“No more… eating?” The Slime Abomination asked, confusion, reluctance and discomfort clear in its tone, which was quite something considering its lack of Soul and inability to feel most emotions. Perhaps if it could feel the more intricate emotions like a normal living being could it would have yelled out with despair, something that Eridel found quite amusing.

He had been silently studying the Abomination this entire time and had learnt quite a bit, and it seemed that short from death, nothing truly worried it. At the end of the day, no matter how smart it had become because of its many brains, it was still an Abomination and its only desires were to devour more and more life force and obtain more and more evolutions. Nothing else.

“You can still eat, but only within the boundaries I have set.” Eridel said with a smile.

“...You want me to guard the Continent?” The Slime Abomination asked.

“Yes.”

“Why me? Why not the Cloud?”

“I already have other plans for Theo, he’s needed elsewhere. And so, what better than the next strongest being on the continent to become its guardian?”

For a moment there was silence.

“...You keep addressing the Cloud as ‘he’, it has a gender?” the Slime Abomination suddenly asked.

Eridel blinked. “...Not really. Not yet at least.” He hadn’t expected such a question.

“Then why do you say ‘he’?” the Abomination pressed.

Eridel looked up to the sky as his right eye twitched.

“That is not something that you need to worry about, child. Instead, you should be thinking about your new duties as a Guardian.”

Eridel was absolutely not going to tell it that he had simply assumed the cloud’s gender.

“But that is not my purpose.” The Slime Abomination responded. “My purpose is to harvest life and all the power it has to offer. Even before I became an Abomination and I was just a lowly Slime Monster, the only thing I knew was to kill.”

‘So it’s aware of its identity as an Abomination… Most aren't.’ Eridel thought.

Most Abominations across the universe were unaware of what they had become. Even the intelligent and self-aware ones were commonly deluded, thinking that they were perfectly fine even if they were most certainly not. It was like something was preventing them from knowing what they truly were and it was an oddity that even the golden orb that had granted him so much knowledge had not provided any info on. However, clearly, the Slime Abomination was a cut above those deluded Abominations.

‘Well it’s not too surprising. With the amount of intelligence that it amassed in all this time, it can probably still utilise the System.’

“I’m sure you’ll pick up a thing or 2 once you get a brand new Soul.” he said out loud. “Either way you can’t refuse, so you better start thinking.”

“...How do we start?” the Slime Abomination said after a while.

Eridel pointedly gazed at the Wraith King before him whose intangible cloak was still fluttering wildly, albeit not as bad as before.

“You can start by getting out of that body first. I’ll be waiting for you at the cave.”

With a single thought, his body was replaced by beautiful golden lights that showered his surroundings in a fantastical display of might. Eventually the lights disappeared and he was nowhere to be found. But in reality, he had already relocated himself to the cave he had sealed the Slime Abomination’s true body in.

Slumped ahead of him was the giant form of the Slime Abomination in all of its pulsing and sticky glory. It was of course still wrapped by the Golden chains that sealed most of its capabilities and nothing had changed at all.

He was still unable to read the Abomination’s mind, but he had been suspecting that the main reason that it had chosen to make the Wraith King an Original Undead instead of a corpse was because it had the desire to escape. Perhaps it thought that it could find a method to escape using the Wraith King’s body. Something utterly futile.

Well, whatever the case. There was no longer a need to escape, Eridel was going to let it out himself.

The truth of all this was that he just wanted to see if it was possible for something that was ‘alive’ but without a Soul to become an Anomaly. And what better target than the Slime Abomination? If the transformation was successful, the Slime Abomination would become something so special that even calling it a Calamity Grade Abomination would become a mockery. To have such a thing under his control was not something he was easily willing to give up.

A few more seconds passed before the heavy chains moved and emitted loud sounds that signified the fact that the Slime Abomination had returned its consciousness to its body. It wiggled for a moment in what seemed to be the equivalent of a stretch before settling down.

“It’s good to see you. Are you ready?” Eridel asked as a grin once more crept its way across his face. He was very excited to see what would happen. If the process failed, the Slime Abomination would likely die and it would be a rather great loss. After all, Calamity Grade Abominations didn’t grow on trees. But if he succeeded…

“No. I would like-” the Slime Abomination began

“Great! What a courageous and valiant young kid! Let’s get started!” Eridel interrupted, completely ignoring the Abominations troubles.

“Brace yourself!” He yelled with an exhilarated voice and a wild grin as he lifted his arms up to the sky.

WHOOOOOOOOM!

Suddenly, enormous amounts of Magical Energy began to flood the cave, and it was so quick that in a span of a few seconds, the amount of Magical Energy in the area had become so concentrated that it began to become visible.

The cave was suddenly filled with golden mist, the sparkling and ethereal kind that you would expect to be surrounding precious treasures or lucky items. And all of it was being vacuumed into the Slime Abomination’s body!