The creature noted in the initial droning of the fracture was not the one in front of me.

A slime creature pulls itself out of one of the puddles and jiggles towards me. I step away as it advances because I don't want it to damage my shoes more than the fracture already does. Duchess uses her [Telekinesis] to pick the creature up.

It's a [Toxic Slime]. They are a creature that can be artificially created. They are formed from rich mana environments and toxic pools. Their rank is determined by the type of toxin, poison, venom, pollution, etc, that they were born from.

It's about half the size of the pool, so roughly the size of a person.

[It weighs a little under seven hundred pounds.]

Noted. Thanks, Duchess. They eat anything and produce toxins similar to the ones they were born from. Since they can eat anything, they usually eat the toxins, allowing a perpetual consumption cycle.

But unlike the undead, these creatures don't break the conservation of energy law. They will eat anything and everything they come across to offset that imbalance... typically other slimes, but in this case, me and my shoes.

If we leave its 'detection range,' it should forget about us.

Alchemists love these bastards because they can be 'tamed' and harvested for materials like you would milk a bovine. A weird, gelatinous, poison-spewing bovine.

If left unchecked, they will spread their toxins as they consume more and more things... This place seems scarce for food since this guy looks pretty grown, but the puddle isn't much 'bigger' than the others. Some of the other pools might have these guys as well.

I wonder what these floors are made of.

I took a sample from the hard floor. It's pretty strenuous, but I got a sliver of stone. After analyzing it, I discovered that the stone is both toxic and resistant to corrosives due to heavy exposure over an unmeasurable period. Mana does strange things.

It's called [Toxogneiss], which 'literally' means 'toxic rock.' More specifically, "a type of toxic rock typically found in high-pressure environments commonly found deep underground."

Unironically, finding out how deep we are to the 'surface' from geology might be something I would've otherwise overlooked. My [Lexicon] tells me traditional gneiss forms 12 to 15 miles deep, so getting to the surface might be a lost cause.

I'm not tunneling that far. The interns or whoever the hazard branch hires to do menial labor can do it.

Duchess puts the slime back where we found it, and we distance ourselves. The last thing I want to do before leaving the fracture for our first day is to find the noted creature.

A [Toxic Specter] is the creature noted. From what I know about them, they are inhabitants of usually poisonous swamps as they gain 'tangibility' only when in a toxic environment. Since I haven't seen any, they must be hiding.

They are technically undead, but calling them elementals wouldn't be incorrect. Instead of death miasma - like traditional undead - they are born from toxic energies, which puts them in a grey area regarding specific classification. I'd say they are an elemental undead, not an undead elemental. Semantics aside, they don't have much value.

Unlike the slime, which can be milked theoretically infinitely, the spirits don't have loot beyond the rare crystal. Technically, you can capture their death burst since they explode when they die. That earns you a concentrated toxin, but that's an annoying harvesting method.

Hmmm... The light show Duchess pulled off scared them away, especially since her magics carry the [Holy] attribute. That's my guess. If anything, I should have been instantly attacked since I'm a juicy target for the undead. Perhaps their elemental nature negates that part of them...

We'll find answers later. Or right now.

I ride Duchess up, and her shield blows all the toxic clouds away. The air is getting tainted, but Flash Gordon replenishes the fresh oxygen.

Just ten feet above the cloud layer, screams are audible as ghostly apparitions slam their faces on Duchess' shield like its glass. Their faces are humanoid in distinction only. Holes instead of eyes, slivers of emptiness instead of nostrils, no teeth, but the mouth seems to contort and stretch.

I never had this urge before, but I pull out my phone and snap a picture. Dozens of fucked up, slightly humanoid creatures pressed up against a barrier a few feet from you is something you don't see every day.

Duchess shoots a ray of light into the crowd. The piercing light eradicated every undead that touched it. Their eyes filled with holy flame as their screams of the damned turned into screams of pain. Her [Holy] ray did critical damage and one-shot multiple [Toxic Spectors C Lv200].

A ray-shaped line in the clouds shows where the clouds were displaced. Or rather, burned away. It left a sizable hole in the specters' bodies. They all burst into fumes, fixing the hole and dispersing more toxins into the air. Crystals hail from the sky, so Duchess catches them with her mind.

"Nice."

She gives me half a dozen crystals. That's enough. We descend to the fracture's exit and leave.

~~~

After creating an immaculate report and filing some paperwork, I send the copies to the relevant departments. My fracture manager got a copy of my report and called me after reading it.

"Did you really do all that?"

"Yeah."

"Sick. If acquisition tries to gimp you of needed resources again, tell me. I'll fuck them up."

"How."

"Take it up with HR. They love pushing their power around and punishing employees who aren't doing their jobs properly. Btw, the lunch rush hasn't started if you're hungry."

I hang up and text Rain.

[Do you need a [Toxic Slime] or 90ish toxins in liquid and aerosol form?]

[No. I already have those things.]

[Oh, okay. I need more mana potions.]

[I'll start charging you.]

[Blood.]

[I'll send them over the next time you call for a court meeting.]

I then text Charlie.

[What's the market for crystals?]

[What kind?]

[Any.]

[They always sell, eventually. Is Flash Gordon producing Rank A's yet?]

[No.]

[Okay, I'm already working on getting buyers. Some of the frequent customers of the guild shop are already hooked... They want necromantic-based crystals. Can Flash Gordon do that? I know he can handle elements well.]

[We'll find out.]

[That's not a confidence boost.]

I'm not obligated to work a 9-to-5, so I leave the premises. I already decontaminated myself and everything that entered the fracture since that's protocol after leaving a fracture.

I gift my regeneration to Flash Gordon, then head to the hospital to visit family.

