It was already noon, Edart had just arrived at his perch in the Slimy Plain. The night's practice ended up tiring him more than he could have imagined, which resulted in him sleeping for longer than he wanted.
That didn't bother him, despite the time lost, he still had half a day to strengthen himself. Today he had a goal in mind, he wanted to see how slimes used mana, at least he hoped to understand a little bit about how it works.
The day before, Edart had stuck to attacking only slimes of the water and nature elements, whenever a slime of another element came, he would just wait for the slimes to eat the berries and leave the hunting area.
Today would be different, he wanted to study magic, more precisely earth magic. Edart wanted to summon earth or manipulate it, so he could use it as defense and also use it to build some buildings. So he waited for the slimes.
— "Ahhh, how sleepy."
— "Eris, is there any slime around?"
— ["Yes, however, this is not one we can deal with."]
The first of the day was a fire slime, which he waited patiently for it to leave. Edart didn't want to become a barbecue, so he didn't dare fight this slime. The next ones were a water slime and a plant slime, these he welcomed with open arms, storing his spoils next to the tree.
Then came a magma slime, when Edart saw it, he felt a chill down his spine. Wherever the slime jumped, a charred circle appeared on the ground. Some of his spears were caught in the path of this slime, and they quickly turned to ash.
Edart didn't dare move, trying not to make any noise, which could attract the slime's attention. Twenty minutes later, the slime left and for another hour nothing happened. His patience was tested, he almost gave up and went after the slime, when he was about to do so, Eris spoke.
— ["Wait, I think there's a slime coming."]
Edart, who was getting up, returned to crouching on his branch. Looking at the beginning of the hunting ground, he saw a brown slime that was calmly jumping towards the berries placed in the center.
Like all the other slimes, this one also went straight to the pile of food, without suspecting anything.
— "Finally you showed up."
This time, Edart didn't throw a spear to launch a surprise attack. The slime was small, between level 4 and 7, not posing a great threat. After fighting several slimes, Edart already had a basic idea of their levels just by looking at their size. Although it wasn't exact, it was always within what he imagined.
Quickly, he climbed down from the tree, crouched down and advanced towards the slime. He didn't go directly to the slime, but made a detour around the side of the slime so he wouldn't be noticed.
Observing the brown slime 5 meters away, Edart noticed a few things about this slime. When looking at it, the first thing that was noticeable was that this slime seemed to have a thicker membrane, as if it were made of earth. The slime also didn't seem to be very fast.
—"Interesting."
As the slime ate, Edart planned in his head. The slime seemed slow, so keeping his distance wouldn't be difficult. Since he wanted to learn from the slime, he couldn't kill it too quickly; using stones would be better. Edart wasn't sure about this slime's skin, it seemed to be tougher, which might make it harder to kill.
In the meantime, the slime had almost finished its meal, seeing this, Edart decided to start the fight.
— ["Name: Brown Slime
Race: Mana Creature
Level: 6
Life: 59/59
Mana: 25/25
Stamina: 12/12
Vitality (VIT): 14
Strength (STR): 6
Endurance (END): 3
Agility (AGI): 2
Dexterity (DEX): 4
Intelligence (INT): 11
Willpower (VON): 7
Perception (PER): 3"].
To get the slime's attention, he used 'Identify' and also threw a rock. While using the skill, he took a look. As expected, the slime was slow, with few points in agility and resistance. Its life and mana were the opposite, with Vitality and Intelligence being its attributes with the most points.
— "Plock."
At that moment, the rock reached the slime, and when it hit it made a sound like stone hitting stone. Edart, who kept his 'Mana Perception' active, saw something incredible: the mana that was in the slime and around it was attracted to the slime's body, creating a thin but dense layer of mana around the slime's skin.
The stone, which did not have much attacking power, when it hit the slime, just bounced off and fell next to it, which made it realize who was disturbing its snack. Looking at Edart, he had an angry face plastered on his round body.
— "I think I made him angry. Eris, keep an eye on your surroundings and let me know if anything unusual happens."
When Edart saw this, he was surprised and happy, but he didn't have much time to process what had happened. In his vision, the brown mana around him began to stir, and soon several stones formed around the slime.
These stones were spinning, like a bullet from a gun spinning as it leaves the barrel.
In the next instant, they were thrown at high speed towards Edart. Without having much to do, he threw himself to the right side and rolled, doing two somersaults and standing up at the end.
Without waiting, he ran around the slime in a counterclockwise direction. With each step he took, a stone hit his previous position. The slime gave him no respite and did not move from its place.
—"I'm starting to understand why this slime is slow."
Edart understood why his Agility and Endurance points were low. He wouldn't need them if he stayed still and just attacked from afar.
The slime didn't give him time to breathe, making it difficult to observe how the slime used magic, so Edart barely learned anything.
—"Damn...."
At that moment, he tripped over something. As he was dividing his attention between the slime and the path he was taking, he ended up getting his foot stuck.
Hitting the ground with his chest, Edart didn't want to stay still, as he thought the rocks could hit him if he stayed still. With no time to stand up, he started walking on all fours.
Walking a few steps forward, he managed to avoid all the rocks, he was happy to avoid that, but soon he realized something.
The sound of the rocks hitting the ground had stopped, not knowing what caused it, he slowed down and stood up. He continued walking, but turned to the slime to observe where the next attack would come from.
