Godrick's party headed straight for the reception desk as soon as they entered the guild.
Once Nellin stepped away, Godrick pulled a pouch from his pocket and placed it on the counter.
"Count these."
"Understood."
The receptionist quickly counted the monster remains inside the pouch.
“All confirmed. Thank you for your hard work defeating the orcs.”
“Yeah. But… still no word?”
“I’m sorry. There’s still nothing new.”
“I’ll keep covering the flyer costs, so please keep at it. There’s no way that guy's dead.”
‘No way he’s dead?’
“Yes, understood.”
“Alright guys, let’s head to training.”
“Yes, sir!”
Godrick’s party made their way to the training arena inside the guild.
‘Is it those guys?’
Nellin guessed that the party she’d just overheard the receptionist talking about was Godrick’s party.
Saying there’s no way someone was dead and heading straight to training after wrapping up a job—it all matched what she'd heard.
“Hey, was that party the one you were just talking about?”
“Yes, that’s right.”
“But didn’t you say they lost a comrade? So why the flyers…?”
“Because they didn’t see him die. But apparently he fell off a cliff and got swept away by the current.”
Anyone would assume that meant he was as good as dead.
Still, seeing how Godrick’s party refused to accept their companion’s death made them seem a little pitiful.
“Do you still have that flyer?”
Nellin didn’t really believe the missing party member was alive, but she figured she should at least remember the face.
“Yes. Here it is.”
Nellin took the flyer the receptionist handed her.
“Huh?”
She tilted her head in confusion.
“Uh… Wait a second…”
“Oh, of course you’d be surprised.”
Because the image on the flyer wasn’t of a person—it was a slime.
“The companion they lost was actually a slime.”
“A slime?”
“Yes. They were a pretty well-known party around here for adventuring with a slime.”
Nellin read the details written on the flyer.
[Name: Tongtong]
–Light green slime
–Very quick
–Friendly with people
–Smart enough to understand human speech
–Often bounces when excited and trembles with joy
–Can jump really high
–Can also glow by itself
–Please report to the Adventurers’ Guild if found
–Extra reward if brought in directly
‘Wait… Isn’t that Alexandros II?’
The description of the slime matched one Nellin knew all too well.
Quick enough to defeat twelve goblins, friendly enough to stay at a count’s mansion for a month without issue.
Smart enough to write, and the bouncing and trembling when happy—she’d heard that directly from Jessie.
‘But glowing? What’s that about?’
She couldn’t be sure about the jumping, but glowing was something she hadn’t expected at all.
‘I’ll need to hear more about this.’
“Got it. Thanks for the flyer.”
Nellin tucked the flyer into her pocket and headed to the training arena where Godrick’s party was.
Godrick’s party was quite literally training.
“Fourteen…! Fifteen…!”
Doing push-ups with just their bodyweight.
“Huff! Huff!”
Running hard laps around the arena.
Clang! Chaaang!
Sparring with swords to hone their skills.
But—
‘Something’s… off.’
From Nellin’s point of view, it was awkward training.
Not wrong or bad.
Focusing on strengthening their individual strengths was still a valid training method.
But to Nellin, it all felt a bit superficial.
‘That kind of training will make them stronger… but very slowly.’
Fifty years ago.
Even on the journey to defeat the black dragon, Nellin’s companion—Aldor Meyer, a human nicknamed the Iron Wall Shield—never skipped training.
That’s how she knew.
There are levels to training, and once someone reaches a certain level of strength, they won’t get stronger without raising the intensity.
The level of training Godrick’s party was doing was exactly that example.
It wasn’t like they were intentionally going easy.
They just didn’t know any better.
They had no master to teach them such things, and until now, they’d been content with getting stronger naturally through mercenary work.
Now, with the loss of their slime companion, their urgency to get stronger was actually clouding their judgment.
“Hey, you guys—stop for a second.”
Nellin called out to Godrick’s party without continuing to watch them.
“Eighteen…! Huh?”
“What the—?”
“Whew… an elf?”
“What business do you have with us?”
With only Godrick’s party and Nellin in the arena, it was obvious who she was talking to.
“You’re looking for your slime, right? Light green, really attached to people.”
“You know something?!”
“D-Do you know where Tongtong is?!”
“Nope, I don’t.”
“What?”
“Hey now, don’t glare like that. The thing is, I’ve seen that slime before, and figured this might be fate or something, so I came to talk.”
“You’ve seen it before?”
“Yeah. I was hunting deer in the forest and ran into it. Brought it back to our village, even fed it some jerky. Never met such a fearless slime before. Well, my grandma complained about the noise, so we sent it back to the forest.”
“Mam, T-Tongtong really did love jerky.”
“Quiet for a sec, Def.”
Godrick kept his guard up as he looked at Nellin and spoke.
“What a coincidence. Nice to meet you. We’ll be getting back to training, so why don’t you be on your way?”
“Can’t do that.”
“Say what?”
