It was a translucent orange, like freshly squeezed juice, yet encased in a thin membrane. From behind a tree trunk, a strip about ten centimeters long peeked out.
"What is that?" sharp-eyed viewers immediately spotted the orange object that clashed with its surroundings.
"Looks like a water-filled balloon. Could there be someone nearby?"
"Wait, am I seeing things? That thing is moving!"
"No way, it's really moving! Did we just encounter a monster from another world?!"
Perhaps sensing Reina May's approach, the orange object began to writhe under the tense gaze of every viewer in the live stream. It slithered like flowing water, like a crawling python, emerging from behind the tree trunk.
Have you ever seen a slime?
A slime is a fictional creature often appearing in video games or novels. Most slimes are jelly-like, squishy, and move by wriggling. Their colors vary, each hue indicating different attributes or abilities.
Yet no matter the type, slimes are usually the lowest-tier monsters, designed to give protagonists and players some experience. They are roadside pests that can be stomped on without much effort. Even ordinary NPCs with no special abilities could defeat a large group of them. Their threat lies mostly in their numbers.
People on Blue Star knew this, so when the translucent orange slime emerged, their rational minds recognized it immediately. Yet their instincts rebelled at acknowledging it.
The orange, semi-transparent, gelatinous body now stood upright, like a cresting wave, over two meters high. But its size wasn't what shocked the viewers the most. The real horror lay within.
Through the translucent body, everyone could see a figure inside: a person clad in rusted armor, holding a shield in the left hand and a sword in the right. To be precise, it was a corpse.
Most of the exposed skin had rotted away, leaving stark white bones and shredded flesh. The dark, bloody, decaying human looked like a specimen encased in amber or an experiment preserved in formaldehyde.
The all-consuming orange mass visibly devoured the flesh, leaving no doubt it was feeding.
The Destiny Battle had already held twelve iterations, yet this was the first time it displayed such gruesome imagery without censorship. Those with weaker constitutions were already gagging instinctively. The Battle had never been so merciful as to blur shocking scenes.
"This is a slime? I must be hallucinating!"
"I'm still eating! AAAAHHH!"
"Screenshotting! Sending this to my cowardly friends' group."
"Stop! Don't send cursed images!"
"Does that thing eat people?"
"I feel sick just looking at the screen!"
Comments overflowed with revulsion.
After the slime fully emerged, Reina May remained standing, watching as it straightened and crawled toward her.
Her eyes sparkled with interest.
"Somewhat… intriguing," she murmured. This lifeform triggered a sense of curiosity in her, a kind of information contamination carried on the wind that had greeted her upon arrival. The slime amplified it.
"Displaying the digestion of its prey directly… an intimidation tactic? Its movement isn't particularly fast; normally it ambushes prey. But its colors are too vivid. Perhaps it frightens first, then consumes?"
Her eyes unblinking, she studied the slime approaching like a child toddling forward, arms crossed, analyzing its survival method.
The slime stretched its body upward like a spring, extending from its compressed form, as if ready to swallow its prey whole.
"The orange substance entering the prey wriggles inside. It liquefies the prey's body, then absorbs it. How does it do this? A unique digestive function? And where does the liquid go? Is it converted into energy…"
Reina May extended her gloved right hand and touched the slime's soft body just before it lunged.
In an instant, the slime froze. Time seemed to stop. Its body had stretched over three meters high, like a massive gate, standing rigid.
"Glitched?"
"Is the stream frozen?"
"No, the leaves are still moving."
As the viewers speculated, Reina May retracted her hand.
"I see. It survives in a core form. The orange jelly is an extension of the core. Prey is converted entirely into energy and fed back into the core," she observed. Between her thumb and forefinger was a tiny, crystal-clear shard the size of a grain of rice.
This was the slime's true form. Besides the life fluctuations, Reina May sensed a strange flow of information running through it, constantly restructuring the core.
"Contaminated. So it's the final BOSS? An unusual existence, between meme and information."
No other clues remained. After all, this was just an ordinary slime a seemingly insignificant creature.
Reina May applied slight pressure. With a crisp snap, the slime's crystal core shattered in her hand.
Immediately, the massive slime convulsed violently, trembling as if ill. Its surface rippled like the fur of a frightened cat, flashing unpredictably like lightning.
Chunks of the orange jelly began falling off, collapsing like rotting flesh, losing support as they hit the ground.
Plop, plop
The sound of the slime breaking apart echoed as the fragments dissolved into a puddle, merging with the soil.
Within moments, only a corpse remained, drenched in water, and a stench of rot began to permeate the air.