Syl: Chapter 300

Chapter 300: Catch Up

I was waiting until we exited the dungeon to avoid any eavesdropping from the [Dungeon Master] before I spilled the beans on all my new toys. Vee seemed to get my idea, and so she started talking about her time while I was incapacitated.

Vee was also being held to some secrecy, so she couldn't reveal much. Not that it would do me any good, as I couldn't exactly do any spider evolutions myself. What it boiled down to was that Vee had "earned" something, and it would give her a new evolution option, which she planned on taking.

Vee dropped a few teasing hints about it, but refused to answer my questions outright as she seemed delighted by wanting to see the "shock on my face" when it finally happened. While having something tempting right out of reach was painful, I was happier that she'd found a solution to her problem.

Watch out, world, soon the might of Vee's venomous tongue will be unleashed!

From what she could tell me, she spent most of her time either talking, eating, training, or occasionally fighting some of the spider monsters. The last two surprised me, especially that the [Dungeon Master] was okay letting Vee kill spiders that were effectively her own children.

I'd already pieced together that the [Dungeon Master] whom Vee kept calling Qhil was some type of Broodmother spider to get cheap dungeon minions. Vee explained, however, that Qhil had no sympathy for any spider that wasn't at least tier four or above, effectively seeing them as nothing but cannon fodder.

Well, even a nice guy like Dran didn't care about all the plantoids we killed. He even willingly gave us more to kill, so I guess all [Dungeon Masters] feel that way.

It sounded quite eventful, and Vee explained that her training primarily focused on [Thread Mastery], which she had discovered could be applied to any web, including those she hadn't personally created. That prompted me to reveal my [Slime Mastery] trait, to which she gave a triumphant cheer.

"I knew it! It was hidden in the description of your evolution. Hopefully, you can learn some really crazy stuff with it."

"At the moment, it's just made everything easier. I was hoping I'd be able to control my slime at a distance, but that's still not possible…"

"Maybe it's a component you're missing? Maybe you'll get it from the next slime you eat?" Vee suggested.

"Tentacles crossed!" I replied, forming dozens of tiny tendrils on my hands and having them crisscross in a spiral.

When we exited the dungeon, I half expected someone to be waiting outside for us, but it was surprisingly vacant. Vee and I said our farewells to the [Dungeon Master] and thanked her for hosting both of us for almost two weeks.

When we were a reasonable distance away, I finally started talking about my real abilities to Vee, of course, through telepathy, just in case.

I started explaining that all my slime traits were now uncapped and merged, and that each and every one had seemingly gained a new ability from going over the cap. Vee was quite overwhelmed by that, and when I mentioned that each one seemed to have hidden interactions with my other slime types, she nearly lost it.

"Gee, and to think that was a species evolution… maybe it should have been a special evolution?"

"Well, I didn't gain an improvement in my stats from what I can tell. I hope my core is more robust, but I'm not willing to test that theory exactly. So it kind of makes sense that if my evolution can't make me physically stronger, it would instead focus all the improvements on my slime traits."

I then went on to explain how [Nitro Slime] had a bunch of new features, and explained that I could create countless new triggers, all from what I assumed was inheritance from my other slime traits. As I ranted on and on, I could sense a growing nervousness from Vee about my overzealous love of my explosive slime.

"I guess we should be glad there wasn't an orange slime mutation or evolution, or you would have picked that over prismatic…" Vee commented, sounding completely frazzled and worn out.

"True! I can only assume they don't have a dedicated mutation path, like how red slime becomes a lava slime, because they are dungeon-spawned slimes rather than naturally occurring ones. There was that camo mutation I saw before, but that's just an inferior version of mimic from what I saw, so it's never been an option for me."

"Oh right, now that we are away from the dungeon, I can tell you something—"

"Your big spider secret?" I interrupted.

"No, not that. I can't even if I wanted to, or I might lose the thing that lets me pick that evolution…" Vee said, sighing. "No, what I wanted to tell you was Qhil's reaction when you first arrived back."

"Really? The dungeon messages didn't seem out of the ordinary."

"Ha! Well, I was there to witness it; she was honestly in quite a panic. Apparently, she tried to [Examine] you in detail and was rebuffed. She tried again, and the system gave her a stern warning! The look on her face was priceless, like she was staring down a hungry dragon."

"Wait… the system warned her against examining me? That sounds awful, it's the entire reason why I prefer [Identity Fabrication] to [Identity Block]."

"Ah, no, you misunderstand," Vee replied with a soft chuckle. "I forgot you don't know much about [Dungeon Masters]. I received a detailed explanation during my visit. I think she was trying to groom me into becoming one so she'd have another ally."

"Huh… that's interesting. I had Mother tell me to go kill a [Dungeon Master] so I could usurp the Emblem."

"Shit, don't they already hate us? Well… you and me by extension…"

"I was told to target someone outside of the group. But anyway, that's for later. Can you explain this [Examine]?"

"Right… so [Dungeon Masters] can view extensive knowledge of any monster that enters their dungeon. More so if it's something of their own species, and Qhil said she basically got a full blueprint to recreate Riftweaver spiders from me just entering."

"Well damn, I guess there might be more Vee's in the future…"

"I'm safe for a few years, apparently. She'd need to redesign a lot of her eggs from the ground up, but she said she could spawn one directly, but at a cost she wasn't willing to pay unless her life was on the line."

