Duty Session 79: Is It Wrong to Pick Up Slimes in a Dungeon?

It isn't uncommon to see slime-type monsters wherever you go in the world, especially in those areas closest to human civilization. Where humans and slimes interact, there is bound to be trouble. In this case, the landers seem to be complaining about stoppages in their water supply. Sludge being brought up from the local well that seems far too colorful to be normal.

Mikage seems to have taken on the task of answering the call, sending out an alert to various nearby adventurers to see if anyone else is willing to join her in a descent into the sewers. The ranger is standing near the well, looking down, listening to the sounds of 'bloop', 'bloop' as something moves beneath.

"This will be interesting." She murmurs. "I hope we get some kind of hazard pay for going down there." The Were Fang tugs on the rope that descends into the darkness below, waiting for the others.

Cyrus sets his cart aside and ropes it to a wooden fence. If someone wanted to take it, nothing much he could really do about it. "You know, Sewer Levels are why I really don't like this whole 'all your senses' thing. Back in the old console days, you didn't have to smell the sewer." He crinkles his nose a bit as he then grabs another longer rope, and begins lowering it down the well, and secures it alongside the first one.

"But I suppose the pay ought to be good. Maybe if I keep working on these quests like this, I'll get out of the Porcelain rank of the Hunters Guild." Cyrus points out. He tugs on the rope, and then moves to sit on the edge of the well. "Two ropes, in case one of them fails." He explains. "And it can make for a faster retreat."

With that said, he begins to climb on down.

When folk arrive down in the sewers, he touches his hand to his forehead. "Cyrus Frost. Astrologian - Alchemist." He explains.

    SLIMES.

    Again.

    Again.

    Why do so many slimes need to be cleared out? Then again, with the sheer number of porings on Aincrad isle, they must be coming from somewhere, right?

    "Our hazard pay is the item the boss drops." Mizuki replies, a bit glumly. She's done this dungeon twice and been slimed twice. SHE KNOWS WHERE THIS IS GOING. She's in her human form for once; small but not smol at an inch over five feet, and wearing the combination of a night-sky-dark purple gi and cavalier boots; mixing these armor sets isn't a good look but she wants to keep dry if she can; if the water gets too tall for the boots oh well.

    "Good idea!" she nods to Cyrus at the two ropes, and follows after him. "The slimes seem to mostly be pretty easy, but so far there's always been some surprise or other..." When he introduces himself, she extends a hand to shake. "Mizuki. Ninja."

More Slimes? Oh god why did it have to be more Slimes? She'd got off lucky the last time.

"Slimes again..."

Gwen for once does not look very happy about this at all.

"Porings I swear to god they are collecting material to make a canon to blow up Yamato."

Gwenmuttersbut as she fallsin with the rest of the group.

"Gwen Pendragon Holy Knight."

Hater of slimes too, she's also mumbling about various D&D slime monsters as well.

Slime monsters were never really Kirito's cup of tea. He preferred bandits and wolf-beasts, but anything for the XP right?

So, Kirito is in this ragtag group of adventurers, blades ready and skills just waiting to be unleashed. "Should be." Kirito replies to Mikage.

To Cyrus, as he arrives also, is given a subtle nod. "Kirito. Bladedancer." he tells him and, by extension, the group. All the same, Krito remains silent and offers nothing else by way of assistance or planning, and continues his descent.

    The rhythmic tap of staff against the cobblestone announces the approaching of a young Spriggan in an outfit that looks something halfway between a martial artist's gi and a nurse's uniform. She's focusing on a piece of parchment.

    Upon reaching the entrance to the sewers, she looks up from the item she's carrying. "Oh boy, oh boy, oh boy! This is the place of the appointment." She claps her hand together, rubs them excitedly, cracks her knuckles, and rotatest her neck, hands on her hips. "I can't believe I'm doing this!". The sheet placed back in her inventory, she climbs down the stairs.

    "Slimes! Slimes! Slimes! My first time with slimes! Hooray!"

    She jumps down the last few steps, and with a big smile, she exclaims, "Uta Furore, Musical Kung-Fu Nurse, Aerialist, Owner of Exactly One Outfit and now Regretting Skipping Those Last Steps And Splashing Straight Into the Gunk!"

With everyone else offering their introductions, Mikage bows in a fashion that looks very stereotypically Japanese. "Mikage. Ranger." It seems like they have a decent variety amongst this little adventuring party. Once that is out of the way, she takes the rope, giving a nod to Cyrus. "Those of you who've encountered these before, any suggestions would be helpful. Better to go in with some knowledge than to wander blind."

