#107 – I think I saw your ship the other day

#107 – I think I saw your ship the other day I didn’t know what I expected, but a fancy room with a small table surrounded by comfortable-looking ornate couches was not it. If I had any doubts before about having teleported somewhere into the castle at some point, this convinced me. But what exactly was this room? Some kind of... “...Guest room? Tea party room? Hmm... Who am I gonna fight...?” Jeofffff: looks like it yeah SunOfABeach: a princess? prince? SunOfABeach: a diplomat from another country? “Could be... Well, guess we’ll find out!” I walked inside, looking for places my next opponent might jump from. From behind the lounge? From under the table? From inside the– The door slammed behind me and the fancy wardrobe opened, revealing my opponent. It was a... “Wait, I know you!” I shouted as I pointed my gun self at the red slimy woman with no face. She looked extremely similar to the red woman from the Slimeship ad! The only difference was that she had no wings and no face. Despite the momentary surprise, I still released the crystal shard-filled water shot, because I’d already learned from this dungeon that making the first move was, in fact, the right choice. I had no idea what happened next. All I knew was that there was a sound of my shot’s explosion, overlapping with the sound of the wardrobe’s door slamming, and then a multitude of clinking sounds coming from inside the wardrobe. What the fuck? Had she just– I had no time to be baffled at how my opponent had apparently neutralized my high-velocity projectile by locking it inside the indestructible wardrobe, because it was my turn to be shot at. A giant fucking cannon emerged from her red body where an arm would be and aimed in my direction. I reacted purely on instinct and threw myself to the side, just in time to dodge the roaring blood-red energy beam that shot out of her cannon. Well, shit. Guess a captain of a ship would have a cannon handy, huh? And of course the projectile was red too! I aimed my gun self at her again and this time, actually used Guided Shot, the skill I’d stolen from the assassin guy, before shooting another water bullet filled with crystals. She tried dancing out of the way again, but my shot adjusted trajectory mid-flight and slammed right into her before exploding into crystal shards. Chunks of red goop splattered all over the wall as the crystals lodged themselves into her flesh ... and just stayed there. I had no idea whether they actually injured her or not – she was already all red so it was hard to tell if she bled. The water shot definitely had done some damage, though. I had no doubt about that. Regardless, that shot was actually just a distraction to let me run closer, my axe self already waiting in my hands. Even as my foe recovered, I was already shooting off Rend straight at her. My ball of metaphysical cobwebs hit its mark and the red woman turned pin cushion staggered and... lost her form, turning into a mound of red sludge. Alright, definitely a slime then. I didn’t let that stop me though and kept running. By the time she recovered and regained her humanoid shape, I was already swinging my axe self, all charged up with black flames. Just as my weapon was about to hit her dead center, she suddenly blobified again and shifted out of the way just enough to only get a fist-sized chunk of her red flesh cut off. I put my axe self in my Soul Pocket, quickly repositioned, took the axe out again, and prepared to swing down at her while using Guided Shot again, but before I could finish my swing, I suddenly found myself restrained by thorny vines, that shot out of the slime woman. The hell?! I immediately tried to struggle myself out of it – ow, the thorns! – before realizing that I had a much easier way to get out – igniting my limbs with Demon Queen Flames and cutting through the vines. But that distraction was enough for my adversary to recover and aim her bigass cannon at me again, point blank range. Shit– I summoned my hyperfast tentacle and smacked the cannon to the side. The red blast of energy just barely missed me, but it still pretty much deafened me with how loud it was. But at that point, I had already freed myself from the sudden vines and didn’t hesitate to dash forward, and chop at her with my still-burning hands. More vines sprouted out of the red woman’s gooey flesh and tried to restrain me again, but I kept destroying them with my fire whenever they got close, rendering this attack pointless. One hand chop at her neck. She ducked under it and manifested a much smaller cannon out of her other arm while retracting the big one. I once again used my tentacle to grab the cannon and jerk it to the side while preparing another hand chop. What I didn’t expect was for that cannon to suddenly explode with blinding light. I yelped and staggered as I tried to blink away the bright spots. I waved my hands around in hopes of deterring attacks while I was both deafened and blinded now, but– Something slammed square into my chest and sent me flying. I slammed into a wall and then fell on the ground. Unsure of whether another attack was coming and panicking at this point, I raised an arm, formed a fist, channeled Ether, and then slammed it into the