Slime Evolution

Chapter 396 - Company for the Night

Night fell over Thalendor in a way Lohan could only describe as a spectacle.

While his consciousness stayed split, with his clones scattered throughout the Broken Suns’ base, monitoring every hallway and whispered conversation among the rival guild’s members, his main slime body remained nearby, in the elven capital’s residential district.

He wasn’t alone, Lisa stayed with him the whole time.

Honestly, there was no real need for her to stay there with him through the whole night. Lohan could stay motionless, anchored to a suspended walkway, focusing most of his energy on keeping the data transmission active. However, she’d refused to leave him alone from the moment Alice and Dylan logged off from the game to rest.

”Lisa, you don’t need to sit here watching my gelatin all night,” Lohan said over the mental link, his tone carrying a gentle amusement. ”Your experience bar is really close to leveling up, why don’t you use this quiet night to head over to Mythlorien and farm a bit of experience with some monsters? With your current firepower, you could clear out a few Cockatrice nests on your own with ease.”

Lisa turned her fox head toward him, her golden eyes gleaming in the bluish dimness of the magical night. She let out a lazy huff and lay down on the wooden walkway, letting her two tails sway slowly over the edge of the structure.

”Really, Halon? You really think I’m going to leave you here abandoned on the ground?” Lisa shot back, her tone mixing her usual teasing with a closeness Lohan had been noticing more and more since their trip to the Lower Zone and the dinner that followed. ”If some Thalendor guard walks by and sees an ownerless blue slime that can’t speak for itself near the residences, they might decide you’re a wild pest and sweep you out of the city before you can even show your card.”

Lohan formed a small gelatin hand and made a thumbs up in the air. ”Your concern for my safety is really touching, Madam President. But I know deep down you just want an excuse not to face those bugs in the forest without my sacred light massage to ease the tension in your paws.”

”Silence, stubborn thing,” she replied, though the fur around her cheeks bristled slightly, giving away the blush she was trying to hide in the darkness. ”I’m tired of grinding for today. And Thalendor’s night is too beautiful to be wasted on the noise of screams and monster blood.”

She stood back up, stretching her slender body with a grace Lohan quietly admired.

Without him needing to ask, she came closer and let him climb onto her back, sliding his mass into the most comfortable spot between the fox’s shoulder blades. With Lohan firmly anchored, they began walking slowly along the walkways connecting the metropolis’s different sectors.

The nighttime stroll through Thalendor revealed a side of the city they hadn’t explored yet.

Practically the entire elf and merchant population was asleep, tucked away in homes carved directly into the interior of the colossal trees.

However, being a magical city, the darkness was never complete. Organic lampposts and glowing vines reacted to the ambient mana, giving off a soft light that shifted between sky blue and pale gold, casting intricate shadows across the suspended vine bridges. Every now and then, a guard in silver armor would pass by them in silence, at first eyeing the pair with suspicion, but then nodding once he recognized their cards.

”Thalendor really is a dream compared to our reality,” Lisa murmured over the link, her voice lower and more intimate as she watched the magical mist drifting over the floating gardens. ”In the real world, the lights of the Upper Zone are just the result of noisy generators and the consumption of resources that destroy planets fast. Here, the light feels like it’s part of the very life of the place.”

”Yeah, it’s a huge contrast,” Lohan agreed, feeling the walk calm his mind, worn out from continuously monitoring the clones. At this hour of the night most of the Broken Suns members were asleep, so he could ease up on the surveillance a bit. ”The air here is so sweet that sometimes I forget my real life is in an apartment, which as nice as it is, is still surrounded by smoke and drone noise. Spending time here with you... makes this world feel a lot more real than the other one.”

Lisa slowed her pace as they crossed a polished wooden bridge running over a crystal waterfall.

The water fell into a natural basin of fossilized stone, reflecting the glow of the three great moons floating in Elysium’s sky. She stopped at the edge of the walkway, looking at their reflection in the water.

”Our day in the Lower Zone... and that dinner...” Lisa began, her voice hesitating for a second as one of her tails brushed lightly against the side of Lohan’s body. ”I’ve been thinking about it while I was in that meeting... even though we ended up having fun in that situation, I was really embarrassed about how things ended at that restaurant. I wanted to show you a friendlier side of my world, but all I managed to do was drag you into the middle of an ego contest.”

Lohan subtly expanded his mass, wrapping around her neck in a liquid, refreshing embrace that made her give a slight shiver of surprise. ”Don’t talk like that, Lisa. The dinner might have been a disaster because of those people, but the day we spent together was the best day I’ve had in many years. Watching you open up to me, laughing for real in the car, and showing that the Ice Queen is actually just an incredible girl... that was worth so much more than any expensive meal.”

Isabella felt her cheeks heat up intensely beneath her white fur.

Lohan’s physical closeness, his blue gelatin wrapping around her back so enveloping, brought a feeling of comfort she’d never experienced with anyone else in the real world.

It was a mix of safety and attraction that left her defenseless against his unpretentious charm.

’You really do know how to disarm my guard, Halon...’ she whispered in her mind, a small smile forming on her fox muzzle as she leaned against the vine railing.

They stayed there, watching the crystal water flow beneath Thalendor’s bridges, talking about their hopes for the guild, exchanging light teasing, and discovering small nuances of each other’s personalities.