Dark.
Pitch black. I can't see a thing.
Where am I? More importantly, what happened to me?
I think I remember… the Great Sage. I got mocked for having that thing as my Unique Skill…
That's when my consciousness awakened.
My name is Mikami Satoru. Thirty-seven years old. Nice guy.
I got stabbed shielding a junior coworker from some random attacker on the street.
Alright, I remember now. I'm fine — doesn't seem like it's time to panic yet.
The only other time the ever-cool me has panicked was when I wet myself in elementary school.
I tried to look around and realized — I can't open my eyes.
Crap. I tried to scratch my head, but… my hand didn't respond. More importantly, where even is my head?
I'm confused.
Hey, hey — hold on a second. Give me a moment to calm down. Isn't this when you're supposed to count prime numbers?
One, two, three — WRONG! That's not it! Wait, isn't one not even a prime number?
No, no — that doesn't matter right now.
This is no time for stupid math! Something might be really wrong here!
Huh? Wait — what's going on?
Could it be… that I've already passed the point where I should be panicking?
I frantically check whether anything hurts.
No pain. I feel fine.
No cold, no heat. Seems like I'm in a pretty comfortable space.
That puts me at ease — slightly.
Next I check my limbs. Forget my fingertips — I can't feel my hands or my feet at all…
What does that mean?
Getting stabbed shouldn't make your limbs disappear — so what's going on?
For starters, I can't open my eyes.
I'm in a pitch-black space where I can't see anything.
An unprecedented wave of anxiety crashes over me.
Could this be… a vegetative state? I'm conscious, but my nerves are severed and I can't move?
No, no, no — give me a break!
I survived, and now you're telling me I'm a vegetable? Wouldn't being paralyzed from the waist down actually be better than this?
Both are terrible, obviously, but being a conscious vegetable? That's straight-up hell.
My worst fears flash through my mind, and I go past panic straight into despair.
Think about it.
Humans supposedly go insane in no time when trapped in darkness. That's exactly my situation — except I can't even kill myself.
Despair would be unavoidable in these circumstances.
Then —
Rustle.
Something brushes against my body.
Huh? What was that…
Every sense I have focuses on that sensation.
Near my belly — or what feels like my belly — something grass-like is touching me.
I concentrate on that point, and I start to vaguely grasp the boundaries of my own body. Occasionally, the tip of a blade of grass pokes into me with a gentle stab.
That made me a little happy.
I'm still in pitch-black darkness, but at least I can feel something with my sense of touch.
Feeling interested now, I tried to move toward the grass —
Slither.
I felt my body move.
I… moved?!
At this moment, it became crystal clear that I was NOT lying on a hospital bed — because what was underneath my belly felt like rough, rocky ground.
I see… I don't fully understand, but I'm clearly not in a hospital.
On top of that, I can't see. I can't hear any sound either, and there's a good chance my hearing is gone.
I don't know where my head is, but I move toward the grass, focusing my awareness on the point of contact.
I can't smell anything at all. Probably no sense of smell either.
What I don't want to admit is that I can't tell what shape my body is.
I don't want to think about it, but my body feels like it has the streamlined, jiggly shape of one of those beloved "monsters" from RPGs.
That thought has been nagging at me for a while now.
No way… there's no way. That can't possibly be…
I'll set that worry aside for now.
I decide to test the one remaining sense I haven't tried.
But I don't even know where my mouth is. What do I do?
《Unique Skill — Predator — Would you like to use it? YES / NO》
A voice suddenly echoed in my mind.
Huh?
What? What did it just say?
Unique Skill — Predator… did I hear that right?
And what's with this voice?
I thought I'd heard some strange voice during my conversation with Tamura, but maybe it wasn't just my imagination?
Is someone here? But something feels off. It's less like someone is present and more like… words are just surfacing in my mind.
There's no sense of another person's will — it's more like an automated computer voice. Mechanical.
For now — NO!
After all, I'm a Japanese person who's perfectly capable of saying no.
I think NO and wait for a response. Nothing. I waited a while, but the voice didn't return.
Looks like there's no follow-up question. Did I make the wrong choice? Is this one of those games where you have to pick YES or you're screwed?
I thought it would keep asking the same question like an RPG menu, but apparently not.
It asked its question and then just… left me hanging. Rude.
I was actually a little happy to hear a voice.
I mildly regretted my answer.
Oh well. Can't be helped.
I'll go back to testing my sense of taste, then.
