Chapter 3 - Mutual consent? What’s that?

“You’re mine now.”

What? Just what? Did she just lay a claim to me? Okay, there is no way that she did that. She really doesn’t get I’m another player does she? And if she does, she realizes that statement sounds a lot like a proposal right?

“Squeak! Squeak Squeak Boing Boing! (Hey! You can’t just claim me, that’s against my human rights!)”

“Mhm. Yep, you’re mine now. Let’s go make it official.”

Yeah, she totally didn’t get a word of what I just said. Shit. I’m not about to become some crazy ass woman’s plaything.

“Squeak! (Bypass!)”

My body started to slip through her fingers and I land on the ground. I immediately set off on a roll to try and escape. My smooth body glides across the ground and I find myself 10 feet away from my starting position.

A shadow finds its way around me, fingers grabbing me soon after.

“Hey, that wasn't nice. Now be a good slime and let me hold you.”

“SQUEAK! Squeak! (NO! Bypass!)”

Once more I set off, this time towards more unstable ground in order to trip the she-devil. It doesn’t take long for her fingers to make their way around me again though.

“Plop. Boing. Squish Squeak. (Ugh. Let me go. I’m a ‘Blessed’ like you.)”

“That better mean, ‘Sorry, Mistress. I won’t run away again.”

“Boing! Plop Plop. Squeak! (No! It Doesn’t mean that. Bypass!)”

“Hey! Why does that have to feel so relaxing every time. You’re messing with me aren’t you! Stop it!”

“Squish Plop! (This girl’s crazy!)”

*************************************************

Hhhhhmmmmmmmmmm. I wonder why this slime keeps trying to slip through my fingers. Does it know that the feeling of its warm slime running through my fingers is very calming? Does she? (Already decided it was a girl? Do you even know if slimes have a gender?) She does, doesn’t she? That’s why she keeps doing it! To relax my guard! Well, I won’t fall for it.

Oh, well. Hhm. Let me think of a name for her. Tina? Cherry? Agape? -snicker- Yeah, let’s go with Agape. She’s totally agape. (Author’s note: agape can mean; an unselfish love of one person for another without sexual implications; brotherly love. Equal love for all.)

Hehehehehehe. At least she will be when I’m done with her.

Crap. She started to slip through my fingers again. Must have gotten back enough whatever that skill she’s using needs.

And catch!

“Geez, Agape. Don’t go running off like that. I can’t protect you from the monsters that live in this forest if you go too far. A girl like you needs to be protected.”

“Squish? Plop? BOING PLOP BOING!”

“Yep! I know. Now be careful. We’re almost out of the forest and once we get to town the guards might think to hurt a lone roaming monster. But don’t worry, soon you’ll be able to be protected by me forever. Hehehehe. I’ll be your white knight, Princess Agape.”

“Boing Boing? Plop Squish. BOING SQUEAK!”

Awwwwwwww. She’s being so vocal. She must love me too.

“Mhm. I love you too, but you don’t have to be so expressive about it. I’ll blush. Oh look, the village.”

“Sque…...Plop.”

Wow this time the walk seemed so much faster. Must be because I had some company. Yay! No more boredom.

At least for a little while.

Ahhhhhhh. There’s the pet shop. Woot now Agape can be with me forever. And the lady at the counter is just the person who can help me bind us together.

“Hey. Hey. Hey, Miss? Lady? How do I make her” I lift up Agape who glares at the lady for some reason “into my pet?”

“To begin the ceremony is easy. You must first select a monster or egg you’d like to make your pet. You seem to have already done this, so you can skip that. Next you need to make a cut and exchange blood in order to create a pact between the two of you.”

“Hhm, exchange blood? That does sound simple. But ummmmm? Do slimes even bleed?-Hey! Agape don’t you dare run away again.”

“Well in the case of your slime, I bet its ectoplasm would work the same as blood for the sake of this ceremony.”

“Agape! Stop glaring at the nice lady, now be still. Wait, Miss, can I borrow a knife?”

“A knife? You didn’t already have one? How’d you manage to get the slime without one?”

“Embarrassing to say, I don’t have a weapon to my name. I got this little beauty of a slime through sheer persistence. And a lot of effort. Mostly stubbornness though. Yeah, mostly stubbornness.”

The lad’s eyes glaze over a little at my statement. As she hands over a ceremonial knife she says, “Here just take it. I know it’s not much but this will at least be better than having nothing.

Kira’s Ceremonial KnifeAttack:1-2Durability:36 / 50Quality:YellowA pet ceremonial knife. It’s higher ranking is due to the quality material used in the making of the knife resulting in its higher durability. Kira’s last knife broke from overuse so durability became a priority when acquiring a new one. Kira gave you this knife from pity. Don’t waste such a precious gift.

