From Player To Npc

Shingi focused his hearing and ECHOLOCATION Spell towards the movement in the pool to understand what the source was. There didn't seem to be anywhere to hide behind, but he used his CAMOUFLAGE Spell, hoping it would be enough. Unfortunately, INVISIBILITY used too much mana, and he couldn't afford to spend it recklessly this time.

With ECHOLOCATION, he didn't get as many details as he would with his eyes, but general distances and distances. But even though his Spell didn't allow him to have the best look at what was getting out of the poll, he concluded pretty fast. 

It wasn't a humanoid creature.

He was getting input of a mass of not a stable shape slowly getting out of the water and putting itself together. This was definitely some kind of slime, and since it could move underwater, it was an advanced one.

Slimes like the one back to Zhen's place didn't like water. Even those with magical resistance had their resistance against Water Magic to be the lowest among them all. Still, Water Magic didn't focus on damage, so Mizuneko didn't have that much advantage back when they went through Zhen's dungeon.

Shingi waited as the slime seemed to had separated itself, and slowly each part was getting outside the water and merging with each other. Soon the slime started shaping something different from the usual form slimes had. It started forming legs and continued shaping the rest of the body with every new slime that joined it.

It took a couple of minutes for the whole body to form, and Shingi soon recognized who that was. 

It was Zhen.

He even had formed his long scarf and the rest of his simple attirement with the slimes. Shingi thought that Zhen was human or some humanoid race and not another type of slime or swarf of slimes. 

But if he was a slime himself, it made sense why he was the dungeon's boss, or more specifically, how he was put in charge to be the Boss. Shingi remembered Zhen telling him that he wasn't the true Boss of the Dungeon and someone left him in his place, but he never said who.

But if that was truly Zhen, what was he doing here, and where was he here? 

'Could it be that I am back to his Dungeon?' [Shingi]

Shingi hadn't fully explored the dungeon, so he didn't know every place of it. He hadn't heard of mentioning a room like that, but most likely, Zhen would keep it hidden if that was truly the case.

"I know you are here. Hiding is useless against me. No intruders are allowed. Not sure why you are awake, but come out to meet your new master." [Zhen]

Shingi recognized the voice and the arrogance coming with it. This was definitely him.

Shingi dropped his Spell and worked forward. He had put on a pair of sunglasses to cover his wounded eyes.

He could hear the beats of Zhen's heart, which was weird since he turned out to be a Slime, getting faster when he saw him.

"You… you. What… how?" [Zhen]

His voice showed his confusion and signs of fear. He wasn't an enemy of Shingi, but they weren't friends either. They mostly could be described as business partners since Zhen had helped design all the Mana Gems and helped in the staves and wands designs and productions after Shingi and Little Phoenix left.

"Where is this place? Are we in the dungeon?" [Shingi]

Zhen snapped out of his previous state as he started his explanation.

"This is a special room made by Master. Some people appear from time to time, and I get notified to come and take care of them. They are always unconscious, though." [Zhen]

"If you got notified when I arrived, why it took you that long to get here? Is it that deep in the Dungeon?" [Shingi]

Zhen shook his head.

"I was busy." [Zhen]

Shingi could tell by how his heart beat and his voice that he was hiding something, but he didn't have time to investigate this.

"Those people before me, were everyone Blessed Ones?" [Shingi]

"Yes." [Zhen]

"Did they have anything else in common? And what do you mean by taking care of them?" [Shingi]

Shingi could tell that Zhen thought about it intensely before giving his response.

"I think all of them had a weird symbol on them lately. It looked like that." [Zhen]

Zhen used some of the mist he could produce to form a weird symbol. Since he made it with mana, Shingi used his MANA SENSE, and even if it was weaker, he could get enough details. It was a mask that half of it had a plain design, while the other half was demonic-like.

This was the symbol the Dark Guild used, and few people knew of it, as they rarely made appearances or wanted to let their existence be known. But Ameanum had seen that symbol through reports on some companies he had helped to develop their games.

"How long ago did people other than them stopped appearing?" [Shingi]

Zhen once more didn't speak for a while as he thought about his answer.

"Long time before the entrance was built. Close to a decade, maybe?" [Zhen]

"The entrance? You mean the dungeon was always here?" [Shingi]

The dungeons were rumored to appear out of nowhere, and Shingi didn't have time in the past to discuss it with Zhen, as both of them were quite busy.

They had some talk, and Shingi learned some interesting facts.

Zhen had memories for a long time, but he didn't know how much as he could tell how much had passed since he was living underground. His Master, the true owner of the Dungeon, had unexpectedly left one day, giving no reason, or Zhen didn't want to share that reason.

Shingi could tell that Zhen had great respect for that Master of his, although he didn't know how that respect was earned. He still remembered those burns on his neck.

When asked if he was a slime, Zhen said that he used to be. His Master had evolved him to become a human, but not just taking a form like the slimes Zhen had made with transformation ability. He could turn into an actual human of flesh and blood, but he could also turn himself into a swarm of slimes or his purple mist.

Shingi wanted to meet that Master of his, and he had thought in the past that it could be Mikhail, but Zhen had denied being the case, and Shing believed him. Zhen was charming and good with words most of the time, but Shingi had a good reading of him.

Shingi asked him if he knew anything about the maze he was just in, and actually, Zhen had some memories of a place like that. But they were from a time before his Evolution, so they weren't as detailed.

He seemed to have gone into different places with that Master of his, and some Shingi had recognized as places that would exist in the Tower's floors only.

Zhen didn't remember exactly how they went there, but he had no memories of getting into the outside world. So either the Dungeon was so big that it connected with the Tower, which Shingi didn't know if it was possible. The other case was that this Master of his could Teleport them into the Tower.

Shingi asked Zhen if there were any teleportation circles or something close to it anywhere in the Dungeons, but Zhen confidently told me that there weren't any. He knew every bit of the Dungeon as the back of his hand, and he could connect with some of his specially selected Slimes to check things if needed.

As for the Blessed Ones that kept appearing here seemed that it wasn't really their actual bodies that got here but part of their spirit. More specifically, it was a manifestation of their lost experience when they died, taking the form of their bodies.

Shingi had heard of something like that happening in the past, of lost experience used like that, but the ones behind that were true monster-like powerful.

Zhen didn't know how it worked, just that his monsters telling him of feeding them to the slimes to help them grow. There existed a few other rooms like that one but the numbers of people appearing were too few. Sometimes there could be none for weeks.

Shingi was confident that each room connected with at least one floor of the Tower, meaning there was a connection. And if there was a connection that got him here, he could use it to get himself back, as going the normal way was a suicide.

But he didn't know if he could use that connection in his current state, and since he was really outside the Tower, this meant that Spirit Element was weaker and in less quantity in the environment.

He went outside the room with Zhen's help, who teleported both of them back to the lab. Shingi felt everything going back to how they were supposed to be, except his control of Spirit Mana. He still felt some resistance, even the mana he produced from his mana pool, almost like it was heavier.

It seemed like the lack of Spirit Element outside the Tower world was affecting the use of the Element in general.

He had to get himself ready and heal all his wounds. But, since he was here, he didn't need to do everything by himself.

He could go back home.