"Good to know."

"Anyway… so she tried to [Examine] you. Even though you aren't a spider, she should've got some information on you from my understanding, but it failed. It's why Ygdran ratted you out when he looked closer."

"Huh… that explains that."

"Yeah. So anyway, she tried to force it and got a warning about 'unauthorized access', and she screamed in terror, nearly falling out of her web. It was pretty funny from my perspective, to be honest."

"So Gramps blocked her from looking at me in detail?"

"That's all I can assume. Unless you've gained another new trick from your evolution?"

"I gained a new Emblem, but it just says I'm [Unique]."

"Oh yeah, you're one of a kind," Vee snickered.

"No, I'm serious. It's an Emblem, and it simply says I'm a unique existence. It's like our [Experiment] one, and I assumed it was just as useless."

"Huh… well, if you are a unique existence, then I guess it might be like some form of copyright protection?"

"What? In normal terms, please…"

"Uhh… You're so unique that Gramps doesn't want anyone else to be able to copy you. So [Dungeon Masters] who try to look at you get a warning from the system police?"

"Police?"

"System Knights? System Bodyguards? System Protectors—"

"Got it." I interrupted.

"Seems like a nifty feature. Not something to brag about, but…"

"As long as my disguises still work, that's all I'm concerned about."

Vee stared at me for a few silent moments. "You're showing up as Sylthaeryn Feirelle, an Elf Elementalist to me."

"Great. That's one less thing I need to potentially worry about."

"Well, if your upgrades are as big as you made them out to be, you could probably fight your way to freedom if anyone threatened you."

"Imagine the exploding worm I can make now!"

"I'd rather not, thanks. You'd probably take me and everyone else out in a giant explosion of doom."

I chuckled and we continued discussing my new abilities and their potential uses. I was right in that Vee wanted to test out my ability to duplicate gold by smelting it with [Metal Slime]. I did make a few pieces of slimy jewelry for her, though, as a demonstration.

"Aren't these bombs?" Vee asked with concern.

"Technically, yes... Although my idea was to create temporary items that last for hours. It was an idea I had when I first noticed how priming something kept it inert, but the maximum duration was never long enough for it to be viable in my opinion."

"You could make quite the scam now. Sell enchanted swords that turn to puddles of slime the next day."

"Well, the slime would still be the metal… but yeah, it would totally be a scam," I admitted.

"An even scarier thought is you could distribute your fake goods around an entire city, and then blow it to kingdom come!"

I stared at Vee. "Why would I do that, though?"

"I'm not saying you would. But it's something you could do. Maybe sell goods to the Outeatus Kingdom and then blow them up? They probably deserve it."

"I'm sure the entire kingdom isn't all bad guys…" I pointed out.

"Yeah, you're right. It was just an intrusive thought I had."

I sighed and shook my head. It was certainly tempting as Vee had said, but I wasn't planning on mass destruction of that level unless someone really crossed me. Of course, I had no idea of the level of involvement with the Outeatus Kingdom, and it could just be their leaders involved.

I could craft a beautiful crown or a legendary sword, and then gift it to the king. Then boom! Threat neutralized? I pondered before giving up on that idea. Actually, if he's the king, he's probably a super high level, and I bet he has dozens of skills or magic items to prevent death.

When we reached the edges of the forest and neared the Carren hometree, I saw a familiar figure rapidly approaching. It was Aimon who was jogging at a brisk pace while a large scorpion was following behind him.

"I'm guessing that's his [Bonded Companion]?" Vee said.

"Kali, I think the name was?" I replied.

"Sounds about right…"

I gave him a friendly wave, and he seemed to slow down. When we met, he was only slightly out of breath.

"Good to see you again, Aimon."

"Good to see you too, Lady Sylthaeryn," he said between haggard breaths.

"I thought we were dropping the Lady and Sir?"

"Apologies," he replied sheepishly. "I've been in a bit of a panic these last few days."

"Did something happen?"

"No… not in the usual sense. It was just that your attendant was becoming rather… heated when I told him I couldn't get in contact with you."

"I apologize for Paeris. I hope he hasn't been untoward to you or your family."

"Not directly…" Aimon whispered accidentally before shaking his head in denial. "That is to say, he was expressing that your mother had returned to Caelthal and was eager for your return. He stressed that you were to return to meet her the second you were finished with your business."

"I'm sorry, Aimon."

"It's okay. I understand how pushy mothers can be..."

Kali by his side hissed, nudging his leg with one of her pincers.

"I suppose our tour will have to wait for another day. Can I offer you something as compensation in return?"

"Oh no… you've given me more than enough already with those extra vials. My research into a universal petrification antidote has been going swimmingly."

"That's good to hear."

He gestured toward the tree, and we began walking and talking.

"I hope you and Vee got the information you needed?" he asked curiously.

Vee waved her legs in response.

"Yes, it was a very fruitful encounter, and now Vee has a goal to work towards."

"Wonderful. I was a little worried because I know that Queen Qhilleeqeth can be a little temperamental from time to time. But it seems she must have taken a liking to you and Vee to invite you into her parlor."

"Wait, she was a queen?" I frantically asked Vee telepathically.

"Umm… no comment?" Vee replied hesitantly.

I hid my frown and continued conversing with Aimon as we headed to the gateway back to Caelthal. All the time, I was wondering what was so urgent that Loreleia and Paeris were demanding my immediate return.