Metal snots

Well, since our journey was not finished yet, I couldn't stay with the old man for long. At least I learned a couple of useful things in just one night, and while it could just be considered the basics of the basics, it was a great achievement for me. In the end, we became quite friends and I even ended up considering him my teacher. We also agreed to meet again when we finished our job with Aeldrya, so I just needed to have a little patience to be able to continue learning interesting things about magic.

'I already want to return to Cerbalon... I hope we will not have problems meeting again.'

As I recalled what had happened the night before, our journey progressed without much trouble. Aeldrya made a couple of stops to collect some odd materials and let Limy fight a couple more easy monsters, though it wasn't enough for her to level up. The fact that she gained half the experience than the others became more notorious than I expected, but it was not something that worried me much. After all, Limy was quite stronger than the current monsters we encountered, so leveling her up was not a priority.

Halfway there we deviated a bit, and that night we had to camp. I had the feeling that there was some town nearby, but the damn perverted elf chose to sleep in the open with the excuse that Limy had to learn how sleeping outdoors felt, although it was not that Limy slept much... And well, half In the afternoon of the next day we could already see houses in the distance.

"We have already arrived."

From a distance, the town did not seem very different from the others, so I did not understand exactly what we were looking for in it. So I made Limy inquire about our objective there.

"We're not looking for anything in particular in the town. I'll take the opportunity to buy some materials, but we came here basically only to have some place to spend the night while we focus on finding our true goal."

“Wich?”

"Do you see those mountains in the distance?"

“No.”

“...

"... Those mountains are rich in metallic ores, and where there is an abundance of metals there are metallic slimes."

“Metallic… slimes.”

"Yes. They're pretty weird slimes. Their body is gelatinous like every other slime, but as hard as steel. We are basically going for their core, although their body can also be useful to us."

“Understood.”

I noticed a bit of disturbance in Limy as I saw her directing her inexistent gaze towards the mountains.

"Let's rest for today and prepare for tomorrow's trip. I don't know how much it will cost us to find one. If we are lucky, in a day or two we will be done and can return, but they are not easy monsters to find. We will probably have to spend several days exploring the entire mountain. Be mentalized, tomorrow will be a pretty tough day."

After entering the town and doing some shopping, we looked for an inn. We found one as simple as the previous one. The beds weren't so much comfortable, but Aeldrya went to bed early and fell asleep right away... It would be the custom of a veteran adventurer to regain strength and be able to wake up early full of energy... or just trying to exhaust Limy took a toll on her...

'Another boring night… Metallic slimes, huh? Helpy, tell me a little about them.'

[Metallic Slime: A rare species of slime. They are found in places with high concentrations of metallic minerals and they feed on them. Their body, despite maintaining its viscous state, is as hard as the metal they use to eat.]

'Do they eat minerals?! Can they dissolve stones?!'

[They can dissolve stones.]

'This monster is dangerous, very dangerous ... Slimes really are a world apart...'

—Limy, it looks like those slimes are pretty strong. The slimes themselves are already immune to physical damage, and these seem to be tough as steel... I think it would be best to let that elf take care of everything and us to stay out of it.

—Master, I can fight.

—Their grade is much higher than yours, and although you could face them, all your abilities are physical, you wouldn't do anything to them.

Limy was also immune to physical attacks, but that didn't mean those slimes couldn't do anything to her. There was one thing that really worried me.

‘Helpy, could metallic slimes do something to a blue slime?’

[It is common during fights between slimes of the same grade to try to devour each other as they cannot hurt each other. The winner usually ends up adding some of the loser's mass to his own and growing. Metallic slimes are grade 3 monsters. If a mere blue slime were to come across one, it would become a mere insignificant snack for it.]

'I imagined it... Really, slimes are a world apart...'

—Limy, you definitely can't get close to slimes stronger than you… I don't want them to eat you…

—Understood…

While Aeldrya was still sleeping like a log, Limy and I were each lost in our own thoughts. Before we knew it, morning had already arrived...

***

Going into the mountains is never easy. The path soon became a walkway of rocks and weeds that reached up to Limy's chest. The climb became quite slow because of having to keep pushing them aside all the time.

"Be careful, from here on it can be quite dangerous."

The ground started to get a little flatter and the number of trees increased. In the distance, from time to time, holes were seen in the rock walls.

"The mountain is full of natural caves and abandoned mines. Many monsters use them as a hiding place. It would not be unusual to meet goblins, kobolds, or even trolls."

‘Finally, normal monsters!’

I was almost glad to hear that we could meet enemies at any time. So far I had only come across monsters that instead of monsters looked like the creations of some mad scientist who had dedicated himself to gluing together parts of animals or critters surviving from a nuclear disaster.

"I don't think that Goblins and kobolds would give you any trouble, but trolls can be different. Fortunately, there are not many, and because of their large size, they are easy to detect. It would be very rare for us to find o... ne...

'For talking…'

Indeed, a wild troll appeared...