~~~

I left the Hazard branch around 10 am. It's now 5 pm. Flash Gordon has successfully leveled up his [Crystallization] skill in these seven hours. I stayed in the hospital for half that time, and the other half, I was forced to do paperwork as the guild master.

It was mainly coming up with a name. We were allowed a temp name, but Vincere Incorporated, the name of our group chat, isn't a good fit since we aren't a merchant company. I don't want the 'Vincere' name to be plastered over everything... but Rain has labeled our collaborative potions V-healing potions.

If I want branding to be consistent, my guild should start with a V.

V. V. V. Victory? Nah. A guild called Victory is doomed to lose. How about VAST. Hmmm, nah. I don't love it. Valor is apparently taken, and so is Versatile... What to call my guild. It needs to not only scream that Ellis Vincere is the owner and that we are here to stay. I need a mighty name that will spearhead my endeavors in the future and leave a mark in history.

Ah. I got it.

~~~

I got a call from Free Chains. I answer.

"Ellis."

"Yes?"

"Did you really input our official name as 'The Guild of Flash Gordon."

"Yes."

"It sounds like a cult."

"It's a guild. It's our guild."

"...if you change your mind, we can change it anytime."

"If you say so."

I have time to kill, so let's do some shopping. What do my beasts need?

Oh, I know. Khan is the only one with the perception stat unlock among my beasts. The more stat types someone has, the more stats they get per level up. It's an investment I failed to implement earlier. Better late than never.

I buy a shit ton of doodads and enter my mansion. I grab Prometheus and head into the basement.

"Okay. I'll throw this ball, and you'll have to hit it with your spit attack. Every time you succeed, you'll get a treat."

"Mrrr"

"You don't have eyes, so I assume you see based on a mixture of vibrations, sensing heat, and something to do with mana."

"Blub"

"[Harden] yourself and contain your heat. We are doing this in the dark."

I place Prometheus on the ground and grip the ball tightly. I slam it against the wall as hard as possible, activating [Battered Bones] to give it that extra kick.

The ball is super bouncy, zipping around the room, bouncing on every surface, and doesn't seem to slow down. It treats me as a wall, bouncing off my flesh as it careens around the room. Prometheus sits there, waiting for the perfect moment.

Eventually, the ball stops. Prometheus uses his [Spit Fire] skill and annihilates the bouncy ball. It melts and catches fire as he approaches me, expecting the treat I promised him.

I silently flick Prometheus, a coin-shaped piece of gold. He absorbs it happily while I explain that he's supposed to hit it while it's moving.

We will try again.

~~~

I'm at the hazard branch as soon as the doors open. Flash Gordon's skill leveled again, meaning he almost ranked it to E. I skip coffee, my workout, and the complementary muffins and head inside the fracture.

The only new things I'm bringing are corrosive-resistant paper and a pencil. Duchess has her shield up, and Flash Gordon is creating oxygen. I mark the location of the exit on the map and think to myself. If this place has a ten-mile radius, we have over 300 square miles to chart.

This place is kinda flat, so It's not too much of an ask. Duchess flies us around while I mark every puddle of poison. We work in a spiral pattern until we reach the edges.

We had no troubles since the only two kinds of creatures we saw stayed in their respective environments. The only issue would be stamina, but I have that in spades. However, we have to head in for the night since Duchess is out of mana, and I gave her all of mine twice.

The following day, we skimmed the perimeter and noted nothing unusual. I marked a few locations where I found ore tainted by the environment and places where quarries would be best built. The only thing left is to venture upwards.

Although I have a cloud shark with affinities with clouds and wind, Khan is too plentiful to be here. He wouldn't be able to stay behind Duchess's barrier. I don't know if he can suffocate, and I don't want to find out. Plus, we won't really need him right now.

Duchess takes us into the cloud layer, pushing the fumes away as we rise. The screaming spirits follow us up until we are surrounded by them. Duchess has to cull the hoard every once in a while just so her barrier won't break.

Eventually, we rise miles into the air, and nothing changes. Different colors of gasses block our vision as they and the ghosts that inhabit them are pushed aside. The gas gets thinner and less toxic as we rise into the air. Duchess eventually bursts through the clouds.

We find ourselves in an oxygen-rich environment. Motes of light falling from above give this place an ethereal vibe. The floor is made of clouds and consists of every color. The ceiling is low, making this place feel more cozy than it needs to be.

I spot creatures I've never seen before, not in any books found in my [Lexicon], in my studies, or even randomly on the internet. They remind me of jellyfish if they were made of mammal meat. Instead of a nest of stingers, they have two tendrils that hang limply below them.

They swim through the air like jellyfish, propelling their light bodies with air. They are bigger than one might assume since their main body is about the size of a human torso, and the tendrils are as long as my limbs.

A hole on the top of their head seems to suck the toxins from the cloud ceiling as they jettison clean air behind them.

[Congratulations! You have discovered a new species! Please name them.]