ALL NOVEL 7 – Slime Incarnation
It was almost disappointing not getting another ability from her point in Luck, but Aono knew that only the first three stats that got points in them gave abilities. It was just as well. A luck-based ability just wouldn't be as strong for her, unless she got enough stat points from Accomplishments, but they gave a variety of rewards, not just stat points.
Speaking of Accomplishments, she simply hadn't expected to get one for deciding to be Aono all the time. It made sense, she'd been scared of the consequences. But ultimately nothing much negative had happened and she had even gotten monetary support for buying new clothes and furniture. While thinking of all the support she had gotten from her friends and the community, she went to bed with a smile.
The next morning, she woke to a message telling her that she had a class change to decide on. Apparently Slime Friend was for people who weren't slimes. Class changes were like that. They weren't necessarily superior, but they were designed to give you a class more specifically suited to you.
Reviewing the list offered to her, she eliminated possibility after possibility. Harvester Slime would improve her mana gem yield from both herself and her tame slimes, but somehow she didn't feel like it fit her. Too focused on the gains to be had from slimes. Slime Friend worked better for her, she thought. But it was interesting realizing that she could produce mana gems too. No drake dung for her, though, no thanks!
Commander Slime was too military focused for her own tastes. There were specialized options like Artillery Slime, Whip Slime, and so on, but she didn't feel they fit her. As she scrolled the list, she realized all of them were slime-related. Made sense, she supposed, class changes generally weren't dramatic, unless you were truly unhappy with your class. And she wasn't unhappy with Slime Friend.
Then she spotted an odd entry on her list. Slime Incarnation. The description was the most brief class description she had ever seen or heard of: "One with slime." Even the other information fields were rather curious. "Requirement: Embrace slime itself" and "Granted abilities: All that is slime."
Maybe it was just a generalized slime class? But something about it appealed to her. Being all about slime? She supposed she could get with a class like that.
As soon as she made the decision, the class change was done with little fanfare. The class in her status changed to Slime Incarnation and that was it. Checking her status more closely, Slime Affinity had been changed to the Incarnation of Slime ability, a passive which was described as "Bonus to all things slime. Bonus to allied slimes."
Slime Understanding's description now simply said "Understanding of slime" and Slime Form was now Slime Enhancement with its description being "Enhances properties of slime." Likewise, Slime Bullet was now Slime Projection and Slime Whip now Slime Extension with descriptions of "Projects slime" and "Extends slime". Slime Regeneration was now Slime Regrowth with the description "Slime regrows."
Testing her more active abilities outside of her house showed an apparent lack of significant changes in those abilities other than being a little easier to use. When she went to her slime pen, she noticed that she could understand her slimes' desires and feelings a little better. And that was all the change there was.
Maybe someone would know something more. The first person that came to mind was Thoy. The elderly hyena was easily the most widely traveled person in the area. She had probably encountered people with many different classes. Not only that, but she was pretty knowledgeable in general about classes and abilities.
So Aono went to Thoy's house after tending her own slimes and knocked on her door. The door opened and Aono was greeted with the sight of Thoy holding her cane. She must be suffering her leg ache today. According to her, the healers said they couldn't find anything causing the pain. That sort of thing happened sometimes, especially with old people.
After the two of them sat down for lemonade and morsels, Aono asked Thoy, "Do you know anything about classes like mine?"
Thoy nodded. "Incarnation-type classes, huh? They're rare. Only seen two in my travels. One Flame Incarnation. Like you being all slime, she was all flame. Could do all kinds of things with fire, including some things you don't normally see fire doing. Healing, undoing the effects of fire, making a bridge of fire that actually supports you without burning you, stuff like that. Not necessarily stronger flames than another flame-related class, in fact I once saw someone burn stuff more intensely and faster than she did. But able to do more weird stuff."
