The half-rotted branch splintered under my weight. I flexed, pushing harder, jumping higher.
Up.
Higher.
Through the toxic air, through the suffocating stench. The slime was still focused on the ground. It hadn't realized yet.
Which meant I had one shot. One.
I pulled the vial from my cloak, staring at the swirling orange liquid. The explosion at camp had been instant. No fuse, no warning.
I was holding a ticking bomb.
Simple plan. Simple execution.
Find the biggest concentration of slime. Drop the vial. Light it up.
The slime would burn. But only if I timed it right. If I missed—if it splashed onto the group—
I clenched the vial tighter. No room for failure.
I looked down from my bird's-eye view. It was everywhere.
If I burned one, the rest would fill its place.
And I had only one shot.
They were fighting for their lives down there.
Well. Most of them. I had to think. Fast.
The green, red, yellow, and purple blobs pulsated through the trees, flowing like an infection. The fastest ones were closing in on the group.
But the others? The ones deeper in the forest? They were slower. Not lazy. Just… waiting.
Why?
I narrowed my eyes.
How did they know where we were? They had no eyes. No ears. No noses.
Then how?
The back of my neck tingled. A slow, creeping realization curled in my stomach.
"They're not reacting to movement. They're reacting to orders."
I scanned the forest, looking for something—anything—that didn't fit.
And then I saw it.
"Ah. That."
At the edge of the clearing stood the heart of the beast.
Literally.
I had killed a lot of small animals. Split them open. Watched their pink, twitching organs pulse between their ribs. That's exactly what this thing looked like.
Except bigger.
Bigger than a house. Bigger than four hogs stacked on top of each other.
A hot pink mass.
Pulsing.
Swelling.
Breathing.
It wasn't just alive. It was thinking. It knew. It knew we were here.
The slime tendrils stretching from its body pointed toward one direction. Toward them. It was giving the orders.
My fur bristled. It wasn't moving. It wasn't fighting. It just… sat there.
Watching. Controlling.
And then I saw it. Something opened. Not a mouth. A void. A jagged, wet wound in its body split open, gaping like a wound that had never healed.
And the slime poured in. No—not just slime.
The smell hit me next. I gagged. The blobs were carrying something.
I squinted, forcing my vision to adjust through the half-dark.
What was that?
I jumped to another tree for a better look. Ah. They were carrying food.
At least—I think that's what it was.
Half-dissolved carcasses. Bones. Soggy, melted flesh.
Some blobs carried limp, half-digested deer. Others carried spiders, hogs, trees, grass, entire logs into its gaping maw. And they never came back out.
Nothing here made sense. Unless… Unless it couldn't absorb them like the others.
The regular slimes devoured through touch. They dissolved their prey inside their bodies.
But this thing? It needed to eat. It was different. It was evolving. It was learning. It was growing smarter.
How long until it became unstoppable?
I gripped the half-burnt stump of wood, its dying embers glowing faintly in the dark. The heat bit into my fur, but I barely felt it.
Ironically, it was the only thing grounding me right now. This had to work. The Queen Slime's maw was the key. If I could get the explosive vial inside, I could destroy it from within.
A sigh left my lips as I heard the screams from the group.
Kevin. Hogan. Silver. Bacon.
But not Lancelot. Not Meili.
I didn't know if that was a good or a bad thing. I still needed them.
That was the only reason I was doing this.
I wasn't Fee. My aim wasn't perfect.
And I wasn't even sure this would work. But I had to take the shot.
Not from this angle. I had to get closer. I tensed my legs, crouching low, then—
Leap.
I shot lower, landing on a weaker branch, closer to the beast. But the slime was smarter than I thought.
A single pink tendril twisted in my direction. It wasn't long enough to reach me. That wasn't its goal. A swarm of slime changed direction.
It was coming straight for me.
The red blobs surged ahead, gliding across the grass. The yellow ones lagged behind. They had found me.
"How?"
I had already ruled out sight, sound, touch, and smell.
Then what was it?
No time. The slime had started climbing the trees. I didn't have a clear shot yet. The fire in my hand was barely alive.
The group was getting liquified. I couldn't wait any longer. I shot out of the branches and hit the ground. Slime squelched under my feet, sticking to my fur, slowing me down.
The pink tendril snapped toward me. It had me. But I was right in front of it now. Close enough to see the veins pulsing under its translucent skin.
It didn't move. It just… watched.
Or—no.
It wasn't watching me. It was watching the fire. I uncorked the vial. If I moved too slow, I'd get absorbed. If I messed up, I'd blow myself up.
Maybe this was never going to work. Maybe I had already lost. Maybe I had doomed myself the moment I stepped out of the glade. The moment I met the man I couldn't remember.
The voice etched into my mind.
"Always trying to protect others. That's your weakness."
The pink tendril stretched toward me. No. Not me. It was pointing at the torch. At the practically dead, ember-coated wood.
Not me. It could sense the fire.
Everything clicked.
The slime had been avoiding fire all along. Not because it saw it. Not because it smelled it. But because it could feel it.
Or rather, the Queen Slime in front of me could sense it— And it was giving the orders. It felt the fire.
It avoided it. Which meant it could also feel heat from our bodies. That's why it targeted us.
And that's why its tendril was fixated on my last ember.
It thought it was food. And it wanted to eat.
"Ha."
A bitter laugh slipped out.
I was in the same predicament as before. The sky was a suffocating black. The air was damp, thick with the sickly-sweet rot of the Slime.
And my last spark was fading.
"You want this, huh?"
I wagged the stick in the air.
The Queen's mouth gaped open. A massive, writhing maw of slime unfolded before me.
I tossed the ember in. The moment it vanished inside, I followed up.
I hurled the vial.
The tiny glass container spun through the air.
"Please work."
The instant it touched the Queen's core—
The world went red.
The explosion ripped through the Slime from the inside. Its entire body ignited, the blazing heat trapped within its gelatinous form.
It bubbled violently, the surface rippling like boiling tar.
For a moment, I thought it might contain the blast.
Then—
BOOM.
The shockwave hit me first, slamming into my chest and sending me sprawling across the ground.
Chunks of burning slime rained from the sky, splattering across the trees, the grass—
My skin.
It sizzled against my fur, the heat searing deep. The stench of charred rot filled my nose, suffocating me.
Maybe this is it.
Maybe I die here.
Trying to save people I barely even care about. And yet, the words echoed in my mind—
"And that's why you'll never win, Connie. Always trying to protect others… that's your weakness."
If that's my weakness…
Then I'll bear it.