My mission was to swallow everything in the room without being caught by the owner, but first, I had to deal with the man himself.
...Actually, if I started eating the contents of these material shelves, wouldn't he notice immediately? Should I wait patiently, or just snack on things outside his field of vision?
Yeah, in a game like this, the correct move was definitely to snack behind his back.
With that decided, I stealthily extended a tentacle. Fortunately, Slime Tentacles were transparent and incredibly hard to spot.
First, I moved toward the bookshelf behind the high-and-mighty researcher. I latched a tentacle onto it and slowly slid my Core along the ceiling. Success—I’d made it onto the shelf.
"Heh heh heh. In that case, I’ll start by secretly devouring the reference materials from the back... but I'll leave the covers untouched!"
Books had covers. To ensure the researcher didn't notice even if he looked, it was best to eat only the contents first. I nibbled a hole through the top board of the bookshelf with a faint scritch-scratch and threaded a tentacle through. With the painstaking caution of someone pulling a block from a Jenga tower, I probed the first book and took a bite. Munch, munch.
Oh, this was parchment. It tasted like pure protein. Better yet, it seemed the data from every book I consumed was being recorded in my menu.
This was great. I could keep eating without a care in the world.
I extended my tentacles further and kept nibbling through the books. They didn't taste very good, but it felt great to see Experience Points steadily ticking up thanks to the effect of my Predation skill. Oh—I reached Level 2.
Having finished the top shelf, I moved on to the next. The researcher... still hadn't noticed! Perfect! Munch, munch, munch, munch.
Alright, I’d conquered this bookshelf! The entire thing was now a hollow shell where only the covers remained.
Just then, the researcher suddenly stood up with a sharp clatter of his chair.
Startled, I quietly retracted my tentacles. He began pacing around the room. Oho, was this the next stage? Heh heh heh, very well. Then I would have to show off a level of gluttony appropriate for the occasion.
Waiting for the moment his back was turned, I rolled off the top of the bookshelf. I used my tentacles to cushion the impact, making a silent, soft landing before diving under the desk. Establishing that as my new base of operations, I peeked out with a tentacle to assess the situation.
...Hmm, it looked like he’d started performing maintenance on his experimental equipment. Most of it was intact except for the flasks, after all.
I decided to take this chance to eat the contents of the desk. I poked a hole through the side and started munching on everything in the drawers!
Time to dig in! Scritch, scritch, scritch, scritch...
The bookshelf had been more filling, but in terms of document data, this was quite a haul. While the bookshelf had been mostly dictionaries, lexicons, and illustrated guides, these were documents regarding the facility's operation, specifically the research expenses.
Let’s see. What did we have here? Material costs? I see, I see. Leprechaun Horns and Sahagin fins. Slime fluid and... yeah, well, a Slime could eat anything. If I found them, I’d just eat them without worrying too much.
I also discovered that my bald host was a Senior Researcher for the Republic of Majark.
The goal of his research was to achieve immortality or create the ultimate biological weapon. His budget was decent, but he was being pressured to produce results if he wanted more funding.
Well, if your expensive flasks got broken, of course you'd want to complain. I got it, I really did. In any era and any world, budgets were always limited. ...Though I was still going to eat every bit of it!!
Now then. Enough with the documents; I was ready to eat the materials. However, the materials were right next to the researcher. I wondered if the stage was about to change again, and just as the thought crossed my mind, he started heading back toward the desk. Crap. Where should I hide? ...The floor!
I hurriedly scraped away at a floorboard. If I could just pry one loose, my Core would barely fit through... Hurry, hurry, hurry... There!
I quickly dove into the hole I’d opened and plopped the board back into place. Phew, now I could relax.
Oh, there was dust piled up under the floor. Sigh—well, I might as well eat it while I was down here. Predate, predate. "Oh, hello, Mr. Mouse." Chomp. Gulp. Blech.
...Man, I missed the Boar Steak Penpen grilled for me.
I’d ducked under the floorboards to hide, but this place was a total bonus stage.
From beneath the floor, I could just nibble a hole wherever I wanted and extend my tentacles to predate everything in sight. Plus, there were plenty of mice.
I had to be careful not to let my Halo poke up through the floor, but I figured I'd be fine as long as I stayed on my back. ...Wait, what did being "on my back" even mean for a slime?
Oh well. For now, I’d thin out the documents scattered on the floor just enough so the researcher wouldn't notice.
Munch, munch, gobble, gobble. I mean, leaving parchment documents in a place with mice was asking for them to get ruined anyway. His management was way too lax. As I ate, I gained even more information.
The Magic Soldier Project? Hmm. It seemed like foundational research into blending various subjects together.
The character backstory mentioned "wanting to know what I was," but looking at these documents, so many things had been mixed together that I couldn't tell what the original base was. Slime, Goblin, Demon Race, beastmen, fetuses, human bones, beast bones, horns, monster organs, Magic Stones, soil, wood, grass. Even minerals were in the mix. Wow, wasn't that something? This thing ate everything. Now that was a real Slime.
There was even a Goblin Theory floating around in the notes. Munch, munch.
However, it seemed I couldn't eat glass. Did that mean other slimes usually dissolved it with acid? Even aqua regia, the strongest acid, couldn't melt glass, after all.
...Hm? Oh. Baldy stood up. And then, he actually left the room.
......
Was this bonus time?
I immediately hopped out from under the floorboards and returned to the room proper.
"Hyahhaa! It's an all-you-can-eat buffet!"
I reached for the material shelves first.
Eeny, meeny, miny... ALL OF THEM! Predate! Predate!
Munch, munch, munch. Yeah, bitter. Hard. Gross. Tasteless. Dry.
None of this was actually food, really. But I predated it anyway. You couldn't eat this stuff unless you were a Slime.
There must have been some rare materials included, because by the time the shelves were stripped bare, I had reached Level 6.
"Man. It was definitely worth holding out until Baldy left."
Regardless of the taste, the Experience Points were delicious.
...I still couldn't eat the flask fragments, huh? But I could store them in my Inventory. I'll take 'em.
Was there anything else? Oh, could I take the desk? No, looked like I still wasn’t big enough. But what about the drawers? Success! Munch, munch!! Next, the chair! Munch, munch, munch!!
Rolling across the floor, I absorbed and digested every book and document I touched. Munch, munch, munch—disgusting! But I digested it all the same!
Oh, my body was getting bigger. Could I handle the desk now? Hmm, not yet! First, I’d predate all those hollow book covers! Oh, right, I had to make sure to stop the bell, too. Munch, munch.
"Take this! Chemical shelf! You're gonna become nutrition too!!"
I wedged a tentacle into the gap with a grind, shattered the lock from the inside, and swung the chemical shelf open!
Whoo, look at all these medicines. It was like a soda fountain!
I popped a lid with a tentacle and dipped a tip into a purple liquid.
A sharp, electric bitterness. It was poison; the kind I could absorb. I splashed it over my body like a shower and soaked it all up. Since I couldn't eat the glass bottles, I tossed them into my Inventory. This green one... oh, looked like a healing Potion. Down the hatch! Gulp, gulp.
I opened them one after another. Gulp, gulp, gulp, gulp, gulp. Meanwhile, I rolled around the room, taking in the documents on the floor, the carpet, and finally—finally!—the desk and the bookshelves themselves. Crack, creak, smash! Munch, munch!
It almost made me want to sing! La la la la!
"Level up, level uuuuup! Nice, I’ve finally grown back to my original size!"
Before I knew it, I had reached Level 8, and the room had been picked completely clean.
Mission accomplished! Hell yeah!