Aria felt a wave of overwhelming relief crash through her.
She had finally escaped the suffocating depths of the Dungeon and reached the entrance without being buried alive down there.
Her shoulders sagged and her breath trembled. Tears slipped down her cheeks before she even realized she was crying.
This Dungeon run had given her something far beyond what she expected.
She had entered believing she would die or meet some horrible fate worse than death by the three men before. But here she was, alive and good.
Alive, and holding a creature unlike anything she had ever known.
The slime looked up at her—or rather, "focused" on her with its senses. It had no eyes, but its attention was unmistakable.
Warm tears fell onto its green surface and the slime remained nestled in her arms, limp and dim. The tears immediately being Consumed by it.
Aria was hugging it tightly without realizing it. Fortunately, the slime's body was soft and elastic so it felt no pain.
Her tears slid into the slime's surface, sinking into its body.
And then… Something stirred inside it.
The slime felt an emotion it had never encountered: a vast, trembling release of fear, tension, and gratitude. The feeling of relief.
It washed through its core, loosening something tight inside the slime itself as well.
The sensation made the slime's entire being quiver. It didn't understand why but it wanted to cry too.
Aria blinked, suddenly aware of how tightly she was holding it.
"Ah! I—I'm sorry," she said, gently loosening her grip.
She looked down at the slime. It was clearly exhausted. Its body sagged, its form looked unstable, and the core at its center flickered dimly.
"For now I don't think we need to worry about anything chasing us," Aria murmured, settling down and placing the slime carefully in front of her.
She glanced around. Her staff was gone somewhere in the chaos. Her only staff. Without it, with her limited talent, casting spells would be even harder. And she was too poor to afford a replacement.
But at least… she was alive.
Her eyes drifted back to the slime in front of her, small and weakened.
This was the perfect opportunity to capture it.
A rare creature like this could change her life. She should do it now.
Before she could move, the slime spoke.
"Are you alright?"
It was her own voice. No longer hoarse or distorted, but clear and gentle, exactly as she herself would say it.
But it was being asked to her by the slime.
Aria's eyes widened. "Did… did you just ask about my condition?"
The slime tried to hop with what little strength it had. It barely lifted itself before flopping flat onto the ground again.
But Aria somehow could clearly understand that it was actually worried about her. It was not just a mimicry of a voice.
Even now with its trembling and wounded condition, and on the verge of collapse, the slime was concerned about her.
Her resolve shattered.
She couldn't capture it after everything it had done for her.
Not after feeling its worry, and its struggle to protect her from the lizard before.
Aria pressed a hand to her trembling chest.
"I… I'm sorry," she whispered, her voice cracking.
"Why?" the slime asked.
The word was simple, soft, spoken in Aria's own voice. And there was a meaning behind it now.
The slime had begun to understand the words it heard before. It understood enough to ask about it in the right situation.
Aria swallowed hard. Tears spilled again, slipping down her chin.
"I… I was trying to capture you," she confessed, her voice trembling. "I was going to use you and sell you for my own selfish gain."
The slime felt the sharp twist of her emotions. Her pain. And beneath it was another feeling. Heavy… bitter… a feeling of… Regret.
The emotion pulsed through her, and the slime's own core throbbed in response, absorbing it, reacting to it, and learning it.
Aria pressed her shaking hands against her face.
And then the dam inside her finally broke.
Words spilled out in raw and unfiltered manner as if everything she had been holding back finally tore free.
"My parents… they have a huge debt," Aria choked out. "This amount of debt doesn't go away even when they die. So I had to take it. All of it. I was sixteen when they told me the amount I had to repay."
Her breath hitched as she wiped her face, but the tears didn't stop.
"We had nothing. No money or talent in magic. I couldn't even use simple healing magic properly. So the only thing left—" Her voice cracked painfully. "—was to sell myself and become a prostitute."
She hugged her arms around her trembling body as if trying to hold herself together.
"I worked in the slums, in those disgusting places. I let myself be touched by strangers. But I can't let them do more than that. So I ran away," Her fingers dug into her sleeves.
The slime remained still, like a good listener.
"So I tried something else. I tried joining an adventurer group because even low-tier Dungeons was much better than what I used to do."
Her shoulders shook.
"But those three men kept touching and groping me every day. Making jokes about my body and what they would do to me. Acting like they owned me. Like I was some toy they have."
She clenched her jaw, her voice breaking.
"I couldn't fight them. I didn't have the strength. I didn't have the power. So I thought… I thought if I capture you… maybe I could finally get out of that life."
Tears fell freely now, dripping onto the dirt between her knees.
"I didn't want to hurt you," she whispered. "I'm just… I'm so tired. I'm so tired of everything..."
Her raw and agonizing confession hung in the air.
The slime listened quietly. It did not judge. It simply absorbed her pain, feeling the echoes of her emotions shimmer inside its core like ripples in water.
Then, another voice came again.
[Evolution: 10/2,000]
—