to that point considering he is a little round blob still.

Having Emett fighting under harsh conditions in the outer area of the swamp against tier 2 monsters will hopefully allow him to advance.

I chose the swamp rather than going back to the forest, because the muddy conditions of the environment gives him an advantage as he can collect mud from the ground to throw as a projectile rather than thinning out his own body to throw things.

I have Jareth on standby to intervene if Emett becomes overwhelmed, it would defeat the point if Emett was to temporarily die while trying to evolve, all of that work would have gone down the drain.

Before we begin battling, I set out the tier 3 golem core I bought at the previous auction as well as the effigy for Emett to assimilate with. For Jareth, I give him a filament dragonfly core to bolster his metallic defense even further.

I know that Emett is ready to evolve not only because he has indicated as much through our bond, but because he has finally stopped growing and has become the size of a beach ball rather than the soccer ball he started out as.

It's a funny sight to see such a large rocky blob slink around in front of me acting all serious despite his initially harmless appearance, but looks can be deceiving.

Once both were done with their respective meals we went into the forest to try and find some monsters for Emett to fight.

All Emett really needed at this point was difficult battles to kickstart his evolution. It seemed that no matter how many cores you fed a monster they wouldn't evolve if they weren't at a certain level of fighting ability. It must be a Darwinian trait, as a weak evolved monster would be in more danger from stronger enemies than if they remained as they were.

We set out to find some tier 2 monsters to pit him against as they were the only type of monsters in the marsh that he stood a chance of defeating, tier 3 or even worse tier 4 monsters were still far out of his reach for now. Of course, I wouldn't allow him to fight without some fallback plan, and so I had Jareth out to sit at the sidelines of any fight to ensure Emett's safety in case of more than one monster or the monster he was facing became too much to handle.

I had high hopes for Emett after having gained more fighting experience from his recent hunting bout with Brutus, and so I didn't plan on needing Jareth to intervene, but better to have a bodyguard and not need them than to need one and not have one.

We started off facing a few more redcaps which were only scary in swarms against a single opponent. With Jareth nearby to take care of the majority of the pack, Emett was left to battle against two of them.

Luckily his rocky carapace protected him from their sharp nails and teeth. The battle was over pathetically quickly as two stones shot out from Emett and hit the bloodthirsty pests point-blank in the face.

It seemed one solid hit to the brain was enough to put them out of commission if not kill them, and just to make sure I took my sword and stabbed each through the heart as they lay on the ground.

I was more than happy to put the remains of 6 redcaps into my storage and continue looking for fights. Seeing how easy those particular monsters were, we decided to go looking for more hardy monsters that could take a hit or two to see how my earth slime would fare.

Ironically we got exactly what we wanted, maybe more so than Emett was prepared for. The next monster we came across was an iron-scaled newt that typically frequented moist environments, so it's no surprise that one was here.

Emett seemed to do just fine against the redcaps, which were monsters focused on speed and offense, but a defensive monster was a whole 'nother beast. They couldn't be taken out with a chunk of rock hitting them, in fact all that would do is make it mad or at the very least irritate it.

I knew shooting rocks at the newt would do nothing, its' metal hide would prevent any damage aside from some bruising, but I decided to let Emett figure that out for himself.

I wanted to see just how he would react to this type of monster, and whether he could adapt to defeat it. Even I didn't know all of Emett's capabilities, so I was leaving it to him to try and figure out something that would be effective against the newt.

Providing an answer to his problem now might help him immediately, but it could hurt him in the long run if he doesn't develop the ability to think for himself while in battle. The only upside to this matchup was that the newt didn't have many offensive abilities and the ones it did have were relatively basic.

Its' two main attacks were swipes from its' sharp claws and hitting things with its' dense metal tail. The claws would do next to nothing, but the tail would be something to watch out for as the weight behind the attack was nothing to scoff at, but as long as it didn't break through Emett's outer shell and damage his core everything would be fine.

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As the silver reptile made its' way over to our group, Jareth and I took a step back to let Emett step up to the plate as it were.

The newt wasted no time in attacking as it launched itself from the tree it was on over to Emett with its' claws outstretched for a slashing attack. The outer layer of rocks kept the damage from the attack to a minimum with only a few scratches to be seen on some of the rocks and gouges made in the mud in between all of the rocks.

Luckily with mud all around us, Emett was able to resupply himself with mud a few moments later until no damage could be seen on him. The monster wasn't discouraged by this and continued moving around and slashing every now and then to test Emett and see his capabilities before committing further to attacking.

Emett decided there was no point in remaining passive and so began to shoot out a few rocks when the newt was farther away to test it out as well.

After a while of this war of ineffective attrition, both combatants came to the conclusion that maintaining the status quo wouldn't do anything but prolong the battle. So they both moved in on each other to try and do as much damage as they could within a short amount of time.

The newt seemed to be going for quantity of attacks rather than quality, as Emett would recover from any wounds if given enough time, and calling them wounds was a little much for the tiny amount of damage they actually did to him.