Hohohohohoho. My situation probably isn’t as bad as the lady thinks it is, but whatever. No way am I letting free equipment slip through my fingers!

Persuasion was successful resulting in the acquiring Kira’s Ceremonial Knife. The creator’s watch this and decide to reward you for your action.

+3 Charisma

Okkaayyyyyyyy Oh well. With a quick prick, I stabbed a small hole in the exterior of Agape. Letting a tiny dribble of liquid plop out.

“BOING BOING SQUEAK!”

“Sorry, that must have hurt. It’ll all be over soon.”

I bite my finger quickly and press our blood? liquids? together to mix and form an unbreakable bond with each other.

Pet Ceremony failed

Hhmmmmmmmmmm. Well that’s weird. Let’s try again.

Pet Ceremony failed

Again?

Pet Ceremony failed

Pet Ceremony failed

Pet Ceremony failed x ???(let’s just say a lot)

“Squeak, Boing ‘Plop Plop’. Squish Plop Doing.”

“You’re right. If the pet ceremony doesn’t work, let’s give it up.”

“Squeak, Plop.”

“Let’s get married instead! I bet you this game allows same sex marriage anyway~”

“Pl-squeak?”

“I’ll take that as a yes!”

“SQUEAK!”

“I know my love. Soon the world will approve of our union. It was meant to be. I mean, why else wouldn’t the pet ceremony work?”

“Plop boing! BOING SQUISH PLOP!”

Her squeaks are so adorable. I can’t wait to get married so that I can finally hear her sweet words of love. Soon my love, soon.

The road to the church is well worn and my feet make their way smoothly to it. I’m almost home! Wait then that means……..

“Agape! Look there’s our home! I hope you’ll like living with me from now on!”

“Mother! I’m back!”

A figure joins me in the interior of the church. “Oh, welcome back. Lafayette? Is that a slime? Why’d you bring a monster back with you? Why didn’t the village guards stop you?”

“Pffffffftttttttt, village guards. I told them I planned on making this shy cutie pie my pet, so they let me bring it in.”

“I see. Then why isn’t it your pet yet?”

“That’s the funny thing. The pet ceremony failed. So, I thought the next best thing was marraige!”

Mother looks at Agape with a look of understanding. A conversation seems to be held between them. Grrrrrrrrrr. Why does she get to understand my pet/wife before me? Meany Mother. Stupid Agape.

A smile comes to the mother’s lips. Creepy.

“Understood. Well then, would you like to begin the ceremony?”

Agape’s eyes jump wide open as she squeals her cute noises. “Squeak! Plop Plop Doing!”

“Yes! Let’s begin this. I want me and Agape’s love official!”

“Then come here.” She grabs a book from the altar and begins reading a passage from it. “As the Great Ivy-Turtle bond himself to the Holy Medley Tree through blood, so too shall you. Let this vine hold your connection to each other as the vines surrounding our village holds us together.

The Mother slices both of us with her nail drawing blood from my palm and the slime from Agape’s body. Mixing the liquids together and she then wrapped my hand with vines linking together me and Agape’s wounds.

“With the blessing of Wood and Life given to us may your union prosper and love come to fruition.”

“Do you, Lafayette Ellywn Dreizel, take this slime to be your lifelong companion in both this world and the next?”

“Oh hell, YES!”

“Do you slime take this gnome before you as your lifelong companion in both this world and the next?”

“SQUEAK! Boing Plop!”

A look is given between the Mother and my love. Gosh her loving squeaks are making me blush.

“I now announce your union approved and the blessings of the Godbeasts shall pass through this bond. Giving proof to your love.”

Congratulations. You have now been married to the slime, Slash Steelwater. Through this union you have gained the blessings of both Wood and Life. Marriage related skills have also been gained. May your marriage be blessed with love and happiness.

Blessing Name:Blessing of LifeBlessing Rank:OrangeDue to being married in a church following the Godbeast of Life, you have been bestowed his blessing. The bond between your partner, Slash Steelwater, affects the effectiveness of this blessing. Current bond percentage is 3%.

H. Recovery +5% +10 Health +5% Life Resistance

Blessing Name:Blessing of WoodBlessing Rank:OrangeDue to being married in a church following the Godbeast of Wood, you have been bestowed his blessing. The bond between your partner, Slash Steelwater, affects the effectiveness of this blessing. Current bond percentage is 3%.

P. Defense +5% Speed in forests +5% +5% Wood Resistance

A reward has been given as you are eighth set Blessed to get married.

+10 Fame +1 Charisma

A low tenor rings in my ear, “Noooooooooooooo! I can’t believe it. I play for a single fucking day and I’m already married. And what that about being the eighth people to get married? The game hasn’t even been out for 3 hours irl!”

“How eager are these people? God, why’d this have to happen? All I wanted to do was relax in this game and now I’m married to this crazy bitch. My life sucks. God damn it!”

