The tunnel still bore scars from the hyenas' assault. Slime ridges sagged where claws had gouged them, cracks marred the walls, and the pit trap lay in ruins. Zeke pulsed faintly in the reservoir, letting cool water soak through him. Every fragment of his mass ached with fatigue. He had won, but victory felt like ash.
"Safety is illusion. Every wall invites teeth."
He slithered to the tunnel mouth, pseudopods smoothing hardened slime into the cracks, layering thin coats the way he had learned with traps. The work steadied him. Each scrape, each seal, was more than maintenance—it was defiance. His nest had been scarred, but it would not be abandoned.
When the tunnel stood reinforced again, he retreated into the chamber and dimmed his glow. Darkness stirred in his core, cold and heavy. He remembered the moment it had awakened—not triumph, but despair. It had come when he nearly gave up, when he had thought survival impossible. Now it hummed like a second heartbeat.
He let it flow. His glow dwindled until the chamber plunged into pitch black. For the first time since awakening, his light no longer betrayed him. He pressed against the wall, nearly indistinguishable from stone. Even his awareness of himself wavered.
"Fire drives me forward. Light ties me to memory. But Darkness… Darkness lets me vanish from the world itself."
Zeke extended a pseudopod, heat curling in his core. He coaxed Fire outward, shaping it through the limb. It flickered clumsily, a faint ember along his membrane. He lashed it against stone. The crack sizzled, soot searing. A faint scorch-mark remained.
"Fire as weapon. Not just hunger—external force."
But it drained mana swiftly. The flame sputtered out, leaving his limb dark and steaming. Fire, he realized, was power—but it burned recklessly.
He brightened his glow abruptly. The chamber flashed white, scattering reflections across slime walls. For a heartbeat, he blinded himself, but the brilliance startled ember-rodents nesting in a fissure. They squealed and scuttled into open ash.
Zeke surged, pseudopods snapping. He engulfed two before the others fled. Their sparks dissolved into him, small but satisfying.
"Light as weapon—not to burn, but to startle, to reveal, to disorient."
Memory stirred with it. He recalled a rooftop, sun glaring off glass, Cass's voice laughing: "You'll fry your brain, idiot." Light had always been memory to him. Now it was also survival.
He dimmed again, deeper than before. Darkness cloaked him, swallowing glow until the chamber vanished. He extended a pseudopod, watching it blur into nothingness. He lashed it—stone cracked, but unseen.
He pushed harder, cloaking fragments as he Split. Two shadows oozed along the wall, edges muted until they seemed part of stone itself. Even he almost lost awareness of where he ended and wall began.
"Darkness conceals. Predators cannot strike what they cannot see. Even prey cannot flee."
First Synergy Attempt
The thought gnawed: "If each affinity is part of me—hunger, memory, concealment—what happens if I weave them together?"
He brightened Light while cloaking in Darkness. The glow flickered, sputtered, then vanished entirely. For one terrifying instant, his body disappeared—not dimmed, not blurred, but gone. Even he could not sense himself.
The silence was suffocating. Then his form snapped back, Light breaking through, Darkness clinging. He pulsed, trembling.
"Light and Darkness cancel. But in the gap between… I was invisible. True concealment. Resonance."
It drained him harshly, mana thinning until sparks leaked. Still, it planted a seed.
He slithered into the ashlands to test. Ember-rodents scurried across soot ridges, sparks glowing faintly.
First, he cloaked in Darkness, dimming until even his glow was swallowed. He crept close unseen. Then he flared Light, just for a heartbeat—rodents froze, blinded. He lashed pseudopods, striking three at once. One burst into sparks under Fire-flame.
The prey dissolved into him, essence warming his core. The hunt had been clean, deliberate, almost surgical.
"Not frenzy. Not gluttony. Precision. Synergy."
Philosophical Reflection
Back in his nest, he pulsed faintly, water rippling around him. He thought of each affinity:
Fire: his hunger, his drive, his pain.
Light: his memory, his hope, his tie to Cass.
Darkness: his concealment, his shield, his silence.
Three parts of him. Three aspects of survival.
"Perhaps brilliance was a lie. I was Asuran once. I burned to climb, to blaze. But here, brightness is death. The ashlands do not reward shining. They reward silence."
He dimmed again, almost smiling. "So let it be shadow that shelters me. Fire will drive me forward. Light will remind me who I was. Darkness will keep me unseen. Together—they are me."
The System stirred.
[WIL +1][CTL +1]
Awareness sharpened. His fragments moved cleaner, threads steadier. His will felt harder, less shaken by despair.
He pulsed faintly, resolve hardening. "I will not burn brighter. I will vanish deeper. Not prey. Not anymore."
System Update
StatusName: Ezekiel AshbourneRace: Prime Slime (Unevolved)Level: 10Affinity: Fire (Basic), Light (Basic), Darkness (Basic)
StatsSTR: 5AGI: 5VIT: 8WIL: 5 → 6RES: 11MNA: 32CTL: 7 → 8
SkillsActive Skills:
Split (Lv.2): Divide body into fragments. Fragments now sustain briefly under Zeke's control but drain mana.
Assimilate (Lv.5): Absorb weak matter or energy to recover energy; chance to retain minor traits. Cleaner, more efficient absorption, but increasingly demanding.
Pseudopod (Lv.5): Extend body into tentacle-like appendages. Whip-like precision and striking power. Limited to two pseudopods.
Passive Skills:
Amorphous Body (Lv.6): Immune to blunt trauma, flexible morphology. Reshapes seamlessly under combat pressure.