I Am Not Goblin Slayer

Chapter 426: The Maze, Fifth Level

A day passed in the blink of an eye.Aside from being punched once by Gauss, Serlandul showed no other physical abnormalities. After much consideration and discussion, Gauss and the others decided today would be the day to open the fifth-level gate of the Maze.

To be precise, it had been almost a week since the battle that ended with the Magic Frog Lord.

The number of people entering the fourth level of the Maze continued to grow.

Now newcomers in the Red Dragon Guild also knew that the current guidelines were for exploring the Maze’s fourth level.

"Ready?"

Gauss looked around at his companions.

Although it had been a week of hard work, compared to fighting and marching, this felt like a different kind of labor.

Seeing his teammates nod quickly, he felt reassured.

He raised his right hand and cast his spell.

"Light Cantrip!"

Gauss released magic, summoning several floating, burning-white light spheres that banished the surrounding dimness.

They had come out into an incredibly spacious cavern. The air was cold, and water droplets constantly trickled down the stalactite columns above.

"Plop! Plop!"

Droplets hit the ground and splashed.

Suddenly, Gauss spoke up, "Watch out!"

He glanced up.

Clusters of Slime were descending toward the very exit he had just stepped through.

"Bigby’s Hand!"

Gauss cast the spell, and a huge hand condensed into shape, covering the passageway.

Numerous Slimes still hadn’t finished reacting.

"Grab!"

Before those Slimes could counterattack, the enormous palm smashed down with brutal force.

"Ptooey!!!"

Countless Slimes burst like overripe fruit.

The sticky juices dripped between the giant hand’s fingers.

Gauss casually checked the Monster Encyclopedia.

Just that one crushing grasp had killed dozens of Slimes.

Under the effect of Gauss’s fifth-circle spell, they had been far too weak.

At the same time, other members of the Red Dragon Guild who had recovered from their surprise tightened their grips on weapons and launched attacks on Slimes hiding in crevices around the cavern.

Arrows and spells flew toward the ceiling.

Slimes hiding in rock fissures and piles of weeds were rooted out, pierced through with swords.

Gauss’s gaze fixed on the largest Slime at the rear.

Its diameter was roughly two meters.

It was the biggest Slime Gauss had seen since becoming an adventurer.

Slimes are one of the common low-tier monsters.

Compared with Goblins, they don’t usually organize to raid villages or caravans, so they aren’t as conspicuous.

In fact, most Slimes reaching such size were rare occurrences.

This Slime, however, was unusually massive.

Gauss’s Awareness picked up something as he watched the creature move.

Suddenly, a shallow depression two to three dozen centimeters deep opened in front of it.

Stronger Slimes often left traces of their movement like this.

Then, several sticky, twitching slime tentacles flailed crazily through the air.

"Diamond Palm!"

With Gauss’s thought, the palm—its surface growing harder in an instant—fell with a speed wholly inconsistent with its enormous size.

Under the palm, the very air seemed to be sucked away.

"Boom!!"

The cavern trembled twice.

When the air settled, Bigby’s Hand lifted, and the Slime had been pulverized into a slag heap, dead beyond rescue.

Although it was rare for a Slime to reach such strength, Gauss showed no mercy.

Slimes were not a benevolent race.

They did not actively attack human settlements under normal circumstances, but their poor information-gathering meant that if they encountered humans in the wild they would still seize the chance for nutrition.

Research suggested the Slime’s path to strength involved gradually increasing their affinity for mana and raising intelligence; killing other sentient beings was a shortcut for them.

Silently, Gauss pocketed the fragmented Slime cores into his Storage Bag.

He scanned the rest of the cavern; the other Slimes were dispatched by the Red Dragon Guild members in very short order.

"Let’s rest a bit."

Gauss instructed everyone to clean up the area around the cavern.

If nothing unexpected happened, this place would become a base camp for later adventurers on the fifth level.

He then took out his Crystal Orb to check the map.

If he wasn’t mistaken, this location matched the position displayed on the map relative to where they had come from.

Since Gauss and the others were eager to set off, and he also needed to confirm the cavern’s safety, they didn’t linger unnecessarily.

After leaving the cavern, moss and puddles dotted the terrain.

Frogs, mosquitoes...

Gauss decisively raised his right hand. The back of his hand glowed faintly.

It was a perfect moment to test something.

Soon, hundreds of insects and small creepy-crawlies swarmed and buzzed around, but after the Weaver’s Mark upgraded, the effect was noticeably different.

Previously, he could hear the chaotic noise of insects, which irritated him.

Now, under the control of his talent, even those insects without independent consciousness emitted clear sounds.

Of course the insects hadn’t changed—the talent had grown stronger, and when "communicating" with them, he could control or assist them.

From now on, he and his companions would no longer be troubled by mosquitoes or poisonous insects.

Against insect-type monsters that had independent awareness, he could use the Weaver’s Mark to interfere with their judgment by disrupting their sounds.

Through communication with the insects, Gauss learned which monster types were most numerous on this level.

Unlike the fourth level, there were two dominant monster groups on the fifth level.

One was the Slime clan they had just encountered at the exit.

The damp environment of the fifth level was extremely suitable for Slimes to breed. The only reason this relatively weak low-tier species could flourish was their prodigious reproductive capacity.

Like Goblins...

The other dominant group was an entirely different species.

From the insects’ reports, Gauss learned more about them.

Outside the Maze, even experienced adventurers and researchers rarely encountered such creatures, and even if they did, they often underestimated the threat.

Gauss had only observed them briefly before, but their rapid regeneration and group tactics made the species dangerous.

These creatures could infect other beings and convert them into spore thralls.

Those spore thralls varied in strength; some were weak, others far stronger.

After receiving the information, Gauss had Shadow use her talent to quickly scout the surroundings with him.

The number of wild animals on the fifth level exceeded that of the fourth.

Gauss also discovered something that surprised him.

He saw a large number of Slimes that had been domesticated.

Some were in caverns like the one they had emerged from; others were crowded inside a massive pit.

Countless spherical Slimes writhed quickly within.

In other words, the insect reports had a slight bias: Slimes did indeed rival the mushroom creatures in numbers, but the Slimes were being farmed.

Obviously, Slimes would not crawl into pens by themselves.

And besides the mushroom creatures, the only ones capable of such husbandry were those more intelligent fungoid beings.

Were the Slimes being raised as a food reserve?

Gauss felt a flicker of curiosity.

Although he knew there were high-intelligence monster races, seeing the concept of livestock-raising—something he associated with humans—in the monsters’ behavior left him a little stunned.

Soon, his theory was confirmed.

A three-meter-tall mushroom person emerged slowly from the grass like an old farmer. It stood at the rim of the huge pit, peered down at the mass of Slimes, and then...