Looking at the slime, the rocks that were harassing it had disappeared. The slime seemed to have given up trying to hit him with rocks, it seemed to be saving mana.
Since the slime didn't do anything, Edart stopped and looked at it, not understanding what the slime's next actions would be.
—"What are you trying to do?"
Five seconds passed and nothing happened. It seemed like the slime didn't want to attack anymore, which made him even more confused. At that moment, Eris warned him.
— ["On the ground, where you are standing, there is a lot of mana gathering."]
Hearing this, he looked down, there was a large circle of earth element mana, it was gathering and getting more intense by the second.
Edart didn't know what it was, but he knew he shouldn't stay there. Not wasting time, he jumped back.
The moment the slime saw that Edart realized what he wanted to do, he used most of his mana points to speed up his attack, leaving only a few points.
This slime was smart, when he saw that he couldn't hit his enemy and saw that the enemy was more interested in observing him, he changed his strategy.
At first, his enemy fell into his trap, not understanding what he wanted to do, which gave him time to prepare his attack, but in the end his enemy realized that something was wrong. Seeing this, the slime can only force mana into its attack, thus spending much more mana than normal.
If Edart had been alone in this world, he could very well have perished here, but luckily for him, he had a great lookout, who could alert him to danger at any moment.
In front of him, a pillar of earth rose into the sky, it had a sharp tip, with the thickness of Edart's body, its height easily reached 8 meters high, all of this happened in just a second.
— "Thank you Eris, you saved my life." Edart thanked her.
— "I just did my job." She said with a happy voice.
Edart moved away from this pillar, running around the slime and went to the other side. Looking at the slime that had been standing in the same place all this time, he saw that this slime was showing signs of exhaustion.
Its brown body trembled non-stop, its body was flatter as if it was melting, it no longer had its perfect round shape. Its body also glowed less, showing that its mana had been consumed.
— "Now it's my turn."
Seeing this, Edart decided to end this fight as quickly as possible.
Edart shot towards the slime, during his run, he picked up a spear that was nearby, activated his 'Accurate Shot' skill and threw it at the slime. As the spear advanced, he wasted no time and went towards another one.
The slime saw his enemy moving towards him, despite his fatigue, he began to summon more rocks. When Edart reached the next spear, the slime threw two rocks, unfortunately for the slime, they missed their target.
Seeing the spear advancing towards him, the slime gave up on the rocks and began to strengthen his body with his earth mana. Soon, a layer of thin and hard earth covered his body.
— "Clinkkk."
His first spear reached the slime, but instead of sticking into the slime's body, when it hit its skin, the spear was deflected off course without any problems.
— "That was all I was missing." Edart said in disbelief.
Edart had already reached the second spear, even though he saw that his first attempt had failed, he picked up this spear and threw it at the slime, putting a little more force.
Quickly, the spear went towards the slime and hit it precisely. — "Crerrckkkk." The spear broke into several pieces, unable to withstand the force exerted on its body. Some stone chips flew away, the slime's stone armor was cracked.
Seeing this, Edart was disappointed, he expected the spear to stick into the slime. He hadn't stood still and was already reaching the position of his club. With his club in hand, he went into hand-to-hand combat with the slime.
The slime recovered its shield that surrounded it, closing the opening and sealing the cracks. With his mana at its last, he tried something different.
"What a slime full of tricks."
Edart arrived in front of the slime and what he saw surprised him. The shield returned to its peak, furthermore, there were spikes protruding from the earth sphere.
He saw the slime's attempts to protect itself, but he didn't hesitate to attack, raising his club and using every bit of strength he had. His attack landed on the slime.
— "Bammm!!!!" "Bammmm!!!!" Each attack made the sphere tremble and crack, some spikes and pieces of the sphere fell. Seeing this, Edart continued. On his fourth attack, the slime retaliated and a spike from the sphere flew at Edart.
— "Ahhhgr"
His attack hit Edart's left shoulder, who stopped attacking for a moment and looked at the wound. Despite burning a lot, the attack only grazed him. Not wanting to suffer more of the same attack, he destroyed all the spikes that were pointed at him.
The fight continued for another minute, where Edart launched attack after attack, not letting the slime attack. When he was about to launch another attack, the slime's shield collapsed on the ground, the slime stood still and familiar messages appeared in his vision.
— ["You have killed a 'Brown Slime (Level: 6).'"].
— ["You have gained 37 XP."].
After that, Edart relaxed and sat down on the ground. With renewed energy, he went after his spoils in order to clear the battlefield for the next slime.
Activating the collect skill, his mana was drained and in front of him appeared the body of the slime and a brown stone that had a faint, almost faded glow.
— "That's what I guess."
Seeing this, he realized that it should be an intact core. Excitedly, he used 'Identify'.
— ["Name: Earth Core (Damaged).
Description: A core belonging to an earth-elemental slime. It is responsible for storing mana for the slime to use."].
— ["'Identify' is level 9"].
The description was what Edart imagined, it was like a mana battery, if he found a way to use it, maybe he would have a mana reserve. Seeing that the description said it was damaged, Edart was afraid to test it.
Identify advanced another level, there was only one more left to earn new points.
— "A little more and I will have more free points."
Edart wasted no more time and set up the battlefield for the next slime. With everything ready, he climbed the tree and waited for the next rush.