The elder meeting was about to begin, but we were put in some sort of holding chamber before actually getting on. The elders gathered inside the windmills that surround the village.
Finally, I got to see the machines that run on Magicule, they were big heavy industrial machines. Nothing as I had ever seen before, they didn't run all of the time, Dragan had explained.
The turbines spun by extracting magical from the outside. But they didn't run 24/7, only during some hours of the night, and when the lights got cut the turbines were placed in a sort of suspension, or stasis. Of course with magic and all, and then un-spuned during the morning hours, as the sun came in.
After that, the energy produced throughout the village came 100 percent from renewable energies. Solar, wind, and water were the main sources that powered the electric grid of Tarragon.
It was a small village, so of course it didn't produce a lot of energy, and the little energy they produced was for storing meat in their giant freezer that stood underground in the village.
Very few villagers had their own in house freezer. Except maybe for Dragan, the solar panels outside his house were surely something that helped him keep the freezer cool.
On the other hand, spring was gently flowing through the village, it wasn't too hot, or too cold, and the aurora descended at night, giving every one its blessing. During the day it seemed to float up towards the dome encapsulating the village and become less visible as the sky turned bright azure in color.
But I think in reality it only made itself invisible. Then during the night, it descended once again.
This had been going on since we - shall I say - consume the sun god's blessing surrounding the village. But Kamika had explained, this aurora was a new sort of blessing. One I had provided.
After I had absorbed the light that the people called The Sun God, I didn't feel anything. But Sybil had assured me nothing was wrong and that the sun god was simply sleeping inside of me, Its power was bound to wake up sometimes, but as long as it was within me, its power was hidden away.
Sybil proposed we try and de-compile it's program, but then ran it's calculations and with my current processing power, it would take around 2190 hours. That's around 3 months. 3 months Sybil would have to run in the background, 3 months where my magic would basically be useless, and I would be nothing more than a wiggly paperweight. I didn't want to burden Dragan like that - so Sybil held on that task for now.
I still didn't get the gist of it all, How was I storing the light inside of my body, I had no idea. But it was there, and it had happened, so I had just gone with it. It didn't bother me right now, there were no weird dreams that premonition calamity because I had taken the sun god, or anything like that.
I think it had taken a liking to me, or us at least, and it had in a way chosen us. Maybe the aurora was still happening because the sun god was sleeping inside of me, and the magic had activated like I had written a program and it was just executing by itself each night.
The villagers loved it though, they even started calling me Great Slime like I was some benevolent god, It didn't bother me, but it felt like the gap between strangers and me had widened.
Dragan had received even more veneration as he was the one who had pact'ed with me. Fruit's baskets and even some money where thrown his way. At least we shared the fruit.
I tried to make friends with the local barkeepers and vendors, but they would treat me like royalty and offer me free food, or their local produce. They would rather worship me than treat me like a human. On the other hand - I'm not exactly human.
It was exhausting. I only wanted to have an honest conversation with a stranger, but I guess they had to treat me like that, or else they would feel like I would punish my wrath against them.
This wasn't the case, but it just made every conversation feel fake, and it bore me.
Dragan had also gained some renown in the last couple of days. His status as the guardian of the Zomearon forest had increased, and now people called him Teacher. I didn't mind it was the title he had earned, I just worried it was going to go all to his head.
But at the same time, I saw his reaction and it seemed like he was too a little uncomfortable with it, so he asked people to call him coach, but they insisted on calling him of higher status.
I slowly saw Dragan disconnect from the reality he had once loved.
He had too, now known, only those close to him, he could trust, and he knew this, not by my volition, but by his own.
He was a smart guy, as simpleton as he was, he was down to earth and took things with a mature heart.
Finally, Kamika appeared from behind a veil of darkness.
"They're ready for you two," she said and used her hand to signal us to walk through that same darkness she had come through.
I was in my slime form so perched myself on Dragan's shoulder. As we walked through the pitch-black darkness of this industrial warehouse, at the end I could see a light, shining from the elder bodies.
When they came into view, they were not at all what I was expecting. Not some cruddy old dudes sitting around mandating what the village needs.
Instead, they were floating shining jellyfish.
Giant floating jellyfish!
With tentacles and bodies made to be squishy.
These were the elders that Kamika had spoken of. I was so taken aback, that I couldn't say a single word, Dragan just decided to take a knee, and Kamika stood proudly next to us.
"What's about to happen next, is something that can't leave this room," she said.
There were three elders floating in this room. One of them put up a tentacle, and a flash of light beamed and then quickly disappeared. In that instance, I felt it, they entered my brain, reading me like an open book. Dragan felt it too, Kamika just held her stance.
"It takes a minute to get used to it, just let it flow," she said. Then the elders started speaking, all of them at once, Three voices filled our heads, but they were speaking in unison.
I had never seen anything quite like this.