The following morning, I dropped by the shop first thing to make sure everything was running smoothly before heading back to the abandoned mine.
I set to work on the waterproof cloth again, but I soon found myself with time on my hands. I’d fallen asleep last night before I could decide how to spend my downtime today, and now my mind was a total blank. In my previous life, I could have killed time with a light novel or a video game, but here...
I had received forty-five rolls of cloth, just like yesterday. I finished the work even faster this time, perhaps because I was getting used to the process. I’d already finished training the slimes as well. Now what?
After some thought, I decided to merge my scavenger slimes into a king scavenger slime and test myself against it in a one-on-one sparring match.
The current stats for the king scavenger slime were as follows:
Skills: Disease Resistance Lv7, Poison Resistance Lv7, Scavenge Lv8, Sanitization Lv8, Deodorization Lv8, Deodorizing Fluid Lv6, Foul Odor Release Lv8, Nutrient Return Lv7, Physical Attack Resistance Lv5, Enlargement Lv5, Reduction Lv6, Jump Lv3, Binge Eating Lv4, Martial Arts Lv2.
Perhaps because the individual scavenger slimes had gained Physical Attack Resistance, the king’s level in that skill had also gone up by one. Its Martial Arts skill was at level 2, whereas the individual slimes only had level 1.
Overall, its skill levels were significantly higher than those of a single scavenger slime. I couldn't be certain, but it seemed like the experiences of each individual slime merged or stacked during the fusion process.
During our bout, I found that its Physical Attack Resistance was incredibly effective, making it difficult to land a meaningful blow. The elasticity of its entire body had increased, and it had become quite proficient at parrying the force of my strikes. While its technique was still unrefined, its defensive capabilities were excellent.
Even when I punched with a fair amount of strength, the king scavenger slime could withstand the impact. I avoided its core for safety, of course, but even so, it took considerable effort to penetrate its defenses.
The main drawback was its lack of offensive power. While it could use Enlargement to increase its mass and pin someone down, a slime’s "muscular strength" left much to be desired. If I exerted myself, I could easily break free, and its strikes lacked any real weight.
Since that seemed to be an inherent limitation, I spent some time teaching it new techniques: stretching its body into tentacle-like whips for striking, entangling opponents to keep them close, and a pseudo-shoulder throw that utilized the opponent’s momentum, its own elasticity, and the Enlargement skill.
I decided to make this its basic strategy—parry the enemy’s attacks to stay safe, use their own weight against them with a throw, and then pin them down with Enlargement once they hit the ground.
This killed a decent amount of time, but the cloth still wasn’t quite dry. I figured it would be ready by the time I finished taking the slimes for a short walk.
Just as I was gathering the slimes to head outside, however, one of them started acting strangely. Through our Taming Contract, I could sense its general state, but I couldn’t quite tell what was happening.
What’s going on?
I hurried over to the slime in question. It was the one I had captured for the experiment to see if it would evolve into a metal slime. Its body was vibrating rhythmically, but it didn't seem to be in any pain or poor health. If that was the case...
"Is it evolving!?"
I’d thought it would take much longer, but I couldn't think of any other explanation.
I watched in silence as the slime’s movements ceased and I felt a faint trace of mana. It seemed to be emitting mana into the air. But it wasn't magic—it was more like breathing. It released the mana, then drew it back in. It repeated this cycle dozens of times. Was this necessary for evolution? Or was it just an unconscious reflex?
As the process continued, its color gradually shifted. It eventually became a lustrous, silver-white color. I wondered if the evolution had been successful. Its status seemed normal, with no sign of distress. However, while a metal slime was usually a dull, leaden gray, this one was a shiny, polished silver.
I used Monster Appraisal on it.
Iron Slime
Skills: Hardening Lv3, Physical Attack Resistance Lv2, Jump Lv1, Digestion Lv3, Absorption Lv3, Division Lv2.
The name that came up was "iron slime." Its skills were nearly identical to those of a metal slime, though its Hardening level was one step higher. Iron... well, I had been feeding it pure iron, so the name made sense.
"But metal slimes eat iron too, don't they?"
Why the difference if the diet was ostensibly the same?
"Iron is iron... and 'metal' is...!"
I pulled out a piece of the stone material I’d been using as feed for the metal slimes and appraised it.
Stone Material (Red Earth) Dug up and discarded at the mines, solidified with Earth Magic. Contains: Iron Oxide, Aluminum Oxide.
"That's it! So the red earth contained aluminum oxide after all..."
I recalled a junior colleague from a road construction job in my past life mentioning something like that once.
"The metal slime wasn't just eating iron; it was eating aluminum too. Maybe even other trace metals."
Using Alchemy, I extracted pure iron and aluminum from the stone bricks. I called over the iron slime and the metal slime and offered them the samples. The iron slime only ate the iron, but the metal slime happily consumed both.
I reached out and patted the metal slime.
"So you're actually an omnivore when it comes to metals? I guess the iron slime is pure iron, but what about you? Are you some kind of iron-aluminum alloy?"