Then, she descends into the well...

Rather than water, the group steps down into colorful sludge at the bottom of the well. It makes for sloppy traveling. As they head down into the tunnels, the sound of something unearthly lingers in the air.

That is when a strange slime seems to clip through the wall, floating across their path. First one, then many. Whisperings. Ghostly slimes which seem to be all but blocking their way forward, seemingly drawn by a skeleton that is placed up against one side of the passageway.

Cyrus never played Sword Art Online, so he fails to recognize Kirito from that. But when looking at the Bladedancer, he notes; "Oh hey, you were part of the First Floor Boss raid a few days back, I think? Right?" A glance to Gwen. "Oh, miss Gwen. Same to you - and Mizuki. Wow... got some famous people here all of the sudden to beat up some slimes." The Snow Leopard Cait Sith seems rather bemused at this.

"How was it? Was it that red Kobold again, Illfang? I heard there was some kind of blue thing this time." He tugs on the rope as he finishes descending to make sure it remains solid, and waits for everyone to finish coming down.

"Sorry, I'm not too versed in sewer missions about slimes. They were usually rats when I dealt with them back in the day." He comments and grabs his tail to keep it out of the water. "Ugh, this is going to be hell to get out of my fur..." He groans, before... "Oh geez! They're coming out of the walls."

He quickly grabs a pack of what look like cards. "Bought this off of some supersticious Lander. Let's see if these work... ehmmm... Begone, evil spirits!" He throws the paper at the walls, in an attempt to scare off the ghosts. "Begone!"

    Mizuki nods to the others as they introduce themselves and offers handshakes all around. Although she gives Uta a concerned look. "You're... eager to fight a bunch of slimes? I guess poporings do have a decent chance of dropping potion ingredients, huh." Uta is going to make more antidote potions than anyone will ever need, clearly. She blinks at Cyrus. "I'm... famous?" She smiles a bit and nods, "Yeah, there was a giant red kobold and blue kobold."

    "Back in RO, the culvert was full of poporings and dire flies I think. Usually we run into a horde of poporings early on, but beyond that we've seen all kinds of weird slimes." Once in the tunnel though, it's... not poporings this time! It's... ghost slimes! "Okay, that's new." Mizuki comments. As the whisperings approach, she opens her mouth and exhales at them.

    Oh right, she's not in beast form. Before she can switch or finish magic casting, she gets swarmed! "Aah!"

    "Mizuki! Gwen! So nice to see you!" To Kirito: "Hey, you're the guy from the duel with Zekken, right? I was there! Great show, it was amazing! Hi Cyrus! We've never met before, but I hope we'll be friends!" She offers everyone a bow, and Mizuki a reply: "Slimes are the most adorable creatures ever. Tried to pet them once, got hurt, but Yuuki told me I should never give up and continue following my dreams." She begins pivoting on one foot to face the other way. "One day I'm gonna have a slimarium, you know? And it's gonna be /glorious/!"

    When she's done turning around, she takes in the scene... and frowns. "Hey. These slimes are not good slimes. They're... dead slimes." She rubs her chin in realization. "...so, is this what happens? When slimes die, like goldfish, people flush them down the drain, and they end up in the sewers as ghost slimes? I had never thought of that... so... does it mean that, back home, sewer maintenance companies have to order shinto protection charms against goldfish ghosts? My goodnes, there's so much wonder in the world, if one only stops, looks and thinks..."

    When the going starts getting worrisome, she goes all business, closes her eyes, and with an intense expression, clasps her staff. She intones a crystalline melody, and with each note, a different section of her staff lights up in a different color, painting the melody in chromatic light along the length of the item. When she's done, the light travels all the way up, to the upper tip, and as her eyes open again, the lump at the top lights up.


    "Begone, spirits!"

    Hey, if the more experienced player says it, it must be a good thing to say.

Gwen looks at Uta. "I'm going to fix that later Uta!"

Gwen seems a little happier with the diversion from Uta. Yet now there's a new type of slime. These are not simple porings. No there are Ghostly slimes. Gwen makes a face, she does not seem very happy. She will close her eye star to chant a spell sending a burst of holy magic at the inbound slimes.

"Yeah don't let them fool you. Oh, Kirito? Been a while."

"My response to slimes is generally /fire/."

She looks at Uta for a moment
R "Think about the old roman sewer systems in Europe, raid dungeons, my friend."

"Mention the gold Thief Bug around my parents and the reaction is priceless."

She notes to Mizuki.

As Cyrus throws strange marked paper against the wall, one of the Whisperings seems to float right up to it as if looking at it. Then, it floats into the wall and when it comes back out again, it has the little purification scroll attached to it's head, clearly not effected by this Lander magic.

