Chapter 26 – Hidden Talent

At the edge of the village, Mu Yuan approached the Large Slime, noticing some leftover food remnants nearby.

Well, calling these glittering yet composition-unknown waste materials “food” wasn’t quite accurate.

Was this what the Large Slime had eaten that caused its intestinal issues?

Wait!

Within the Large Slime’s massive jelly-like body, there floated… various scattered items.

There were broken iron pieces, shattered gems, unknown metals, glowing mushrooms, and more.

These materials had been collected bit by bit by the skeletons during their explorations. While not highly valuable, they were still useful – Deadbone had used these waste materials to set up numerous traps and defensive lines.

Some were unidentified, non-tiered materials that they collected just in case they might prove useful someday.

And this Large Slime had swallowed quite a few of them.

It had eaten them, but not completely digested them.

No wonder it got bloated!

Deadbone looked innocent.

But probably, perhaps, possibly, approximately… it was a dietary mistake.

What should slimes actually eat? The great scholar Deadbone fell into deep contemplation.

…

After considerable effort, Mu Yuan finally managed to make the large slime regurgitate the miscellaneous items from its body.

The gelatinous mass remained unwilling, hopping and trying to move toward the discarded items. Was this greed for wealth or gluttony? Are you trying to kill yourself!

The foolishly adorable Large Slime showed no signs of having Emperor potential. It couldn’t understand – it just wanted to eat.

It emitted urgent “guji guji” sounds.

…Indeed, it really wasn’t very smart.

But Mu Yuan could see that this Large Slime was somewhat unusual.

After all, ordinary slimes wouldn’t cause so much trouble – they wouldn’t do anything beyond following their instincts or their Lord’s commands. From this perspective, this Large Slime possessed a certain degree of intelligence.

Though its intelligence seemed misdirected in strange ways.

Why would it covet these shiny things?

Mu Yuan conducted some tests.

He had Deadbone hold down the Large Slime while presenting various items and Treasures one by one, observing the jelly mass’s level of desire.

Sure enough, when Soul Sand appeared, the Large Slime struggled violently with intense “guji guji” sounds.

Unfortunately, being only level 1, no matter how large its size, it remained firmly pinned by Deadbone. Its “guji” sounds became pitiful and wronged.

Through subsequent tests, Mu Yuan discovered that the Large Slime wanted everything – Crimson Blood Fruit, Replenishing Fruit, and more.

If you called it a glutton? But it also wanted things that were clearly inedible, like the Shaman Heritage Stone.

Wanting everything will only harm you!

Actually, the Large Slime had previously shown desire for Soul Sand too. However, Soul Sand wasn’t essential food and was an important strategic resource. Without Mu Yuan’s permission, Deadbone didn’t dare to feed it to the Large Slime on his own initiative.

Besides, what if it ate too much and got bloated?

Oh, it seemed it had already gotten bloated earlier.

…

The Large Slime’s pitiful act proved highly effective.

Mu Yuan’s heart eventually softened, and he handed it a small amount of Soul Sand.

Absorbing Soul Sand was an instinct all troop types possessed. Seeing the Large Slime swallow it and let it float within its body, Mu Yuan wasn’t worried.

Hmm, if it absorbed all this Soul Sand, it would be enough to reach level 2.

He would observe for now.

But before long,

“Guji, guji guji~””No, not giving, you’re just a Slime, you need to learn to casually eat some leaves to sustain yourself, don’t be too wasteful, understand? Wait a moment…”

Humans and Slimes don’t share a common language, and the silly, adorable Large Slime couldn’t comprehend even a fraction of Mu Yuan’s well-intentioned efforts.

But Mu Yuan sensed something slightly off about the Large Slime before him.

It seemed a bit larger? More energetic?

Hold on,

When he clicked to inspect the giant jelly in front of him, he discovered that this lump of a Large Slime had already leveled up to LV2 at some point, and the Soul Sand given not long ago had been completely digested.

Did Deadbone give the Large Slime Soul Sand yesterday?

Mu Yuan shook his head. Deadbone might have given it, but if he had, he would definitely have mentioned it.

Which meant that the Large Slime had digested the Soul Sand and leveled up to LV2 in a very short time.

This speed was more than just a notch faster than Deadbone, who possessed the bearing of an Emperor.

The Large Slime definitely didn’t have the bearing of an Emperor—it only had clear yet foolish eyes—but it might, perhaps, possibly have a tiny bit of talent.

“Latent talent.”

“Refers to talent that hasn’t fully manifested, doesn’t appear on the status panel, but already shows a hint of extraordinariness.”

“Players have it, and a very few troop types do too.”

Of course, many high-tier troop types possess talents, and he, Lord Mu, was destined to be a Lord commanding countless high-tier troops. A mere unknown talent was hardly worth getting excited about.

At most, a minor surprise.

After some thought, since it was a troop type with hidden talent, it could be considered somewhat exceptional among Slimes. Mu Yuan decided to give the large lump of a Slime a name.

“Since you’re a Slime and both greedy for food and wealth, hmm… then I’ll call you Dolai.”

“Guji guji?”

Dolai, with its large, clear, foolish eyes wide open, had no idea what the name meant, something that would accompany it for life.

It just happily swallowed another small fragment of Soul Sand and hopped away, going “guji guji.”

Watching Dolai’s retreating figure, Mu Yuan opened the status panel again to check.

“It really is just a blank three-star.”

“Even worse, because it wasn’t evolved from a one-star Slime, Dolai doesn’t possess any skills at all.”

Mu Yuan planned to wait until later, when enough Evolution Points for the Slime line had accumulated, to evolve a three-star Large Slime and compare it with Dolai.

Normally, a Large Slime evolved through his hands would learn one skill. Dolai, in this case, was at a disadvantage, inherently deficient.

However, Dolai leveled up quickly in the early stages, and if its latent talent could be unearthed, it would effectively have one more talent than other troop types in the future, so its potential wasn’t bad.

But, was it possible to also compensate for Dolai’s inherent deficiency?

Mu Yuan pondered.

In his view, a three-star troop type without any skills was already inherently handicapped—truly pitiful.

As he mulled it over, Mu Yuan noticed that the Evolution Points column had accumulated one usable unit.

But this one unit of Evolution Points wasn’t for the Skeleton line, nor the Slime line, but rather…

“Falcon?”

“I almost forgot about this bird.”

As a scout, due to the lack of means for communication and the Falcon not being particularly intelligent, the information it could provide Mu Yuan was actually very limited.

If used for combat, it would naturally be even more lackluster.

The Falcon had nearly died a few times during its scouting missions.

One-star troop types really are quite weak. Unless more Falcons were recruited for widespread scouting, it would be difficult to gather substantial intelligence.However, three-star units were no longer weak—their improvement over one-star units wasn’t just marginal, and his three-star units even came with innate skills.

“What skill will the Falcon obtain after evolving?”

“Let me see.”

With a thought, the blazing white light of evolution enveloped the tiny falcon.

The next moment, the figure within the white light stretched its wings and grew taller, visibly expanding until it transformed into an imposing, majestic large bird.

Ding!

Notification: Your unit ‘Falcon (Common★)’ has bathed in the Miracle Light and undergone metamorphosis, evolving into ‘War Falcon (Common★★★)’.

Notification: Your unit War Falcon has learned the skill ‘Vision Sharing’.

(End of Chapter)