Crazy. Bitch. -twitch- I might be crazy but I ain’t no bitch. Looks like this kid needs to learn some manners. Wait. Was that Agape?”

“Agape? Why do you sound like a boy?”

“Ohhh. So, she can finally understand what I say. I guess one good thing came out of this. And crazy bitch. I don’t just sound like a guy. I am a guy. An almost eighteen year old high schooler that is this close from rage quitting this game due to your inability to tell the difference between the blessed and the rest of the population.”

Sniff, does he have to be so mean about it?

“I just thought the AI’s were really good.” Tears start to bubble to my eyes. “I’ve never been good at figuring things out. I’m sorry. I’m sorry I’m so dense.” Water starts to trickle down my face and my nose sniffles from the action.

“Good going young man, now you made her cry.”

For once the Mother actually seems nice. No wait, she’s still got that shadow smile on her face. Nevermind.

“Ugh, sorry. But, seriously you just forced me into marrying you.”

“I’m sorry. I’m sorry. It’s just when I saw you, you were so cute, with the adorable noises you made. And then when I hugged you, your body was so warm and comfy; I couldn’t help it! Wahhhhhh!”

“Ummm. Please stop crying, please. I forgive you okay, so can you please stop crying. It’s getting annoying.”

“Sniff. If you promise not to yell at me anymore.”

“I’ll try.”

“And if you promise to stay with me and not delete your character.”

“No.”

“Wahhhhhhhhhh!”

“Fine. Fine. Fine. I promise to stay with you, okay? Just stop crying.”

I immediately stop crying. My tears get wiped away as a smile grows upon my face, no trace of my depression from earlier. Yay! Not only did I get a pet, I even got a person to accompany and entertain myself with.

Making Agape my pet worked out way better than I planned it to.

“We’re going to be really good friends Agape.”

“My names not Agape, it’s Da-I mean Slash. Geez I got to get used to having a new name.”

****************************************************

(While this catastrophe was happening, another just as equally ‘heart wrenching’ story was taking place not even twenty miles out from Slash’s home clearing.)

So out of complete curiosity, I chose to go random. Which might have been a mistake, now that I’m stuck in this situation.

It’s all my sister’s fault for saying such an ominous thing.

I skipped my classes for the day in order to be stuck in this situation. Wish I had a time-machine to prevent this mistake. Specially one with a guy with very nice hair or maybe a bowtie.

Yeah like that’s gonna happen. I’m not the companion type anyway.

But seriously, a time-machine would be nice right now.

Back to the main point. Choosing random for my race proved to be a very stupid decision to make. I’m not horribly disfigured like my sister so kindly jinxed me. No, instead I’d consider myself quite beautiful.

To look at. And nothing more.

Because I’m a tree. I can’t move at all except in a direction for growing my branches or because a breeze went by.

I mean it isn’t all bad. I got what I wished for.

A super ultra rare race. My stats are so broken I could only be considered an OP character. Heck my racial abilities by themselves make me a God. Heh. I made a joke. Why?

Because I am a God. My race happens to be one of the Godbeasts.

When I first logged in I checked my status and the notification that popped up along with it.

Status WindowName:Gummi LifeRace:Medley TreeGender:FFame:0Level:Experience:0(100)Guild:n/aSpouse:n/aJob:Life’s ApprenticeAlignmentGood:[Unknown]Neutral:[Unknown]Evil:[Unknown]TitlesSapling GodbeastStatsHealth:340 / 340H. Recovery:30 per min.Magic:180 / 180M. Recovery:36 per min.Energy:190 / 190E. Recovery:25 per min.P. Attack:22M. Attack:26P. Defense:46M. Defense:46Speed:2Dexterity:5AttributesAgility:13Charisma:15Intelligence:13Luck:[Unknown]Resilience:9Stamina:14Strength:11Wisdom:14Unattributed Attributes Points:0Elemental ResistancesFire:10%Lightning:10%Metal:10%Water:10%Wind:10%Wood:10%Light:10%Darkness:10%Earth:10%Moon:10%Sun:10%Life:100%

As the first character to become a Godbeast you are awarded.

+10,000 fame +20 to all Attributes(except luck) Exp.

I mean that’s great and all but………...y’know…..I’m a tree. I can’t really kick any ass like this. I can’t even move to metaphorically kick any ass.

Even if my bonus just made me even more of a badass. I’m probably the most powerful character right now.

The game just started, so with these stats, it’s the only possibility. Which sucks because then how the hell am I supposed to die? The realism they’re trying to add to this game only sucks in this situation. Because in order to start a new character, this character, with god awful high stats, needs to die.

Which is getting harder by the minute.

I’m growing. Yep, I’m growing. Due to this game’s variety of races a player can become, leveling can be customized to the race. Because without it, leveling could become a pain for some races.