Mizuki faces a similar result, trying to magically banish the ghostly creatures. They seem to find her interesting, a few floating in a circle around her. They don't seem to actually damage hitpoints as one might suspect, but they do apply a debuff which seems to slowly drain mana.

Uta has better luck with banishing the spirits. They seem to withdraw slightly from the light around her, some of them vanishing back into the walls. A few more seem to sputter into pixels from Gwen's magic. Mikage seems to follow suit with Uta, channeling light magic through her sword. Together, the three seem to finally banish back the Whisperings, leaving the way open further into the sewers.

    Oh right, Uta wants to make a slime zoo. Mizuki hopes she's kidding about the goldfish ghosts, though. She's kidding, right? She's got to be.

    Mizuki runs away from the whisperings. "My mana! I need that!" But eventually the ghostly slimes are banished and they can move on.

    When she hears the squeaking, Mizuki looks hopeful. When a tabby slime bounces into sight, she throws up her hands. "Yes!" She looks to Uta. "THESE are what you need to capture! Not just for your zoo either, they'd make adorable pets!"

The Snow Leopard Cait Sith continues to listen to Uta as she rapid-fires her greetings, and sneaks in a 'Let's be friends'. "Hahaha. Ah." The youth seems amused. "Quite the excitable one hmm? Nice to meet you again, Uta." He remarks before noticing that... the papers, they do nothing.

"Ah man." He touches his hand to his forehead. "I got ripped off!" As if to prove this point, the Whispering goes in and out of the wall, and now has the paper attached to it. "Oh come on! It's supposed to ward you off, not give you a cool looking hat!" Cyrus complains. Luckily, the rest of the team is having better luck with this. Some of the ghostly slimes being banished and defeated.

"Should know better than to rely on a shady Spriggan dealer just off of the Ezzo boat I suppose." Cyrus remarks, rubbing the back of his head.

The party moves on in order to get to the next area, and it isn't long before they come upon...

"Oh geez..." Cyrus is horrified. "These slimes ate Felins! Poor kitties!" Capture them?

"Ehm... a-alright." He grabs a bottle, and immediately throws what looks like a giant glob of glue-in-a-bottle at the monsters, which shatter and tries to tack them down.

"You should be more careful, buying charms from shady characters." Mikage chuckles at Cyrus' consternation. So far, the slimes have seemed mostly harmless. Then again, that is exactly the sort of thing that would lead someone into finding something horrible. But, as they continue, they find ... cats.

"Aww, they're cute." The ranger has a soft spot for cats. "Wait... how do you know they ate Felins?" She asks, looking confused. "You know what, I'm going to leave them to their lunch."

So, Miki decides to take a careful path between the slimes, hopping from foot to foot in order to avoid them and leave them to their hunting. She has no interest in fighting them.

"What in the world are you going to do with one even if you catch it?" She asks, looking at the glue-covered slime.

    Uta replies to Gwen, "...oh, sorry, did not mean to sound pushy. Take your time with that! ALL the time you need! don't worry, I can wash this one as soon as I have access to clean water and my menu! ...and what is the gold thief bug?"

    Then there is the slime being adorable around the ward. Reaction:

    ( ._.) -> ( o_o)

    And then, just as if it was Intertubes Cleaning Day, Cat Slimes are all over the place, as if they were coming out of every pipe.

    ( o_o) -> ( O_O)

    "...I don't have monster-capturing skills..." Uta squeals back to Mizuki in a mixture of joy and regret. "But Emiko promised to help. I'm definitely gonna hit her up on this."

    Transfixed, she walks towards the slimes, and- TRIES TO PET ONE.

    "Hey! /I'm/ a Spriggan!", protests Uta, luckily switching her attention away from the petting.

    And then, after a pause, she slaps her face. "Oh goodness no. I mean, sorry. My character is. This game is messing with my head, I don't know what to think anymore! I... I..."

    ...she goes back to trying to pet the kitty-slime.

Gwen looks over to Cyrus for a moment then grins

"Uta's good people."

She looks at Cyurys for a moment she looks at kitty slimes. She has run into such things before, thankfully they are just cute enough? Gwen only tries to drive them off with several controlled water spells. Rather than just going in as an angry Holy Knight, so she'll just and up pressing on wondering just what might br witing for them.

"You are the onewhohit random. You have pointy ears and wings friend Im just saying just be Uta, like I chosen to just be Gwen."