floor, between myself and where I thought my enemy was. I heard – but didn’t see – the crystals sprouting around my hand, creating a very scuffed barrier. Then I hastily rolled over, reached into my backpack, grabbed my flask, pulled out the cork with my teeth, and chugged it, hoping it would help me recover faster. The effect was instant. Just like the very first time when I’d tried drinking some refined ooze, I felt power surge through me as my body healed and my vision gradually cleared. Just as I blinked away the last of the bright spots, I saw the red woman towering over me – she had just walked around my crystal barrier – pointing her cannon down at me. Fuck. Rend! It hit and gave me just enough time to free my hand out of the crystals using the black flames and roll out of the way before a surge of red energy flooded the spot I’d just been in. I scrambled to get back up, mind whirling to figure out how to gain an advantage in this fight. She was way too versatile. Laser cannons, flash bombs, thorny vines, occasional superspeed – if her dodging my opening move was anything to go by – on top of her having weird biology with seemingly no weak spots? How was I supposed to beat her? ...Ah. Exactly as I had already beaten one opponent who had no physical weak spots. Once again, the cannon was pointed at me and I was already moving to jump to the side. Unfortunately, I couldn’t. My feet were held in place by the damn vines that had snuck up on me. With no better moves left, I materialized my axe self in front of my main body, and tilted it to the side to hopefully help block the incoming blast with the blade. My haphazard move seemed to have somewhat worked. Part of the blast still slammed into me and scorched me – thank god I still had the blessing – and sent me tumbling on the ground. Once again, I rushed to try and stand up again, despite the pain I was in. When I looked up, I saw that part of the blast had gotten reflected back at my opponent though, judging by her non-cannon arm missing and there being red splotches of slime all over the walls, floor, and ceiling behind her. She was flagging but trying to aim the cannon back in my direction. But it didn’t matter, I didn’t need to aim to use Rend, and right now, she would have a hard time dodging. I used Rend, enhanced by Mind Breaker. The ball of cobwebs that shot out looked way more dense than before to the point of not really looking like cobwebs anymore. It flew straight at my foe, and hit– The slime woman suddenly jerked her entire body to the side, moments before my psychic attack would have hit. Oh, come on! Not fair! I managed to stand despite my struggles and summoned my axe self again... only to see that it had been wrecked by my earlier haphazard move. Dammit, I had to fix it after this. I put it back into my Soul Pocket and then charged at the slime woman who seemed to still be recovering, despite pulling out that ninja maneuver earlier. Since my main weapon was broken, I had no choice but to use ignited hand chops again. Even as she tried to reform her humanoid shape, she threw more thorny vines at me to restrain me again, but my black flames took care of all of that. Then she pulled out that small cannon that had flashbanged me before and aimed it at me. I fired off another empowered Rend and screwed my eyes shut just as the blinding blast went off, tossing me back and still blinding me despite my closed eyes. At this point, my everything hurt and I really hoped my Rend had hit its mark. “Ugh...” I raised my head from where I lay on the ground with a groan and blinked away the bright spots to see... a heap of melted red matter on the floor with a cannon and some thorny vines sticking out of it. It was still trying to reform though. I grit my teeth, raised my hand through the pain – god, my head – pulled out my gun self, aimed it, and then pressed down the trigger while pouring in as much Ether as I could. It fired off a rocket, then another, another, and another– They all landed on top of the slime blob, exploding one after the other, and splattering liquid plasma – shut up, I know it doesn’t make sense! – all over the spot. I let my arm drop, still holding my gun self, hoping that it was finally over. The smoke cleared, the plasma receded, and all that was left... was a big chest with a skull on it. I let out a sigh of relief mixed with a groan. Chat was spamming things again at this point, but I mostly ignored them, and just lay there on the fancy floor, waiting for the headache to recede. Then I remembered that I had an awesome pillow, so I reached into my backpack for it, pulled it under my head, and closed my eyes for a moment. I stopped ignoring chat and checked what people were saying as my headache slowly but surely receded. Jeofffff: final boss time? GeorgeDoshington: les gooo GeorgeDoshington: final boss nexttt SunOfABeach: I still think she was a diplomat repeaeaeat: why would a diplomat be so powerful? “Hmm... A slime woman in a demon city does feel out of place, doesn’t she...?” I drawled, my eyes still closed. “And we don’t know if the next room is the final one, chat.” SpoOo0oOon: nana youre awake! “Just resting... I didn’t expect she would have so many tricks up her sleeve.” Irid123: kinda felt like you Irid123: you