Chapter 233: 233
Lying in the coffin-like box made of ice, Michelle had to wait for a long time in silence before she noticed a change.
It was very subtle.
With not a speck of malicious aura and nearly nonexistent presence, a black slime-like creature crawled to the ice spread around. If it didn’t touch the ice, Michelle wouldn’t have even noticed it.
Swinging her eyes open, she stared at the jelly fluid moving around. If a seemingly harmless creature like that could move around so freely, it meant it was hiding its power.
Feeling it moving over the ice, Michelle knew that once it found the hole she left in the ice for breathing, it would slip inside. Then, she would be in dire trouble.
So she had to get rid of it before that happened.
Sending her spirit energy into the ice, she had huge black and whitish-blue spikes stab out of it, piercing through the slime. The next moment, she controlled the ice box to shatter and the shards flew away from her, pushing the slime creature away.
Michelle quickly jumped to her feet. She refused to believe it was just an ordinary slime. She was waiting for it to show its true powers.
She had already let her guard down once against the boulder monsters, and the consequences were nearly dire. She wouldn’t let herself make another mistake like that.
But even after being pushed away, the slime didn’t show any signs of hostility. It just tried to crawl closer to Michelle again.
A frown formed on Michelle’s face. Glancing down at herself, she wondered if there was a wound somewhere on her body. Maybe the smell of blood was what attracted the slime.
But she didn’t see anything. And she didn’t particularly feel pain anywhere.
So why was the seemingly harmless slime approaching her?
Michelle refused to believe it was just a harmless slime. It was time to get rid of it.
Squatting down, she extended her hand towards it. At the same time, she took control over the small amount of poison element within her body and moved it all to her hand.
The slime continued moving at the same pace until it reached Michelle’s hand. Once there, it wrapped around, making it look like Michelle’s hand was stabbed through a black jelly.
Seeing that it wasn’t doing anything else, Michelle was confused. So she decided to try what the slime would do if it was in danger.
She started moving the poison element spirit energy within her hand to the surface of her skin. From there, it entered the slime’s body.
At first, the slime didn’t show any reaction, not even noticing that poison was entering it.
But after a while, it started wiggling and stretching around Michelle’s hand. A while later, it was wrapped around her hand like a long glove.
"Just what is this..." Michelle frowned. It seemed more like the slime wanted more of her poison element spirit energy to enter it than that it wanted to get away.
Did it have completely no awareness of danger? Or was it immune to poison?
With a frown, Michelle flung her hand to the side, forcing the slime off. It fell to the ground with a wet plop. It wasn’t really a pleasant sound.
"What are you?" Michelle nudged at the slime with her foot. But it just stuck to her leg stubbornly.
Not liking it, Michelle combined all her spirit and soul energy in her leg and let it surge out of her leg, entering the slime’s body.
The next moment, she condensed the spirit energy and controlled the soul energy to turn into a black fire.
The explosion tore the slime apart and the black flames engulfed the scattered parts.
Thinking it was finally over, Michelle let the flames rage on for a while longer before retracting them. But the moment she did so, the scattered parts of the slime came together and reformed into the slime.
A spark of rage appeared deep within Michelle’s purple eyes. She was still keeping it contained, but it was impossible to tell when she would let loose again.
Feeling that from within Michelle’s body, Nyxaroth came out and struck at the slime in his solidified form.
But all that happened to the slime was that it got squished to the ground. The moment Nyxaroth retreated a bit, it returned to its original state.
"Nyx, what is that thing?" Michelle’s voice was already icy cold.
Nyxaroth stared at the slime for a long time before answering. "It’s not dangerous," he concluded.
That irked Michelle a bit. "So I should just let it follow me around?"
"You move faster than it." Nyxaroth wasn’t really concerned. "Just get out of the radius where it can sense you."
"Fine, then..." Michelle wasn’t satisfied, but it seemed that was the only way to get rid of the slime.
But before she could move a single step away she felt a strong, oppressive presence. There was no bloodthirst, malice, or killing intent in the presence, but Michelle still felt suffocated by it. Something was coming.
"I’ll be retreating." Nyxaroth turned into a speck of mist and returned into Michelle’s body.
Staring down at the slime, Michelle could feel it wasn’t the source of the presence. But she was convinced it was somehow connected to it.
Reaching down to it, she let it wrap around her hand again.
And the moment it did, the presence disappeared. "Nyx, can you still feel it?" Michelle quickly asked.
"No!" Nyxaroth’s raspy voice came from within her body.
Flinging the slime down, Michelle felt the presence instantly return. And Nyxaroth felt it the same way.
"I knew it wasn’t normal!" Michelle hissed in anger.
"Maybe as long as the slime is on you, the creature won’t approach." Nyxaroth thought about it for a moment.
Michelle shook her head. "What if the presence is always around since it appeared, but when I touch the slime, it just dulls my senses?"
Nyxaroth hadn’t considered that. "But I can feel the presence vanish too."
"But, Nyx..." Michelle still believed her theory. "You are my contracted beast. What if the slime affects you too?"
Nyxaroth went silent for a moment, before a thought struck him. "Serith doesn’t have a contract with you!"
So Michelle asked Serith. And the answer was the same as Nyxaroth. The presence vanished whenever Michelle touched the slime.
Letting the slime wrap around her arm again, Michelle sat down on the ground, waiting for what would happen. She refused to believe the creature wouldn’t come to her just because of a small slime.
And she was right.
After some time, Michelle could see something approaching from the distance. From all sides. It was crawling over the shattered buildings and the used-to-be street.
At first, Michelle couldn’t make out what it was, but when it got closer, it struck her. It was an army of slimes just like the one on her hand.
"If I’m not dead now, I really don’t know..." Michelle frowned, moving her free hand to touch the slime on her other hand.
Michelle started preparing for the worst. From her experience with the first slime, the slimes couldn’t be killed, so she needed a way to get through them. Because if they were hostile, once they got to her, she was dead.
But before she could even think of a plan, she felt her soul energy move. Serith was trying to communicate something. "They are Shadow Slimes."
Reading that, Michelle didn’t know what to think about it. She had no clue what Shadow Slimes were.
So Serith went on to explain.
Apparently, Shadow Slimes were one of the few creatures which could use not spirit or soul energy but shadow essence. And they were uncontrollably attracted to those with the potential to become Shadow Masters.
The fact that the first one approached Michelle meant the group was uncertain whether Michelle had the potential. And after the slime confirmed it, they all came out.
"So, are they dangerous to me?" Michelle asked. "What do they do to those with the potential?" she added.
Serith had a vague answer for that. The Shadow Slimes never intentionally hurt anyone with the talent.
From that one sentence, Michelle could tell her safety wasn’t guaranteed. Just because they didn’t hurt others intentionally didn’t mean they couldn’t still hurt her. Accidents could happen.
Thinking about what to do, Michelle stood up, looking around a bit. There wasn’t really anything she could use to get herself out of the situation. And she really didn’t feel like leaving her life up to whether the slimes kill or don’t kill her accidentally.
"Are they weak against something?" Michelle suddenly asked.
Serith could only guess. "Probably light." It was a well-known fact that creatures cultivating the shadow essence tended to avoid light. But it was hard to tell whether they were weak against it.
Still, Michelle decided to try it. It was her last resort.
Summoning her ice element, she formed a ball of Ice Fire on her palm, letting it grow rapidly. She wanted it to create as much light as possible.