    "Well, they didn't necessarily eat them." Mizuki comments. A basic overview of local monster types is one of the few bits of lore she bothered to read in the days leading up to the Apocalypse. "They-- you know what, never mind. Anyway, if we capture some, maybe we can tame them?"

    As she approaches the area the slimes are pouncing through, she starts performing hand seals that allow her to spray water at the slimes. "Don't worry, they hate water. Back, kitty, back!" It works at first, the slimes hissing and bouncing away, but this time one of them pounces her instead, latching onto her arm with its cute little mouth!

    "Aah! ow!" Mizuki's arm jerks mid-casting, messing up the seal and allowing another nearby slime to pounce her, and another, until she's being swarmed! She flails and goes down under the pile of slimes, transforming into were fang mode so she can try to claw and bite them, but it's too little too late. "Get 'em off me! Don't let them make Mizuki slimes!" Getting eaten by adorable cat slimes is a way to die that she'd never live down!

    Cyrus's glue sticks a number of tabby slimes to the ground, preventing them from harassing anyone and potentially allowing someone to collect them! Mikage sneaks by without incident. Uta approaches a slime. It hisses at her like an angry cat, then bites her hand! Just like what happened to Mizuki last time.

    Fortunately, Gwen is ready with water magic to blast the slimes off Mizuki and Uta (unless Uta feels like carrying an attached tabby slime through the rest of the dungeon, anyway) so that they can proceed.

    Mizuki sits up, then kips up to her feet. "Thanks again, Gwen. That woulda been the dumbest way to die. Well... A pretty embarassing way, anyway."

    Echoing of steps against the stone wall is the soundtrack of this passage, slightly darker than the rest. Uta is leading the way with her luminous staff tip, making sure that it is the first thing to turn corners in case anything tries to attack, and when three or four seconds pass without anything trying to bite her weapon's head off, she carefully follow suit, gesturing for the others to come along.

    The action is particularly obvious because her beckoning hand still has a kitty slime clinging to it. Hey, on the plus side, it flashes red every few seconds, with a corresponding wince from the Spriggan. And, luckily, Uta can regenerate damage at just the right rate that this is not much of an issue...

    Gwen's words get a quizzical look. "...I'm not sure I could just 'be Uta', to be honest."

    After the last corner, the staff is not the most lumious thing: the team has reached a sort of central collection area, with a deeper well of water in the center. Relatively clean, so it must be part of the clean water feed rather than the sewer.

    But that is not the interesting part.

    The place is aglow with magic, there are even runes on the wall. And the place is teeming by slimes in adorable mage hats which come in various colors.

    Uta's voice is barely a whispered squeal, most of it caught in her throat by sheer emotion: "...oh my goodness we've found Slime Hogwarts..."

    She is paralyzed, unable to breath, staring at the slimes floating around and shooting magic at one another or off into the darkness. All she can squeal, with an even higher pitch and lower volume than before is, "...they're playing Slime Quiddich..."

"I mean, roughly a tenth of this region is Spriggan." The Snow Leopard remarks. "I'm just saying, it almost feels like we're dealing with Khajit. Love 'em, but darned if it isn't annoying when they prove the stereotype." Cyrus explains to Uta.

He then looks to Mikage. "Ehmm, it's the Slime lore I got told by the Landers before this mission. They eat things and turn into those things... I think is how it works? Or was it just that they had to live near those areas?" The youth rubs the back of his head. "I could have sworn it was eating." He remarks as he tries to find a few more potions on him as they move on and encounter... slimes!

Of course they're slimes.

Suddenly, one of them throws a firebolt, which singes his fail! "OW! Hey! I was expecting to get sewer dreck all over myself. Not to get roasted." Noticing those runes on the walls, he quickly runs up to them, thinking they might be access to another secret door to get out... (They're not.)

He gives up after a little while, and resorts to instead throwing some healing potions at people.

"Was this the same Lander that sold you those charms?" Mikage might just be starting to think that Cyrus is a little naive. "Not that I have monster lore as one of my skills, so I couldn't tell you one way or the other."

Then, of course, she ends up looking over at Uta. "Slime... Quidditch?" It's as if she's trying to figure out what Uta is seeing that she isn't. Her head tilts, looking more than a little confused. Then, to Cyrus, she asks, "Did these ones eat mages?" The idea doesn't seem to hold up in every case.

"I'll see if I can close a few in together and make them easier to take out." She raises her sword horizontally, runs her palm along the flat of the blade, causing it to glow with magical energies. The water beneath the slimes seems to frost over, then spear up from the pool, forming a sort of cage around the slimes.

