episode_0012

Quietly, Lily inserted herself into Allen’s ordinary and repetitive daily life.

Although the gazes of the townspeople towards Allen, who was accompanied by Lily, were not kind, Allen paid no mind.

At least Allen knew that Lily had done nothing wrong.

“… Have you come to receive a commission today?”

“Please give me the usual request.”

“I understand.”

“… ”

Lily trembled slightly in Allen’s arms under the cold gaze of the receptionist.

As Allen gently stroked Lily’s head, the receptionist soon began to examine the commission brought in.

“A request for subjugating a giant slime.”

Among several requests, what caught Allen’s attention was the request to subjugate a giant slime.

When people hear “slime,” they might think of a weak monster that even ordinary people can handle.

However, the types of slimes were so diverse that there was no one who had perfectly classified them, and among them were extremely powerful slimes.

One of them was the giant slime.

Apart from its enormous size, it looked like an ordinary slime monster, but it was quite a challenging monster to deal with due to its various abilities.

“I will take on this request.”

“Are you really going to take on this request?”

“Yes.”

The receptionist looked at Allen suspiciously.

It was strange enough that he was accompanied by a demon-blooded girl, let alone accepting a request to subjugate a giant slime without any hesitation.

It didn’t seem like a sane decision, no matter how you looked at it.

“I understand.”

Since the mercenary guild’s job was only to arrange requests, the receptionist gladly handed the commission letter to Allen without taking any responsibility.

“What request did you receive?”

“This is the request.”

Allen handed the commission letter to Lily, who was curious.

When Lily looked at the commission letter without saying anything, just fidgeting her fingers, Allen realized belatedly.

“She doesn’t know how to read.”

“It’s a request to subjugate a giant slime.”

“A giant slime…?”

Only then did Lily look up at Allen with eyes full of interest, and Allen just smiled while stroking Lily’s head, promising to teach her how to read and write soon.

“What fruit is that?”

“That’s a fruit called wild strawberry.”

“Is it tasty?”

“Do you want to try it?”

On their way to the area where the giant slime appeared, Allen and Lily engaged in small talk.

For the girl who had lived in a small cage, the world she suddenly encountered was full of curiosity.

Whenever she didn’t know something, Lily asked Allen, who kindly answered her questions, resolving her curiosity.

“Lily, I have a question. Is it okay if I ask?”

“What are you curious about?”

“How old are you, Lily?”

While asking out of curiosity, Allen was cautious.

Among children who had lived a tough life, there were often those who didn’t even know their own age.

“I am 18 years old.”

“I see. Impressive… Huh?”

Relieved to know Lily’s age, Allen, who was stroking her head, could only freeze in place.

“Why are you like that?”

Surprised by Allen suddenly stopping in his tracks, Lily asked in confusion, but Allen, upon learning the shocking fact, just stared blankly at Lily.

“18 years old…?”

“Yes.”

Allen felt a dizzying vertigo as if his head was spinning.

No matter how much of a demon-blooded hybrid she was… to have that physique at 18 years old.

How slow must her growth have been for her to develop so slowly?

“Are you okay?”

“I’m fine.”

Although Allen wanted to say, “It’s not me but you who should be worried,” he swallowed his words again because it seemed like it would hurt Lily.

“Now, even if it’s from now on, will I grow a lot if I feed them…?”

Allen decided to actively utilize the knowledge from his past life.

Determined to feed Lily with “good foods for growing children,” Allen finally realized that he had arrived at the habitat of a giant slime.

“It looks like we’ve arrived.”

“Is this where that monster lives?”

“That’s right.”

As it was a dangerous area from here on, Allen asked Lily to stay in a safe place and then emptied his backpack to prepare for subduing the giant slime.

Thud, thud—

“What a quick arrival.”

Feeling the ground shake as if an earthquake had occurred, Allen noticed that the giant slime was approaching.

“Eek!”

Terrified by the disaster of the trembling ground, which she had never experienced before, Lily shrank back in fear.

Reassuring Lily, who was like that, Allen extended his hand and gradually revealed himself to the giant slime, throwing pieces of scrap metal at it.

Even though it was a special slime, its intelligence was no different from other slimes, so the giant slime, mistaking the thrown scrap metal for food, ate them one by one.

“… It seems to be changing slowly.”

With almost no more scrap metal brought from the village, Allen anxiously muttered.

Allen threw the last remaining scrap metal at the giant slime.

After eating the last scrap metal and shining briefly, the giant slime transformed into the form Allen desired.

Kyu-ing!

As the body of the giant slime transformed into a metallic form, Allen immediately drew his sword and struck the slime.

Clang—

Despite being made of metal, the giant slime, which easily collapsed like a paper doll, couldn’t even utter a final word and fell.

“Now it’s okay, even at this point.”

“Wow…! How did you catch it?”

As the giant slime fell, Lily rushed to Allen and clung to him to satisfy her curiosity.

“For now, calm down. I’ll explain.”

“Yes.”

Looking up at Allen with eyes still full of curiosity, he began to explain slowly.

“Giant slimes have the ability to change their form depending on what they absorb. If they absorb fire, they become like fire, and if they absorb lightning, they become like lightning. So what happens when they eat metal?”

“They turn into metal!”

“That’s right. You’re smart. Of course, there are many other abilities as well, like splitting.”

“But that slime didn’t split?”

Lily asked, puzzled.

Allen stroked Lily’s head and spoke.

“A slime that has taken on the form of metal cannot split.”

“So that’s why you fed it metal?”

“That’s right. Of course, whether it transforms or not is up to the whim of the slime.”

“It’s fascinating. Even though it has the ability to split, it can’t do so in a metal state.”

“That’s a fact that most people don’t know.”

There are various types of slimes in the world.

While they often share basic characteristics, slimes that transform their bodies by absorbing substances are not very common.

In Allen’s mind, there was knowledge about hundreds of types of slimes, but among them, only three had the ability to transform his body.

Even more than 95% of slime species were so weak that people did not bother to figure out how to defeat them.

They were just monsters that fell down easily with a decent sword swing.

Thanks to this, Allen was able to easily hunt down super giant slimes and earn hefty rewards.

As a member of the hero party who had faced countless monsters, Allen used common sense and knowledge.

“Amazing!”

“Thank you.”

Having obtained the core of the super giant slime, Allen tried to take steps back to the village with Lily.

“Why are you doing that?”

Seeing Lily innocently asking him, Allen hesitated for a moment.

Although he was slowly getting closer to Lily, Allen wanted to get even closer. He thought about suggesting to Lily to call him by his name, but he couldn’t easily bring himself to say it.

“Well…”

After hesitating for a long time, Allen seemed frustrated. Lily, seeing this, walked up to him and grabbed his hand.

“Let’s go quickly, mister.”

Seeing Lily calling him by a friendly title for the first time, Allen genuinely smiled after a long time.

Holding hands like that, the two headed towards the village.

“The title ‘mister’ isn’t bad either… but I’m still a young man at the age of 28, so it feels a bit awkward.”

“Mister.”

“… ”

Allen felt dejected.