The slime bounced once on the mattress, blinked, then made the same little sound again while tilting toward him.
"Bi."
Hajin stayed frozen for a second, exhaling slowly while his brain tried to catch up with what his eyes were seeing. The circle on the floor was still fading under his chair, and the black panel in front of him kept the last line open.
[Contract success]
"No," he said, rubbing one hand down his face. "No way this is the first thing I get."
The slime hopped closer, bumped into his knee, and sat there, waiting for a response.
"Don't look at me like that," he muttered.
It bounced again, louder this time.
"Bi."
Rain kept tapping the window while he stared down at the silver blob, trying to line this up with the class result from the center. F-rank Summoner, Minor Creature branch, eight percent combat affinity, then this tiny thing making squeaky noises on his leg.
He reached down slowly, expecting it to slip away, but the slime leaned into his palm and stayed there while he lifted it to eye level. Its weight was almost nothing and its surface was cool, while its body stretched around his fingers without falling apart.
"Can you understand me," he asked.
The slime held still, then poked one soft nub at his chest.
"Bi."
"That didn't answer anything."
It poked his chest again, then tapped his chin, and when he moved his hand toward the desk it turned immediately, tracking the motion before he finished the move.
He set it down near the keyboard, turned to grab his report slip, and heard a muffled tearing sound before he could finish unfolding the page.
"Hey."
By the time he snapped his head back, the slime had launched itself onto his pillow, bit deep into the corner seam, and was already dragging stuffing into its body in little white strands.
"No no no, stop."
He lunged across the bed, catching it with both hands while more stuffing stuck to its surface and vanished. The pillow sagged in his other hand, corner gone, fabric wet and chewed where the bite landed.
"That's my pillow," he said, staring at the damage.
The slime wiggled in his grip, looked up at him, and made a happy sound, "bi bi."
'You're kidding,' he thought, dropping onto the edge of the mattress with the half-dead pillow beside him. 'First summon and it already ate my pillow.'
He set the slime on the desk and pointed at it while trying to sound stern, though the whole thing felt ridiculous.
"Stay."
It froze in place immediately.
He took one step back, then two, and watched it stay put until he lowered his hand.
"Come here."
The slime bounced off the desk and landed on his chest.
"Okay," he said, catching it before it slid. "So you get simple commands."
He carried it back to the desk, opened the top drawer, and pulled out stale convenience-store jerky from a pack he'd forgotten last week. One tiny strip went down in front of the slime, disappearing the moment it touched the surface.
"Again?"
"Bi."
Second strip vanished even faster.
He grabbed a broken pen cap from the desk corner, held it out for a second, then dropped it in front of the slime just to see what would happen.
The cap dissolved into silver ripples and disappeared.
"You can eat plastic too."
Three more tests followed before he realized he was leaning in with his elbows on the desk, running one check after another. Coin, paper clip, bottle cap, all gone, each one swallowed in seconds while the slime made the same satisfied little sound after every bite.
The black panel flickered back to life at the edge of his vision.
[Entry 001 activity detected]
[Trait expression: Devour]
[Digestive adaptation: Active]
Another line appeared below it, thinner and unstable.
[Maturity: 1%]
He blinked twice, then looked from the panel to the slime and back.
"Devour," he said quietly while the slime bounced in place.
"Bi."
"Right, you heard that too?"
No answer came, but it pushed forward and tapped his wrist for more.
He opened the bottom storage box next to the desk and dug through old academy junk, muttering to himself while tossing things onto the floor. Failed practice gloves, cracked manuals, broken simulator tags, then one small pouch with two low-grade core shards left from training classes he had dropped out of.
"If you die from this, that's on me," he said, holding one shard up to the light.
The slime reached first, wrapping around the shard before he finished the sentence, and swallowed it in one slow pull that made its body glow faint silver for a second.
The panel flashed again.
[Low-grade mana matter consumed]
[Entry 001 compatibility confirmed]
[Maturity: 3%]
He sat back, core pouch still in his hand while his pulse started rising again, 'This little one is not normal at all,' he thought.
The slime climbed onto the back of his hand, settled there, and stayed still for the first time since it appeared.
"You were waiting for that, huh."
"Bi."
He looked down at it for a long moment, then lifted his hand until they were eye level again.
"You keep saying bi."
The slime blinked.
"Bi."
"Fine, then Bibi it is."
Its whole body jumped once, then it launched at his chest and stuck there with a wet slap, wiggling hard while making the loudest sound yet.
"Bi! Bi!"
He caught it before it slid, letting out a short laugh he had not planned while the thing clung to his shirt and refused to let go.
"Yeah, yeah, relax. I guess you like that name then."
Bibi settled against his palm, still warm from the core shard, and watched him while he reached for the second shard in the pouch.
"One more."
It shook its body in a fast side-to-side motion, then tapped his thumb and pointed itself toward the desk jerky instead.
He stopped, stared at the gesture, and lowered the shard slowly, "you don't want the second one yet?"
Bibi gave one short bounce.
"Bi."
"Hmm, guess you do have intelligence," he said, poking it with his finger, "so it's just a language barrier holding us back from communicating."
It took the jerky strip from his fingers gently, swallowed, then crawled onto the top of his wrist and stayed there while he stared at the wall.
His life was still a mess for sure but now he had a summon that was sitting on his pulse, eating plastic and mana shards while a hidden system labeled it with traits no one at the center had mentioned.
'It's weak now, sure,' he thought, rubbing Bibi's back with his thumb. 'But you are definitely not ordinary.'
The next hour passed in loops of quick testing and note-taking on an old receipt pad, with Bibi bouncing between desk, bed, and his shoulder while he tracked what it understood.
He dropped the receipt pad, stared at the total left in his account app, and felt that familiar pressure press behind his eyes.
[Current balance: 187,420 won]
'Haah, this is the worst, my rent in due three days, loan in four and I still have a shift at ten tomorrow night.'
Not to mention no guild would take him seriously with this class card, and even if one did, the contract would chain him for years while they mined every secret they could out of Bibi.
'Normal route is dead,' he thought, leaning back in his chair while Bibi slept in a silver coil on his shoulder. 'If I want fast money and fast growth, I need public wins.'
He unlocked his phone again, opened three streamer platforms, and skimmed requirements with his thumb moving faster than his hesitation. Most new channels drowned in the first week, but gate clips still paid if the run was clean, especially when the host looked hungry enough to fight for it.
He would need cheap gear, a beginner gate, and a live run with no backup.
'It's definitely risky,' he thought, 'but it's still better than waiting to get buried.'
He pulled up registration on the platform with the best gate category payouts, set his ID info, and paused at the channel name field while rain kept hitting the window and Bibi making tiny sleep sounds against his neck.
"Guess we're doing this," he whispered.
Bibi woke enough to lift one eye.
"Bi."
He typed a name, hit save, and watched the new channel page load with a clean black header and a number at the top he knew too well.
[Followers: 0]
He looked at the empty dashboard, then at Bibi curled on his shoulder, and bared his teeth in a small grin that felt more stubborn than happy.
'Fine,' he thought, closing the app and setting three alarms. 'Let's see how fast we can force this city to pay attention.'