"Good morning, Lisa." Lohan said as he felt the power of his Slime body pulsing, showing the difference that was forming between his virtual body and his real body.
His body, which had a diameter of 37 centimeters, gradually shrank until it reached a diameter of 24 centimeters, the size of an official basketball.
At that new size, Lohan felt much more agile and flexible, despite having a slight consumption of Mana to maintain that form, with his constant digestion of biomass, that consumption was negligible.
Although still at a low level, the Slime’s power was already far above what it had been two days ago.
"Good morning, Halon." Lisa replied, nodding to Lohan before turning and looking around carefully.
"Ready to attack our first dungeon?" He asked excitedly, rolling from side to side to warm up.
This was a habit he had developed whenever he entered Elysium, especially after waking up, when his consciousness was still erratic and he had difficulty exercising 100% of his capacity.
"Yes, even though it will be challenging with just the two of us, we don’t have any more time.
The rumors I told you about yesterday have come true. Some players representing the Hogue Group have already left the Starting Village and are conducting a major fundraising campaign to set up the first Open World Guild. We have to speed up our progress and dominate this Guild today, before they do," Lisa said in a serious voice, revealing the anxiety she felt in this race.
"Why do we need to be the first? Wouldn’t it be better for us to opt for our safety and the stability of the Guild’s development? We have a Legendary Race and a Mythical Race, it will only be a matter of time before we surpass them." Lohan asked, genuinely confused.
Lisa stopped and looked at him thoughtfully.
After hesitating for a few seconds, she finally sighed and replied. "The Go... Elysium has developed numerous rewards for the first players to accomplish important feats. Even for us, with our rare Races, we would still benefit greatly from the rewards that Elysium would bring us. Leaving something like this to a rival group would be the same as nurturing our enemies... we have to take advantage of our advantage in the open world."
Lohan caught her slip at the beginning of her explanation, and knowing Lisa, it didn’t seem like an involuntary slip... she was too restrained to make such a basic mistake, but he couldn’t understand what she meant, deciding to just keep it in mind and focus on the rest of the explanation.
After leaving Thalendor on Friday, they killed monsters relentlessly, repeating the same thing on Saturday, trying to gain as much experience as quickly as possible, even with Lohan neglecting some of his biomass gain to focus on gaining experience to level up.
This rush came from what Lisa had heard in the real world about a rival group that had reached Level 11 and left Novata Village on Saturday before lunch.
Although they were only Players with Common Bases, Uncommon Bases, and only one with a Rare Base, they were an organized group, focused on forming the first official Guild of Elysium.
Unlike monsters like them who needed to complete a Dungeon to get a Dungeon Core, humanoid Players could directly purchase a license at the city hall of any relatively large and influential city.
Sure, money alone wasn’t enough; Players needed to complete a series of quests in that city to gain enough reputation for the city mayor to authorize the creation of such an organization there.
But now that these Players had arrived in the open world, it was only a matter of time before their reputation grew enough to purchase the authorization, and for Lisa, it was basically a race.
"Sure, is there anything we should take to the Dungeon as a precaution?" Lohan asked as he stretched and released three small clones and got used to the feeling of controlling four bodies at the same time, so as not to feel discomfort when he needed to use this in combat.
The three small Slimes rolled around, digesting any available biomass, performing standardized movements, while gradually differentiating themselves and making unique movements.
Lisa looked at his warm-up routine, which Halon had started doing the day before, finding it funny and interesting, but not dismissing his efforts to stay in shape with his own skills, and replied. "I don’t know what the Spiritual Energy is like inside the Dungeon, so I plan to prepare some food for myself while we’re there, because if there isn’t any, I’ll need to eat to recover my energy, but as for you, I think you’ll be fine..."
"Wait... you need to eat?!" He asked in surprise.
Lisa looked at him confused, before nodding. "Yes, even Players need to eat like people in this world."
"Then why haven’t you eaten until now?" He asked confused.
"With enough Spiritual Energy, I don’t need food to sustain myself, just as I believe you don’t need food with your digestion skill. But in a dungeon where I don’t know what the Spiritual Energy is like, it’s better for me to take something with me just in case." She explained.
This was news to Lohan.
He still saw Elysium as a game, so the need to eat wasn’t something that crossed his mind, but thinking about how this world was proving to be more and more real, totally different from "just" a game as he thought it was, and with all the signs he had received, he realized that he had to change that view and mindset as soon as possible.
"Alright, then let’s go to the Dungeon!" Lohan said excitedly, absorbing the three small clones again and feeling ready for battle.
The confidence he felt was not unfounded.
It had been 7 days since he had focused all day on training and getting stronger, so the gains he made yesterday were sensational.
[Name: Halon
Race: Slime (Mythical)
Class: Devourer (Mythical)
Level: 08
Experience: 394 / 12,800
Mana: 35.23 / 35.23]
Feeling the new power coursing through his body, Lohan looked at the status screen and felt that even if there was something unexpected in the dungeon, everything would be fine.
’After all, what could go wrong?’