The slime perceived the nutrients entering its body as flavor. That was why it could not help being surprised as it absorbed the rabbit. The “taste” was similar to what it had experienced when absorbing deer blood and eating jerky. That same “taste” allowed it to recognize the rabbit as meat.
But...
'Not jerky!'
No matter how fresh the rabbit was, it could not be exactly the same as jerky. After all, jerky was food prepared by cooking meat and adding seasonings. Since both were meat, their nutrients would naturally be similar, but their flavors were distinctly different.
▷You lied!
▶??? Lied?
▶What was a lie?
▷Rabbit is meat! Rabbit isn't jerky!
▶Ahahaha!
▶Well, it isn't jerky lolol.
[Noblesse Fire]▶It can tell the difference?
[Squishy Queen]▶What do you fools take slimes for? Of course it can tell that much!
▷You lied! Mean!
When the new meat failed to taste like the jerky it had expected, the slime launched into a series of angry bounces.
[Free Spirit]▶Jerky is made from meat too! Still, wasn't it tasty?
From what the Smartass had learned, most monsters enjoyed even uncooked meat. He had therefore assumed the slime would enjoy the rabbit too.
▷Tasty! But not jerky!
It admitted that the meat was tasty, but it was not the jerky flavor it had wanted. Its anger did not fade easily.
▷You said meat was jerky! Rabbit isn't jerky!
[Madam Cat's Cradle]▶Oh my! Squishy is adorable even when angry~.
▶Is there anything you don't find cute, lady?
[Madam Cat's Cradle]▶Who are you calling a lady?!
▶Hahahaha.
▶Once you've had kids, you're a middle-aged lady~.
▶For real lol.
'Hmm, how do I calm it down?'
In his workshop, the Smartass briefly considered how to soothe the slime's anger, then suddenly had an idea: divert its attention to something else.
[Free Spirit]▶Squishy! I didn't explain it properly! Sorry!
▷Meat! Not jerky!
[Free Spirit]▶Yep, meat isn't jerky. My bad. But the meat was tasty, so don't you want more?
▷Want more!
[Free Spirit]▶Then try catching a different animal next time instead of a rabbit! It'll definitely be tastier than a rabbit, and there'll be more to eat!
▷Different animal?
[Free Spirit]▶Like a deer or a wild boar!
'Deer!'
The slime immediately responded to the choices the Smartass offered. In particular, it still remembered the taste of the deer blood it had first consumed. Not as good as jerky, but a taste that filled its body with vitality. What would a deer taste like if it ate the entire body, as it had the rabbit?
Its anger vanished, replaced by curiosity about the taste of deer.
▷Deer! Want to eat!
[Free Spirit]▶Then go look for one!
▷Okay!
[Noblesse Fire]▶That actually worked?
▶It's still a little kid lol.
[Slam First Ask Later]▶They only fall for it for a while. Once they're a little older, they catch on right away and look at you with distrust in their eyes...
▶Nobody asked about your family life.
+++
“Whew. At least I avoided making Squishy hate me.”
The Smartass sighed in relief inside the cavern.
The slime was still innocent by nature. But the Smartass knew better than to take that innocence lightly and keep teasing or lying to it. The resentment that created was bound to last a very long time. Just as children could remember a prank even as adults, despite the prankster assuming they would soon forget because they were young.
Even now, the Smartass could not forget the pranks played on him in his own innocent childhood.
'Still, this has kept Squishy interested in animal meat. In that case, next...'
He decided he should teach it what to watch out for when encountering humans.
Monsters living on the Demon Continent might be another matter, but the slime was still very weak. It could catch something like a rabbit, but if it encountered humans or other monsters, it would very likely be attacked. He would advise it to avoid humans whenever possible, but...
'There's no way a curious little thing like Squishy will stay put.'
Its reaction when first meeting Nellin made that clear. When it saw a human for the first time, it would approach out of curiosity again.
Even if the slime had the strength to defend itself and defeat a human who attacked it...
'I absolutely have to stop it from eating people.'
After becoming a lich, the Smartass had decided there was no need to concern himself with the ethics of the human world. Indeed, watching monsters kill and eat humans on several streams had not upset him. Having been betrayed by humans and driven into a corner until he became a lich, he was hardly going to take their side.
However, even setting ethics aside, the slime would be in danger the moment it ate a human. What if rumors spread of a human-eating slime? Someone might issue a request to exterminate it.
If a person lost to a slime and died, the reaction would be, “Sheesh, how pathetic do you have to be to get killed by a slime?” But if a slime ate a person, people would cry, “That slime is dangerous!” and come flocking to exterminate it immediately.
Above all...
'Nellin would be sad.'
The Smartass believed Nellin would be saddened if the slime she had promised to meet again—the slime she had deemed weak and harmless—became a man-eating monster. He did not care what happened to other humans, but he had no intention of standing by while his former companion was saddened or that promise of reunion was sullied.
'Of course, that's not an immediate concern.'
The slime had kept moving since leaving the elf village. But reaching a human village from there took over a week even by carriage. There was therefore no immediate concern that the slime, still roaming the elves' forest, would encounter a human.
On the stream, the slime was bouncing along, using Sensing to look for a deer. Its soft body bouncing energetically was cute, but watching only this stream grew boring. As a veteran stream viewer, he could not let himself get absorbed in a single broadcast.