One thing to be said about slimes is that they were especially hardy creatures that could recover from anything should their core remain intact and with enough resources to replenish themselves, and with Emett being an earth slime all the resources he could ever need were at his feet.

Emett seemed to realize his attacks were just as ineffective against the metallic monster, and so he began to try and mimic the lizard by using his tendrils to lash at it up close since projectiles weren't doing anything.

The lashes were denting the hide armor of the monster, but not breaking it as he had hoped, so Emett dropped that attack and began to try and think of something that would pierce the resistant hide.

After stopping completely to think while relying on his so far impervious defense, Emett gave the newt a long enough amount of time to set up and use its' seemingly ultimate attack.

The newt swung its body around and its tail followed with a hard strike that actually pierced the slime's hide due to the appendage being straightened out like a spear at the last moment.

This caused Emett to cry out in pain, but luckily it seems like his core was unharmed as he wasn't dead yet. Unlike the other wounds he had received so far, this one wasn't healing nearly as quickly, indicating that some real damage had been done.

At this point, I was ready to step in and let Emett recover before trying to fight another monster, but as if sensing my intentions, the slime sent through our bond that he felt that he would be able to take the lizard on and to not interfere.

I obliged my hard-working summon and waved Jareth off from stepping in between the two, which he obeyed despite seeming confused at the order.

It seems that last major attack was the inspiration needed for Emett to come up with another attack that might just work against the newt. Because, the next time they came around and clashed, Emett stuck out a sharp and stiff tendril right in the path of the overconfident reptilian.

It seems that after any attacks against it being ineffective and having that last attack breakthrough, the monster had become emboldened and recklessly charged the slime. Unfortunately for the monster, that extra inertia from the charge was exactly what was needed for Emett's spear-like tendril to pierce through its' hide and run it through starting at the neck.

To no one's surprise, that last attack was more than the newt could recover from and it quickly bled out from a busted artery while still being skewered on Emett.

I went over and congratulated the victorious slime and even had to ask him how he managed to get through the tough hide of the monster when previous attempts were ineffective. Emett's reply was to stick out another tendril just like the one he had made earlier, and when I touched it all I felt was hardened rock rather than the squish I associated with the jelly-like inner body of the slime.

It appeared that Emett had managed to harden his pointed tendril, creating a make-shift spear. I was ecstatic that Emett had not only discovered a new ability, but he was also able to overcome his opponent by imitating their attack.

This showed intelligence and a capability to learn that would be important for future battles that might not be as low stakes as this one was with backup in place to intervene if necessary. There wouldn't always be summons in place to ensure safety while battling, so it was important to gain ass much experience as possible under supervision so no fatal mistakes would be made when it mattered.

After gloating for a moment, Emett slid over to the lizard body that he had discarded in order to celebrate and began to dig through the corpse until a core was taken out. After receiving my approval to eat the core, he began to enjoy his victory treat which was made all the sweeter for him due to having earned it by himself against a tough opponent.

As I had suspected, as soon as the core had finished dissolving Emett began to glow the bright golden color I had come to associate with evolution. His form began to get lost in the bright glow and all I could make out was the sounds of stones shifting against each other and a change of shape in his outline.

As this was going on, a few specks of light would filter over to me and absorb into my chest, with each addition of light I felt an increased amount of stamina and also felt that I could withstand more damage or heal quicker.

That wasn't the only thing to be transmitted, I also felt that I had another skill thanks to Emett's newly discovered ability. When I tried it out I felt my body become stiffer but also much harder as well, it seems that I had gained the skill to harden my skin and further my defense for a short period of time at the sacrifice of speed and flexibility. This could be a potentially life-saving skill against an inevitable attack aimed at me.

When the evolution had finished and the light had subsided, what was standing in the place of the amorphous slime was a mini golem about 3 ft high and 1.5 ft wide. It seems like the effigy had worked and rather than grow larger, Emett had grown permanent limbs and a head that had the impression of eyes and a mouth.

What surprised me even more, was when those impressions on his face moved. It seemed that my rotund little summon had grown a face along with his limbs, and hopefully in the future, he would be able to speak.

His outer coating was made up of smooth sections of marble or some other type of white rock, and in between all of that was some sort of mud or dirt, there was no slime to speak of. It seemed the biggest change of Emett was his race rather than form, as he was now a completely different type of summon.

This is more than I could have asked for and it meant that his evolutionary pathway was much broader now, as slimes had little potential and would usually just grow larger or take on a minor affinity while remaining a slime.

The race change also appeared to be the reason for his diminutive stature, as most of the energy was spent shaping and changing Emett rather than making him grow bigger like my other summons had done when they evolved.

I would classify him as a tier 2 summon at this point, but he would likely be able to compete with normal tier 3's once he got used to his new form. I had high hopes for him in light of his new changes, and I was just glad that taking a chance on contracting with a slime summon had paid off.