    Cyrus quips about Khajiit. "Hey!" Mizuki objects, "I may be a Thief, but I only steal from bad guys! Also, I'd never touch skooma!"

    She looks to Gwen. "How can I 'just be Mizuki'? I remember being someone else for over 27 years! Well, okay, I don't really remember the first few, but still! And without reading books and playing videogames as a kid in the real world, I might not want to pretend to be a fantasy adventurer in the first place."

    She briefly points at Gwen. "You know, are you any different? Your parents are in here too, but are they Gwen's parents? Would you have the same relationship if they didn't raise you?"

    This line of thought has her somewhat grumpy, so it's a pleasant distraction when they come to a room of WIZARD SLIMES. "Keep 'em busy, those of us who can read the runes help solve the puzzle!" She runs around the room channeling bits of magic into the runes, searching for the right ones to activate attacks on the slimes!

Gwen says "Kitty slime pets? That could sell really well."

She laughs for a moment

"You'd be a cute slime girl Mizuki!"

She says this wile getting the slimes off Mikage with water magic. She notes to Uta.

"Just be yourself then?"

"Oh dear I run into these before and Harry Potter? Never thought of it that way before."

She does not move to fight, no she goes to str using the runes, she's seen this set up before.

"Well I do have coin.."

She keeps working on the runes herself as she has done this thing before.

    Uta blinks at Cyrus and asks, "...what's a Khajit?"

    The firebolt reaches Cyrus and lights him up where it impacts, to signify damage. In fact, the fire lingers, and it might need some explicit patting down (or immersion in water) in order to be extinguished.

    The magical slimes must be attuned with the Arcane Powers, because as Mikage's sword barely begins to glow, long before her spell is completed, they dart away in a frenzy, departing radially to escape the cage being created...No! They're making it! They're escap-

    SLAM!

    Just BARELY in time, the ice bars connect with the ceiling of the chamber, holding most of the slimes in place. Some of them even slam into the bars, sending their adorable wizard hats flying towards our adventurers.

    "...who's Skooma?", asks Uta.

    Ten or twelve slimes make it to where the adventurers are, but Uta's martial arts training leaves her well prepared to deal with the situation. A leap in the air, a flip, dodging left, right, spinning and tumbling while a bunch of what, based on the color of their hats, must be Hufflepuff slimes, zip by too close for comfort; she leaps, plants her foot against the wall and does a backflip to dodge the Ravenclaws, missing them by a hair's breadth, followed by a perfect landing.

    The slimes that flew past are now heading straight for Mizuki and Gwen, but thanks to their decoding of the runes, the symbols start bloing blasts of colorful energy towards the incoming slimes, like laser disco lights. Gwen's are regular and to-the-point, while Gwen's...

    ...Gwen's pretty much proceed at breakneck speed, accelerating, so that the last slime is zapped when it's still far, far away from them. Level clear!

    "ANYWAY!", exclaims Uta, and lifts her kitten-mitten-slime-clad-hand from earlier to call the attention of her fellow adventurers, hand which glows red for a moment. Wince. "Time to move on... follow me!" she exclaims, and makes a beckoning motion with her other hand, newly clad in a wizard-slime mitten.

    Magic glow. Wince. Tears of joy in the eyes, pained smile.

Gwen is trying to keep to the lead being a tank and it's a good thing she does as they leave the magical slims behind? Something more akin what Gwen thinks of when it comes to slimes make itself known. A massive black slime of some sort.

"I knew there was something like this down here! I KNEW IT. Damn it if we had a New York plumber along..."

She redies herself as she looks at the Black Flan she will charge on in as Tanks are wont to do.

"ANCHOR HOWL!"

She's so going to need a bath after this and the smell makes her want to almost throw up. She bites that down.

"ANCHOR HOWL!" R
Bright green lie bleeds form Gwen as she gets up in the Ooze' grill even as it starts to lash out at the party trying to grab everyone from Uta to Mizuki in its foul clutches this isn't a happy fun slime at all here.

Worse several of it's 'limbs' go after both Uta and Mikage even after that.

"I... don't know. Maybe they raided a mage's closet?" Cyrus offers to Mikage, rubbing the back of his head. "Yeah, it was the same Spriggan. Ugh." The youth moves along with the rest of them, shaking his head. "I'm not used to Landers lying to me like that. They didn't used to do that. Or... did they, and I never caught on?" It's all so confusing.

He then looks to Mizuki. "You're not a Khajit though... are you?" He squints his eyes. "... though that does make me wonder if there are drugs in this world people would end up using. I know people were saying you can get Drunk post-Apocalypse. That wasn't a thing in the past."