'I should watch another stream.'
With nothing to worry about for the moment, the Smartass began browsing other streams.
'Squishy Queen is streaming for the first time in a while. I thought she'd be too busy watching Squishy.'
He entered Squishy Queen's stream. And...
▶[Free Spirit has been kicked.]
'!?'
He was turned away the moment he arrived.
+++
“Hmph! How dare you try to enter, you insolent creature.”
The Slime Queen kicked the Smartass the instant she saw the notification that he had entered. Her reason was simple: she resented him.
After the slime left the elf village, the Slime Queen had been considering how to guide Squishy from then on. Even while respecting its wishes, she could at least point it in a better direction! But there was a major problem.
As a Slime Queen, the highest form of slime, she instinctively knew the possibilities held by the monsters known as slimes. The problem was that she knew all those possibilities. Every option looked good, leaving her unable to decide which direction to guide it in!
So the Slime Queen had decided to keep several possibilities open for now. Ordinarily, she would leave a slime to grow on its own according to its environment, but this fellow slime was unusual: it had been intelligent from a young age. In that case...
'Surely the time of choosing granted by the system will come for my kin as well.'
She would offer advice in whatever direction the slime wanted, so it would have more options to choose from when that time came.
Just as she was making that resolution, and about to type that it should not eat only poisonous plants, the Smartass spoke up first, suggesting more meat instead of poisonous plants!
To the Slime Queen, it felt as though he had not only beaten her to the punch but stolen the role she had intended to play. Then the slime failed to catch a rabbit, and Fenrir went so far as to teach it how to ambush prey.
The Smartass and Fenrir. In the Slime Queen's heart, both had become insolent, detestable creatures who had stolen her role.
▶Hey, Squishy Queen~.
▶Been a while since you streamed.
▶Why haven't you been streaming lately?
“I shall stream whenever I please. And I will not be able to stream often from now on, either.”
▶????
▶Why why why why why why why.
“I have one of my kin to look after. That is all you need know.”
▶Did a Slime King show up nearby or something?
▶Oh, is Squishy Queen finally going to mate?
▶[Anonymous 4299 has been kicked.]
“Who said anything about mating? Such insolence!”
▶She said that after kicking them lolol.
▶The mating thing did cross a line lolol.
▶Ah! S*x!
▶[Mating Parrot has been kicked.]
After ejecting several of the trolls who invariably appeared whenever she streamed, the Slime Queen looked at the reason she had started streaming again after so long: the slimes. Unlike Squishy, they had no sense of self, moved only on instinct, and obeyed only her commands.
But lacking intelligence did not mean they simply sat still like dolls. They merely lacked the intelligence required to be chosen by the system; ordinary slimes still had roughly the intelligence of small animals.
The Slime Queen, who regularly gave them orders, had stopped responding. Even slimes with little intelligence could recognize that as strange. Since they could not see the system window, all they saw was the Slime Queen staring blankly into space. Had something happened to their leader?
Unconsciously worried about her, the slimes gathered around.
The Slime Queen could convey her wishes and issue commands to other slimes, and she could also sense strong impressions from her kin. Usually, those amounted to hunger or confusion over commands too complicated to understand. Finding that these slimes were now filled with “concern” for her could only surprise her.
'I was so focused on that fellow slime that I neglected all of you.'
Even if their intelligence was low, they were her subjects and kin, living in the same cave. Seeing them worry about her brought a smile to the Slime Queen's face.
And so, for the first time in several days, she began a slime-trick stream. Once she resumed giving her usual commands, the slimes' worries disappeared.
+++
'Deer! Meat!'
The slime's target had changed from rabbits to deer. As the saying went, adversity fueled determination, and it was even more enthusiastic than it had been when hunting rabbits. Because it had failed to catch a deer for four days!
Deer were no easy opponents. Approaching cautiously went well enough, but the trouble began when it slammed into them. Their greater size compared to rabbits was not the issue. The slime's Body Slam landed squarely on a deer's torso. The problem was durability.
Unlike rabbits, deer did not go down in one hit. Startled by the Body Slam, they simply ran away. Even when the slime tried to chase them, they moved too quickly for it to keep up.
The chat erupted in laughter again at its failed hunt. Then advice came its way.
▶So close lolol.
[Slam First Ask Later]▶Aim for a vital spot! Somewhere you can take it down in one hit!
Strike from somewhere the prey did not expect, aiming for a vital spot that could bring it down in a single blow. After following that advice for several days and going through repeated trial and error, the slime had now found the perfect opportunity.
Locate the deer and approach. Check the surrounding terrain. Without letting the deer notice, approach a nearby tree and slowly creep up its trunk. Finally, aim for the deer's head—and spring!
It launched a downward Body Slam.
Caught by the unexpected ambush, the deer's head was driven into the ground beneath the slime. The well-placed blow made its legs give out, and it collapsed with its head still pressed against the earth.
'Caught a deer!'
Just as the slime was about to bounce with joy at finally succeeding in its hunt, it heard the system's voice.
[Required experience threshold reached.]
[Evolution conditions fulfilled.]
[Multiple possible evolutions detected for the subject.]
[Please select the form you wish to evolve into.]
'Evolution?'