She took another swig of lemonade. "The other had Sword Incarnation. Wasn't a sword person or anything, but I saw him literally sleeping on a bed of swords, riding flying swords, conjuring basically as many swords as he liked in battle, and cutting someone's argument in half. That was a particularly strange sight."
Aono stared. "Incarnation classes sound, well, odd."
Thoy shrugged. "Everyone I spoke to say those classes're bizarre. So that's the kind of class you have. You'll probably be able to do similar things with slime."
That was definite food for thought. Aono'd been just trying the same kinds of things she did as a Slime Friend. But what if she tried pushing her horizons further? What properties of slime could she enhance? What if she, say, had her slime dissolve quarrels?
Immediately, she got a sense that was beyond her. For now. That was what astonished her, that the answer from her new understanding granted by her class wasn't "no". She had a lot to try, then. As for extending slime... "Thank you, Thoy. You've been a huge help. And I didn't thank you for how much you gave me."
Most of the folks at the community meeting had contributed one or two Merchants. Thoy had contribued three Nobles, the next highest coin above Merchants. The only one above it was Monarchs.
Thoy waved her hand. "Nah, this old woman has a lot saved from her monster hunting days. Might as well make a difference with a little of it. Besides, I already have you as one of the folks in my will. You wouldn't let me pay your whole debt so I'll do it when I'm dead and you won't dare turn down a dead person's last will."
Aono blinked. "Me?"
With a wag of her finger, Thoy said, "Don't go thinking you're the only person I've named in my will. I've named everyone I know of and like who's in need of money. Not like the money'll do me any good when I'm dead."
Just how much money did Thoy have?
After they said their farewells and Aono returned to the area near her home, she tried shooting, no, projecting a lump of slime at the ground. Then... she willed it to extend.
A psuedopod emerged from the slime on the ground. And she was still able to make it sharp like she was able to before. Huh. That was one new possibility already.
More testing later, Aono found that she could project not only slime detached from her body in various directions but launch her own body into the air. Landing had been tricky and she ended up launching herself up slightly just before she hit the ground, only to slam into it when she applied too little force on the second try. Ow.
Applying more subtlety in her usage of the ability, she found that she could hover in the air, though it was so draining that she nearly crashed into the ground again. So something to try at higher levels when she would have higher stamina.
She could also make her slime dissolve more intensely by enhancing its acidic property and make it more water by enhancing its wet property and make it more sticky. As for Slime Regrowth, it seemed to work much the same as Slime Regeneration (injuring herself with a knife to find out hadn't been fun to do). She had considered using it to regrow Mecee's hair since she had once heard him complain about his baldness, but she sensed it was beyond her current abilities. For now.
Over the next few days, Aono noticed that some folks gave her the occasional confused look when they thought she wasn't looking, and some had to look at her status to remember the correct name to use. But few seemed to care to make a big fuss about it and she suspected such reactions would fade as they became more used to this her.
Both being in a slime body and a cute body had taken some getting adjusted to, but she had already been spending time in Slime Form more and more before she went all the way. No, the oddest part was not bothering to hide herself. That took changing some habits, like ducking out of sight if it seemed like someone might see her in her slime form.
In the end, she had just marched around the market square for all to see, and that had helped somewhat with that. Even if people asked her what she was doing. She just replied, "Getting used to being cute." The confused looks on their faces had been funny.
Okay, with that and the constant smile on her face, she was pretty certain she now had a bit of an eccentric reputation. But honestly she had one just from hanging out with Tamu and doing odd things with him. It didn't matter, she was happy with her current state of being.
It was a far cry from when she had first formed as a young human child in the Pure Kingdom. At that time, she had basic knowledge but no memories. After all, she had only just appeared into existence. Needless to say, it had been a confusing time.
She wasn't the only folk to come into existence like that, either. It was less common than reproduction but more common than the awakened folks, who had once been a Tamed, Wild, or even a monster. Rarer still were the artificially created folks.