To Uta; "It's a race from this American game called 'Elder Scrolls - Morrowind'. They are known for having this drug called Skooma." Cyrus explains, having put out his tail earlier after the firebolt hitting him.

The crew moves on to the next region. "If we keep running into slimes like this, we'll never make our way out. Does anyone remember what the last goal wassss..." His voice trails off, spotting what awaits them.

He quickly grabs two of his potion bottles. "Incoming tendrils. I'll freeze them!" Cyrus calls out, throwing the bottles in either directions of the flan and shattering on the ground right beneath the tendrils, creating two 'towers' of ice that rapidly freeze the limbs of the ooze. "I'll keep you all healed up!"

Potion grab, throw at someone's head.

    You'd be a cute slime girl! "Ehhhhhhhhh..." Mizuki shivers. Although, come to think of it, with how she's been behaving, if she'd been stuck as a slime instead she'd probably be taking advantage of whatever benefits THAT offers, just as she has the cat ones. Still, that's not how it works; she was implying that if they ate her (or... eugh...) they'd become Mizuki slimes.

    Once they're past the wizard challenge, Mizuki exposits to Uta, "They're a species of cat-people--" she points at herself, "more like this than the cait sith -- well sometimes, it's complicated -- that are stereotyped as thieves and drug addicts. Skooma's a fictional drug, I think it's supposed to be like opium or something."

    Then she notices Uta has not one, but two slimes on her hands. Her tail bristles. "Uta! It's still on you!" Then she realizes, "...You're actually going to try to carry them out of the dungeon that way? But how will you do anything without your--"

    Mizuki sniffs, and wrinkles her nose before the others smell it. "Oh no." She whines, "It's the poop slime again..." She transforms back to human so she doesn't have to smell it as strongly.

    As they enter the monster's room, Gwen starts tanking immediately! "Yeah! just like the boss last night!" With the pseudopods' attention on Gwen / being frozen by Cyrus, she's free to start casting! She motormouths the incantation, since she's practiced it: "Angryspiritsoftheworldstrikenow!"

    Mizuki holds out both hands towards the slime, palms out. "JUPITEEEEL THUUUNDEEEEEEEER!"

    Just like before, a sphere of lightning forms in the monster's space and repeatedly zaps it with a THWACKing sound that sounds more like a physical impact!

"I don't want to know what this one ate!" Mikage shouts as gooey arms start coming her direction. Nope. She isn't really about to let Cyrus live down the whole idea that slimes are made from eating whatever thing they represent.

She dodges one of the incoming sludgy tendrils, putting a hand over her nose in the process. The stench here is not pleasant. "The smell is bad enough, I am /not/ letting that thing touch me."

Instead, Mikage summons air magic around her, seemingly without the focus of her sword. She uses it to send herself up out of the water. A small tornado holds her up there for a split second as she forces a torrent of air against the slime, knocking it again and again into Mizuki's Jupitel Thunder.

Then, of course, she ends up splashing back down into the muck, likely splattering poor Cyrus in the process. Oops.

"This one is an Flan type, not a Slime. They're different." Cyrus answers Mikage, at least able to tell the difference there. "So I don't think that rule would apply to this type."

Followed by being splattered by Mikage. He wipes his face from the dreck. "Eww... it's all in my fur." He groans, his longer fur pieces hanging down.

    Uta, green in the face and brown in the clothes, teeters and wobbles, displaying the occasional gag reflex as her cheeks bulge.

    "...You know, I can make potions," she manages to start, at Cyrus and Mizuki, "...I'm not sure it's /ethical/, but do you see any reason why someone with a medical profession shouldn't be able to produce such substances in-game?"

    "...See, Gwen?" she says, pointing her thumb at Cyrus. "Is that what you meant? I should play into the stereotype of the untrustworthy, lyin', cheatin' undependable scoundrel?"

    Uta goes even greener in the face, almost loses her balance and has to steady herself as she makes a suspicious sound. "...I don't even want to /think/ about what this one ate, Mikage! I think... I think I'm going to..."

    *ankle-grab*"EEEEEEEEEEE!!!!"

    With the sudden jerk, the two slimes are abruptly disloged from Uta's hands. "Noooo! Mizuki Jr! Neville Blobbottom! Don't leave me now!!!"

Crys is one of the first to act against the Black Ooze, okay Black Flan. His attack isn't a bad idea, it's a very good one given how much water is in slime? He'll end up freezing a good portion of the bet giving others a time to make attacks that might take a bit more time.

"It's more like crack from what I saw of it."