The metal slime, predictably, didn't answer.
"Well, at least I know the conditions for evolution now. And that was the first time I've actually seen a slime evolve with my own eyes."
Until now, they had always evolved while I was asleep. If you fed them well, they usually evolved within six months, but since the exact timing was unpredictable, I couldn't exactly pull an all-nighter for half a year just to watch.
Still, that mana-breathing behavior was fascinating. If I started thinking about that now, I’d end up being late getting back to town. I needed a distraction.
"Actually, I think I've figured something out about Appraisal, too."
It seemed that the No-Attribute Magic "Appraisal" functioned like a search engine. If I used it with only the vague thought of "what is this?", it only gave me a name. If I just wanted "details," it gave me the bare minimum.
However, back when I was cleaning the cesspool, appraising the ceiling had brought up the word "Sterilization," and appraising the waste had brought up "Pathogen." It seemed the spell drew upon the user's own knowledge; the depth of the information provided changed based on what the caster understood.
I tested the theory a few times and confirmed that if I visualized exactly what I wanted to know using my own technical knowledge, the results became much more detailed.
For instance, I appraised a piece of stone for its weight and the specific ratio of iron to aluminum.
Stone Material: 503.9g (Red Earth) Dug up and discarded at the mines, solidified with Earth Magic. Mineral content: Iron Oxide 4.2% (21.1638g), Aluminum Oxide 5.1% (25.6989g).
The data was incredibly precise now. It was all down to the clarity of the mental image. This could be useful... or could it?
While detailed info was nice, I didn't have much use for it at the moment. What was I going to do, weigh the iron ingots I made for Serge down to the milligram? Or maybe I could get a sample of a high-quality ingot from him to use as a reference? If it helped my products look less suspicious, it might be worth it, but otherwise, the standard Appraisal was usually enough.
While waiting for the waterproof cloth to finish drying, I practiced my magic by creating 500-gram ingots of iron and aluminum with eighty percent purity.
Once the cloth was ready, I gathered everything up and headed back to town. I delivered the waterproof cloth to Serge’s shop, picked up the next three hundred rolls of fabric he had ready, and returned to the inn. Since it was still a bit early to call it a day but too late to pick up a new quest, I decided to check on my own shop.
The place was as crowded as ever. Actually, were there even more people than before?
I entered through the employee entrance and checked the breakroom, but no one was there. Was the entire staff out on the floor?
I opened the door to the storefront and spotted Fina, one of the three girls I'd hired recently.
"Welcome back, Manager," she said.
"Good work today. The breakroom was empty, so I thought things might be getting a bit hectic."
"We're busy, but it's manageable. We have plenty of hands, after all. We've started to figure out when the peak hours are, so we all coordinate our efforts to match the rush."
It seemed my staff had completely acclimated to the work while I was away. I really didn't have anything to worry about.
As that thought crossed my mind, I noticed something else.
"Oh..."
"Is something wrong?" Fina asked.
"The cleaner slimes... they're ready to divide."
"Eh?"
For a cleaner slime, the laundry process was essentially a massive feast. After several days of constant "eating," they were ready to undergo Division.
"The number of slimes for laundry is about to increase. I'm going to let them divide now, so the cleaning process should become even more efficient."
"Really? That's incredible!"
"The slimes are the ones doing the hard part. I'll be back here for a while, so don't mind me."
"Understood!" Fina grabbed a bundle of clean laundry and hurried back to her post.
Time to get to work.
I oversaw the division of the cleaner slimes and established new contracts, bringing the total to fifty-four. While cleaner slimes don't usually divide that often, ten of them had actually divided twice over. This job was clearly perfect for them. With the numbers increased, the laundry was being processed at lightning speed. The efficiency had more than doubled. I wasn't about to let that potential go to waste.
"Fina, Caulm, do you have a moment?"
I caught them as they were coming to pick up more laundry. I gave them a quick explanation of the situation and suggested they both join the front-of-house staff.
Until now, the receptionists had been handling both the drop-offs and the returns. But with more staff and faster slimes, I suggested we divide our roles.
"I'll handle carrying the bundles out, while the two of you focus entirely on returning items to the customers."
"So we're specializing to increase the flow. Let's give it a try," Caulm agreed.
The two of them headed back out front, and I began hauling the freshly cleaned laundry out to the counter.
"Next customer, please!"
"Right this way!"
"Customer number eighteen!"
"Here are your items. Are you satisfied with the cleaning?"
"Oh, it really is spotless... and for this price? How wonderful."
"Thank you very much! We hope to see you again! Next... customer number eight!"
Within minutes of dividing the tasks, the line began moving significantly faster. Perhaps because the slimes were hungry after dividing, they seemed to be working with even more gusto than usual.
At one point, we nearly ran out of claim tags, and the crowd waiting for returns started to swell, but we managed to smooth things over by temporarily shifting our approach. The combination of more slimes and more service windows drastically increased our turnover rate.
We successfully navigated the afternoon rush and reached closing time without a single hitch.