Apparently there were a fair number of formed folks who were the only one of their species. Jamiin, the Bladed Metalkin, was one of those. When examined more closely, the species section of their status said they were the only one of their kind. Awakened folks could be similarly singular on occasion, the only Folk of their kind.
Not that Aono herself was particularly common. From the extended display of the species section, she could tell that she was one of only 23 slime Folk. There were many millions of Folk in the world, so that was a very tiny number. That fit with the knowledge that Slime Understanding had given her. Slimes were most commonly Wild, followed by Tame, followed by Monster, with Folk in a distant dead last.
Briefly, Aono wondered what it would've been like to have parents but honestly that would've likely been much like the Pure Nurturers who had helped raise her except maybe a little more forgiving. Really, what she wanted was to have formed somewhere else than the Pure Kingdom. But she couldn't change what had already happened. Folks who tried tended to get slapped down hard by TIME.
As she rested her back against the town wall, built like many things in the region from marble quarried from the Blinking mountain, she heard two people passing by.
"So, that Aono thing? Mighty peculiar if you ask me. Aiio too, just up and deciding not to be a he or a she. Not that I'd begrudge them those things. Just can't understand why." one of them said. Aono recognized the voice of Lim.
The other person, who was Jouu, said, "Eh, wouldn't be the first or even most peculiar thing that bo- that girl has done. Ah this'll take getting used to."
Lim said, "Yeah, that stunt she and Tamu pulled with Hoou's sheep was way odder. No idea how the chaos they managed to convince those sheep to lie on their back with their legs sticking up. Gave Hoou a real surprise. Then the sheep just rolled over and began chewing grass right as rain and that duo was just laughing their asses off."
"Oh, yeah, that sounds like a good one. My favorite's the one where they launched gourds for Deads' Day from this miniature catapult and inside the things was just candies. My kids loved that, especially when they got to pull the lever themselves." Aono could positively imagine Jouu's grin just from his tone.
Lim mumbled, "Least they cleaned up after themselves."
Jouu chuckled. "And now they're stuck doing it every Deads' Day because everyone loves it too much. Including the dead people."
"I liked the one where they used some dye to turn the grass near my house into a get well message for the little one when he got mighty sick." Lim said with a note of softness.
"Nice of them. Wouldn't that be hard to get rid of?" Jouu asked.
Lim said, "Nah, washed right away in the rain."
"Wonder what they used for that," Jouu said.
"Asked them and they just did this big grin. Told me though after I told them I wanted it for the wife's birthday. Some fancy dye mixture, I'd have to find the note I wrote for it." There was the sound of Jouu rumbling in his satchel. "Not here, probably at home."
Lim muttered, "Lots of talent, those two."
"Yeah. So Aono instead of Gara, huh?" Jouu sighed wistfully. "I guess I kinda can understand why she might want to be a girl. They're, you know, well, it might be nice being them? They probably have nice times."
Lim was silent for a moment. "...Think you've got some thinking to do."
That just got a "Huh?" from Jouu.
As the two drew away, Aono considered what they had said. She already knew people considered her odd and it looked like that applied to Aiio too.
Aiio was actually the person she'd be going to next, since they were the town tailor. They produced higher quality work, but the tailor in the next town over was a bit cheaper. Those two had firmly established their niches. You went to the next town for your basic clothing particularly for growing kids, but you went to Aiio for your finest. Aono wanted Aiio for all her stuff, though. Thoy had been generous enough on top of the others contributions that Aono could afford that and a bed.
She hadn't realized that there were fans of the sheep prank, however. The candy melon catapult, yeah, that had been popular aside from a few complaints. And she could still remember the slight smile on Lim's face when he saw the message and the broad one on his son. Yeah, she'd had some good times with Tamu and even done some good things.
More surprisingly, however, was that Jouu might be like her, maybe. It wasn't like she knew the farmer that well, but between Aiio and Jouu, she might not be as alone as she thought she was.
That thought made her happy.