Meanwhile Mizuki now zap the hell out of the thing with a lighting spell which is clearly hurting it did the thing scream? There's naos also the smell of Ozone from that attack as Mikage let lose a focused air attack which sends it back into Mizuki's spell and well the smell? Let's not think about the smell too late the smell now is somehow worse it smells /cooked/ on top of everything else.

"No that's not what ... HEY LET HER GO!"

Gwen will counter-attack the tendrils that grabbed Uta and cuts through them. Even as this goes ton the thunder tornado bring an end to the horrible monster. Yet what else awaits everyone, Gwen will go to lend Uta a hand if she needs it.

"Hey you okay, Uta?"

"Everyone alright?" Cyrus asks, turning to look at everyone else. Gwen manages to get Uta released. Good, because Cyrus doesn't have any really great weapons to cut things down. He relies on his potions, simulating a lot of magic spells. But cutting things isn't exactly his strongpoint.

"I don't recommend we get into the habit of making drugs. I don't think the New World Alliance would appreciate that reputation being put on our heads. Though." Pause. "Oh wait, you're Olympus Alliance right. I guess your policies would be a bit 'broader' than that." He proposes.

"Alright, let's move on." Cyrus doesn't take the lead, he's not a tank. He tops people off with a few potions. "So far, things have gone pretty smoothly. If we just turn this corner, we..."

A sudden blue lightning casts across the waters. "Quick, out of the water!" As it threatens to electricute them. The visage of a large thing stalking the tunnels. "What!? No way, there can't be dragons here! We are so not ready to deal with a..."

It comes around the corner. More horse-sized than anything, the light just made the shadows look so much bigger. With dripping wings and gooey body, the Slime Drake comes around the corner, letting out a wibbly roar and then tries to lightning people again with a sudden breath from its gummy mouth!

Cyrus quickly gets up on the upper area of the Sewer, and throws a potion right next to the blue Drake slime, causing a big fire to suddenly spread, and engulf the area, restricting its movement. "It should have less ability to chase us like this!" He calls out.

"Slime, ooze, flan, what the heck is the difference, anyways?" Mikage complains, wiping some of the disgustingly tainted water out of her face. Seeing how upset Cyrus is about being splattered though, she can't help but make sure to splash in his direction before carrying on forward. He was taking the lead, he might not notice.

The strangely draconic looking slime has her looking at it with some measure of wonder, though that lasts only as long as it takes to have to dodge out of the way of lightning. "Let me see if I can get a good shot off on it. Keep it contained!"

She extends one arm, the blade of her sword replaced with magical energies being channeled into the hilt. It extends from both sides, forming into a sort of energy bow. Reaching back, she mimes plucking from a quiver, despite the fact that she doesn't have one. Even so, as she moves, the light forms into one as she sets it into place.

With the others fighting, she takes careful aim, making sure to look for just the right shot before loosing it. The arrow soars, before making a disturbing sort of sound as it impacts the drake. Normally, piercing weapons don't do much against slimes, but it seems that this one might just explode upon impact... inside the slime's chest.

    Uta, sitting down in the brown gunk and still rubbing the large spot glowing red on her head, the one she fell on, says, "...I think I need something for my upset stomach, but otherwise I think I'm fine. Ow." Luckily pain in game is appropriately dampened, and the fall doesn't produce the same disasterous effects it would have in real life. "I suppose you did not mean it like that, Gwen, but let's be honest here: if I were to embrace what the random generator gave me, well, I'd have to lean into the inherent darkness the race with itself, and can you picture me being all- What in Hades is /that/!", she exclaims, jumping to her feet, and back a few paces.

    She narrow her eyes at the drake-like creature. "...Slime Hagrid. You son of a..."

    She dodges off to one side, grabbing her staff that she had temporarily somehow slung behind her back (does she have a secret staff strap there? Does she... hold it where her wings connect to her back?), in a pose of readiness, weapon held in both hands. She begins chanting a deep, dark, ominous tune, which causes her staff to... do the opposite of glowing: going completely dark in spots, the spots following the oppressive melody.

    What, at first, seems to be just a trick of the light where her outline is not as well defined, an aura of darknes soon coalesces around her, in black and purple tendrils, oozing out of every part of her body; the temperature around her dropping a few degree. Her silhouette a terrifying black mass, her hair fluttering in a dry, icy wind which is not actually there, "I. Have. Had. Enough. Of. YOU," Uta's voice, cold, cutting, growling menacingly spats out at the creature, and with a circular rotation of her hands, a yell, a foot slammed on the ground as she falls forward and a flick of her wings, the writhing mass of darkness, now coalesced around her in the shape and size of a hamsterball scaled up to human proportions,SHOOTS towards the drakeslime.