This means, as a tree, I gain experience by just existing. In layman’s terms, I’m leveling without doing shit. I could log out right now and I’d still be able to level.

Which brings us to why I haven’t logged out yet. I decided to use the real life to game time distortion to my advantage. By doing my planning here, I get more thought for my hour in solving this problem of mine.

The best plan I’ve got is using one of my racial skills.

Skill Name:Skill Rank:Skill Level:Skill Experience:Form ShiftClear10%Long ago, the Trees to better hold their powers changed into different forms. This becoming an innate ability of the Trees. Due to your weak powers using this skill won't draw it is full potential. Use with cautionCost:5,000 M.

Problem with this plan being that I don’t have enough magic to use it. 5,000? Hello? Quite certain no one has that……...Ugh, that’s gonna take a while to get to that amount. 452 levels to be exact.

That is if I didn’t put any points into intelligence, wisdom, or resilience.

And if I put all of the points into them, by my calculations, I’d have to play for a little under a year in this game. Which doing that is both a waste of points and a waste of time. Who cares if that’s only two and a half real world months.

I can’t just keep skipping class because of this setback. What about Finals?

Ugh, let’s just not care. This place is kind of pretty anyway.

My parent? was right above me towering over the entire area with its massive body. Branches of various different species mingled together to form one heck of a unique looking tree. The few breeds I can recognize are the japanese cherry blossom, spruce, pine, an apple? branch, and just out of sight I think I see a coconut tree’s leaves.

Geez, that’s one crazy tree. Wait, I shouldn’t insult it considering that’s what I’m going to look like one day. Plus it somehow made me and is my parent right?

Why’s that not a pleasant thought?

I’ve got to stop having these pessimistic thoughts.

Once I think that, over in the brush various figures make their way through. Furry bodies, tufts of black and white, tumbled onto the ground. Growling and yipping comes from the swirling mass of fur.

After a while, their forms started to come more into focus. More like once they tired of playing, the beasts stopped moving around as much.

A shadow of a wolf. That’s all these giant balls of fluff could be called. Their snouts were shorter than a normal canine’s as well as its coloration. Instead of the wide range of colors a wolf can normally be found, this new species seemed to contain only two.

Boots of black attached to a body of white. Eyes set deep in the color of the night. Even its rounded ears were tinged in the color. Two rows of teeth, one on top of the other. Giant and razor sharp. Clearly designed for shredding and tearing. The creature's’ size was massive, dwarfing my tiny form.

It’s fur was longer than normal as well. Inky in look and if I had the balls, probably smooth in texture too. Their tails a stump compared to the long appendage usually found on its kind.

Layman’s terms. It’s a grotesque mixture between a wolf and a panda. Clearly something got screwed up in the mixing process. The designers really put some effort into creating something so unique. Bet you they named it a Panda-Wolf or something of the like.

“Hello, Young One.”

Oh Shit! Where’d that voice come from! As a tree, it’s very hard to sneak on my 360° view. You’ve won this time mysterious woman’s voice.

Whew. Out of thin air another one of those panda wolf things showed up. Of course it had to be a larger version. Probably the other one’s mom or something.

“Welcome to the forest. How do you enjoy it?”

I’d answer if I could, but I can’t. I’m a tree. Trees don’t really talk very much to my knowledge.

:If you think trees don’t talk, then you’re just not listening hard enough.”

Double shit. Did this thing just answer to my thoughts?

“Is it really that surprising? I-”

Yes!

“Well aren’t you excited. Due to your father being busy, I came to guide you. Is there anything you’d like to know, young one?”

Yes, oh yes. I’m wondering is there anyway to be able to move that doesn’t involve waiting a year to just be able to use ?

“There is. It’s a skill that will take a little effort to get to the point you wish to use though. Is that okay with you?”

At this point, I don’t care. You can only make notes about the same tree only so many times before you grow crazy.

“Okay then.”

A ding goes off in my head. No hesitation as I open the notification.

Skill Name:Skill Rank:Skill Level:Skill Experience:Spirit FormOrange10%A favorite Divine ability of the PandaWolf. As the creator of this skill taught you it with the intention of teaching you, the skill you've learnt is a downgraded version of the original. By projecting your mental energy, a spiritual form can be created that can affect your surrounding. (Able to affect: n/a)Cost:10 E.

I knew it! PandaWolf! How ‘creative’.

****************************************************

Off in a dark corner of the many worlds, a scratchy voice spoke ominous words. “The balance has been broken.” The sentence sending the voice into a fit of coughing.

“Sniff. I hate being sick.”

________________________________________

I'd like to say that this chapter is late due to rl problems. Which isn't false. I was busy making my Halloween costume and getting a few extra hours in at work. But it's mostly late due to procrastination.