also have all sorts of tricks I hummed. “I guess...? Do you think it means something?” Irid123: it could “If there were other people around... They would probably get random powers from dungeons like me as well, right...?” I mused. Irid123: or it’s a cycle Irid123: slime woman was an isekai protagonist like you Irid123: failed the final trial Irid123: and now it’s your turn “...I don’t know about that, Iris. I don’t think that adds up... Or rather, wouldn’t the last isekai protagonist be the Phoenix then...?” I frowned, my eyes still closed. Even though I denied it, something about that idea seemed just plausible enough that it made me consider the implications. But after a moment, I shoved it aside and continued chatting with chat about other things – mostly about what I did wrong in this fight and how to improve – as I recovered. I also briefly wondered whether that really had been the spaceship hotel captain from the ad or not after a chatter reminded me that there might be a whole race of red slime people out there. Didn’t wanna be racist, you know? After about ten minutes, I slowly opened my eyes and took in the carnage. The formerly beautiful and shining room was... still shining and whatnot, but the furniture was thrown around, crystal shards scattered everywhere, the other side of the room was wet, and there was a big pool of plasma just across from where I was laid. Part of me felt kinda guilty for ruining this place. But then I remembered that this whole place would reset every time I made it here, so it didn’t matter. SunOfABeach: don’t forget your axe “Oh... right.” I summoned my axe self back to me and grimaced when it came back in multiple pieces. Though thankfully, despite being shattered, I could still control and Quick Fetch all the pieces back to me. “...I hope I can repair it quickly,” I mumbled, keeping in mind the time limit. I saw down with my legs crossed, positioned the pieces back into the axe shape and began using Empower to slowly fix it. SpoOo0oOon: are you really continuing? SpoOo0oOon: shouldn’t you take a break? SpoOo0oOon: this was too intense... Maybe I should. It would probably be the safe play. But if the next room really was the last one, I would be quitting just before the end... And I didn’t think I could make it in time for the quest if I quit now. Though I didn't know for sure if it really was the last one. I would at least check out what the room was before making a decision. It took about half an hour but eventually, I managed to put the pieces of my axe self together and they fused seamlessly. I wasn’t sure whether it would still be fragile and required a bit more work though, so I probably shouldn’t use it as a shield again anytime soon. “Well, good enough!” I decided and stored my axe self in my Soul Pocket before getting up and heading to the chest. Just as I’d learned before, I used my hydrokinesis to nudge the plasma out of the way – ugh, so slow... I needed to hurry, the dungeon was about to reset – before walking to the chest and ope– Jeofffff: finally stopped the mimic checks ... Walking to the chest, igniting my hand with black flames and conjuring the black electricity from my glove as well, lifting my hand and then giving it a huge overhead chop. “Hya!” My hand thunked on the black stone of the chest, failing to do any damage. ... Jeofffff: ... ... “Hmm. It didn’t say ‘ow!’, so it can’t be a mimic,” I very smartly declared with a nod. Jeofffff: genius deduction “Thank you, Jeoff,” I said, putting as much exaggerated sincerity into my voice as possible. Then, finally, I opened the chest. What greeted me was a... thorny vine? Wait, it had a handle. “A... whip?” I grabbed the handle and pulled the thing out, careful not to prick myself on the thorns, before looking it over. Both with my eyes and my Ether senses. There was a long but very simple Ether circuit along the whole thing. I tried feeding Ether into it and– The whip suddenly moved, smacking the air in front of me with a loud crack without me even moving my hand. “Wha– Huh... Wait a second...” I tried again, this time being a bit gentler, and sure enough, the whip wiggled in my hands. I tried to be more deliberate with how I injected Ether into it and... GeorgeDoshington: the tentacle queen grows stronger I snorted. But he wasn’t wrong. I was kinda controlling the whole thing like... like my tentacle. Huh. Fascinating. “Neat... I wonder if it does anything else.” Maybe there was poison in these thorns...? Wait, hold up. Was there any poison in the slime woman’s thorned vines? ...I didn’t feel poisoned. Not like back with the archer. Well, unless it was some delayed poison, I was probably fine then. Jeofffff: you’re running out of time btw I jolted at that, remembering the one hour time limit of this dungeon. “Oh, right! Crap! Aaaah, okay. I’ll try this thing later, lemee first check what the next floor looks like!” And if it looked like the final one... I –carefully – put away the thorny whip into my backpack and walked to the door from where I’d come, before grabbing the handle and opening it. What greeted me was... “Oh, damn...” Even fancier than the room I was in, even bigger than the square, even more foreboding than the flying shark room or the dark crater. It was the throne room.