    Now devoid of Darkness, she turns to Gwen, "Sorry, I kind of got distracted a moment there. What were we saying?"

    Mizuki just gives Uta a confused look. Why would she want to make drugs? "No! Don't be a scoundrel, Uta!" She watches Mizuki Jr. and Neville Blobbottom get washed away by filth, then helps Uta up. "It's alright. I'm sure you'll find a way to capture some eventually."

    When they enter the Lair of the Slime Drake, Mizuki rezzes her cloak and hat; she uses the cloak for cover when it opens its mouth!

    "AGH!" On the plus side, she is mostly not slimed! On the minus side, ow, lightning hurts! While it prepares for its next move, she makes the hand seals for stoneskin, covering herself in stony armor. Then she runs around the chamber, trying to stay behind it and spitting fireballs and throwing knives at the boss! When it does turn to face her, she huddles behind her cloak again and hopes stoneskin can tank it!

    And when Uta uses that spell, she cheers! "Way to go! That was a pretty cool spell for someone who's never even been in a dungeon!"

Gwen looks to Uta as her friend gets back up.

"Okay well you are ... damn, I'm not putting it into words well. We can talk later about this."

She'll fall in once more with the rest of the party as they head deeper in.

"Yeah I'd avoid the drugs myself... A slime dragon? REALLY!?"

Gwen scrambles out of the water as she does this she'll end up moving to interpose herself between the attack with her shield trying to use herself as living cover for her friends.

Splash splash. His poor tail becomes a mess thanks to Mikage's way she's walking right behind the Cait Sith.

"Nice shot, Miki!" Cyrus calls out, using that nickname purely by instinct. "That technique is quickly becoming your signature move." He declares, grinning at the arrow carving right through its slime body, and shattering a piece of its Slime Core. *GLOOP*

"Flans are the the physical resistant ones, and usually are just elemental. Though there's always exceptions to the rule. They are bigger magic casters than the Slimes. Mostly, it's just the way they look. I admit, I don't /really/ get it." Cyrus admits.

He's about to say something else, but he's struck silent as Uta suddenly gets a deadly aura about her befitting the Spriggans of old. The youth's entire face drows in a dark visage as Uta seems to detect a slime that /isn't cute/ and just starts wailing on it with her magic. He raises his hand. "H, hey, Uta..." The Darkball slamming into the creature and ripping away some of the slime.

Luckily, Dark-Uta stops being a thing a moment later, and the youth breathes a sigh of relief. Mizuki's throwing knives sink into the slime, but then droop out. The flames of that fire spell are more effective, further burning away at its body to expose its core... another series of attacks from everyone, as Gwen moves in to shield the team from the slime drake.

Until finally, the core properly breaks, and the slime's body disintegrates... leaving behind the remnant of what the Slime had eaten to become a being such as this. A series of talons.

"Nice! I think that should serve as good proof that we cleared this place out, along with its core." Cyrus calls out.

    The slime drake FREAKING EXPLODES but Mizuki's ready for it, hiding under her cloak! Once the danger of getting covered in slime is past, she derezzes the hat and cloak. "Ha HA! I did it!" she pumps her fists in victory! "Not this time, slime!" Well. The end of her hair is still slimed, and she was touched by the tabby slimes, and stepped in icky water, but on the whole it's less unpleasant than having slime clinging to her all over her body so it counts as a win!

    Uta gives her staff an expert twirl, and slides it behind her back. "Aaaaand, cut cool hero pos-"

    *** SPLORTCH ***

    Uta, drenched in slime from head to toes, just stares ahead, unblinking.

    She looks down at herself. She turns to look at Mizuki. "Smart girl." And back to looking down at herself she goes.

    "Oh, hey. Free potion ingredients, I guess? I'll have to see if these can be used for anything."

    She then turns to Gwen, "Ok, sure, I'm up for discussing this!"

    She blushes a little, hand behind her head, "...thanks Mikage, your arrow was pretty impressive as well. Remind me to sign up for a life insurance before I take up your offer to spar against you." She turns to Cyrus, "Say, Cyrus, do you have a good insurance agent to recomm-"

    Flashback to the slime wearing the ward as a festive hat and other such purchase-related disappointments. "...On second thought, Cyrus, nevermind." She appears to remember something, and asks, "Oh, by the way, did you call me earlier?"

"I am afraid the only Insurance agent I know is the church." Cyrus answers. At the ask of him having called her earlier, he just raises his hands and shakes his head. "Ummm, no. That wasn't me." He glances away nervously. Nega-Uta is scary.