“Like I said—I think this is fate. That’s why I spoke to you.”
Nellin had learned something during her travels.
In times like these, a little provocation could go a long way.
“You’ll never get stronger at that pace.”
“At that pace…?”
“Even at a glance, you can tell you’re doing all kinds of training without a plan. If you keep going like that for a hundred days, you still won’t get anywhere.”
“So you’re saying you know how it should be done?”
“Of course. I used to know a guy who was obsessed with training. He loved to explain his training routines, and I heard it so much I could recite it in my sleep. But, well, talking like this doesn’t do much good, does it?”
Nellin walked to the corner of the training hall and grabbed a wooden sword from a stand.
“All four of you, come at me at once. I’ll show you whether I’m full of it or not.”
Nellin, known as the “Starlight Archer” for her divine archery skills— but that was just her specialty.
She knew how to wield a sword too.
***
‘What exactly is “Jiggly”…?’
In her room, Amelia was deep in thought about the slime.
It was already surprising that it could glow and produce antidotes, but today something even more shocking had happened—so it was no wonder she was lost in thought.
When she woke up that morning, the slime was missing, and Amelia had panicked.
Fortunately, a temple acolyte helping her bathe came in with the slime.
Hearing that Paulen had brought it back, she was relieved.
She didn’t know how it had escaped, but at least it wasn’t missing anymore.
And just when she thought the matter was over, Paulen spoke up after breakfast.
“Amelia! Jiggly is now my Muscle buddy!”
“...?”
What in the world was this muscle-bound paladin talking about?
Had he injured his head?
The thought passed briefly through Amelia’s mind.
“Jiggly! Muscles!”
When Paulen struck a muscle pose—
Boing!
Two tentacles shot out from the slime and mimicked Paulen’s exact pose.
“Huh? Wha—what is this...?!”
Amelia stared in disbelief, looking back and forth between Paulen and the slime.
“What on earth is happening...?!”
“I’ll explain everything!”
Paulen briefly recounted what had happened earlier that morning.
How the slime came to the training hall, mimicked his posture, and even tried to lift dumbbells—how it had become his workout partner in a moving show of spirit.
He then went on about how the slime must want to get stronger, though it was mostly his own delusions.
Amelia half-listened, her mind still stuck on the fact that the slime now had tentacles.
But no matter how much she thought about it, she couldn’t find any clear answers.
Brrrrrrr!
“Ah.”
The only truth she could confirm was how pleasant the slime’s vibrations felt in her palm.
“Jiggly! Can you do my back too? I guess I’m just so happy today that my muscles are tighter than usual!”
“Please don’t undress in my room, Paulen.”
“Hmmm, then I’ll move to the training hall!
Let’s go together!”
“Why me…?”
“As your bodyguard, I can’t leave your side, Lady Amelia!”
Is that really something a bodyguard should say?
Even so, Amelia couldn’t muster a strong objection.
After finishing her morning schedule—
Brrrrrrrrr!
“Ohhh, that’s it! That’s the spot! My muscle tension is melting away!”
Paulen had moved to the training hall and was now enjoying a slime massage.
He lay face-down on a blanket on the floor while the slime worked on his back.
Amelia, giving no attention to Paulen’s blissful expression, opened her scripture and began reading.
After the massage, Paulen sat up and spoke to the slime.
“Thanks, Jiggly! Just as promised, once everything’s ready, I’ll help you build some muscles—so get excited!”
Boing!
‘What even is “muscle building”? Can a slime even build muscles?’
Amelia mentally jabbed at their conversation while pretending not to care.
Then it happened.
“Lady Saintess! There you are! Kyaa!”
A nun entered the training hall and covered her face with both hands at the sight of Paulen.
“P-Paladin Paulen! Why are you undressed?!”
“My apologies. I was in the middle of training. Hahaha!”
“I-I see…”
Blushing, the nun tried her best not to look at Paulen and addressed Amelia.
“Lady Saintess, would you please come to the clinic?”
“Is someone seriously hurt?”
Unless Amelia personally visited, it was rare for the clinic to request her presence.
If they did, it usually meant a very critical case had arrived.
“No. It’s not an injury—patients have come in suffering from poisoning, multiple of them. They’ve been afflicted by manticore venom.”
“Manticore venom?!”
Manticores.
Monsters with the body of a lion, the tail of a serpent, and a human face framed with a lion’s mane.
The poison gas emitted from their human mouths causes hallucinations and intense itching, driving victims to scratch themselves raw.
In severe cases, victims die from the self-inflicted wounds.
“Wait—if it’s a manticore, then paladins must’ve been attacked?”
“Yes, that’s correct. Four of the ten paladins who went on the subjugation mission were poisoned. Lady Saintess, may we please borrow the power of the slime you care for?”
“You mean Jiggly’s power?”
The nun nodded.
“Yes. I heard the slime possesses detoxifying abilities. Please let us rely on that power once again.”