I move my body toward the grass from earlier, feeling the contact point carefully, and lean into it.
I press my body against it, confirming the texture. Yep, this is definitely grass.
While I'm feeling the grass, the contact point between it and my body starts to dissolve. I panicked, thinking my own body was melting, but it seems only the grass dissolved.
Then I understood — the dissolved grass is being absorbed into my body.
So I dissolve the grass and take it in. In other words, my body absorbs things through contact rather than through a mouth.
Incidentally, I couldn't taste anything at all.
So this is what it means.
It seems I'm no longer human. Almost certainly.
Which means… I probably did die from that stabbing.
It's less a question and more a near-certainty. If that's the case, then being in a grassy rocky area instead of a hospital makes sense.
What happened to Tamura?
What about Sawatari-san?
Did my PC get properly destroyed?
The questions never end. But maybe there's no point agonizing over them anymore. I need to think about what to do going forward.
Actually — wait.
What exactly do I look like now? Come to think of it, based on what I felt earlier…
I refocus my awareness on my body.
Jiggle. Jiggle.
My body pulses rhythmically.
In the pitch-black darkness, I took my time mapping out the boundaries of my own body.
And…
Can you believe it!
After all those years of being cool and manly, now I've got this sleek, streamlined physique!
Wait — am I an idiot?! I refuse to accept this!!!
As far as I can feel, my body shape can only remind me of… that thing.
No, no — I mean, look, it's not like I hate them? Yeah. They can be cute sometimes, sure!
But if you asked whether I'd want to BE one, nine out of ten people would feel the same way I do.
But maybe I just have to accept it…
It seems I've been reincarnated as a slime.
Munch. Munch.
Munch, munch, munch.
I was eating grass.
Why? Because obviously!
I'm — B.O.R.E.D.
Quite a few days have passed since I reluctantly accepted that I'm a slime.
The first thing I worried about was food.
I decided to test whether a slime body feels hunger. After checking my surroundings carefully, I moved around and found a patch of dense grass.
Actually, it was right next to the first grass I found. If push came to shove, I could probably eat this stuff, and the juice from the grass would handle my hydration. Being in pitch-black darkness where I couldn't see anything at all, having it right next to me was a stroke of luck. For me, just moving around was a life-or-death matter.
So — experiment begins.
I counted to fifty thousand sheep. Got bored.
Tried to sleep — not even remotely drowsy.
Tried counting prime numbers — lost track partway through. Obviously.
Being alone with your own thoughts is a lonely affair. What hobbies can you even do by yourself…
If I had the internet, I'm confident I could kill time forever, but I don't have a phone, a handheld console, nothing. This was painful.
Meditation like some kind of monk? No chance for an amateur.
Another thing — uncertain as it was, there didn't seem to be any other living creatures around here.
I hadn't sensed a single trace of another life form.
Well, with no eyes, no ears, and no sense of smell, I couldn't be one hundred percent sure, but at least nothing had attacked me.
Thanks to that, I've survived without even feeling in danger.
So, after enduring terrible suffering (psychological), here's my conclusion:
I don't get hungry. And I don't need sleep.
Absolutely no hunger at all, and never felt sleepy either.
I don't know how many days have passed — in pitch-black darkness, you lose all sense of time.
During this whole period, that strange voice didn't show up again. I wouldn't mind chatting now if it did.
Since there's nothing else to do, I've been eating grass.
With no other way to kill time, I eat grass for the satisfying sensation of popping little bubbles.
Now I can even feel the process of absorption, decomposition, and storage happening inside me as the grass is broken down and its components are separated and accumulated.
If you asked what's the point — there isn't one.
I just got scared that I'd go crazy if I didn't do something.
Eventually I got used to it — absorbing, decomposing, storing, repeat.
There was one mystery, though.
Even back when I realized I had no appetite, I wondered about this: if I don't need to eat, do I need to… eliminate?
The answer turned out to be: nope!
Not once have I ever needed to relieve myself.
Being a slime, I suppose it makes sense — but then where did all the stored material go?
As far as I can tell, it doesn't seem to have changed from its original form.
What's going on?
《Answer. It is stored in the stomach of the Unique Skill — Predator. Current space utilization is less than 1%.》
What did you say?! A response — it came!!!
But wait — when did I activate that skill? I said NO!
《Answer. The Unique Skill — Predator has not been activated. Any matter absorbed into the body is automatically stored in the stomach by default. This setting can be changed at will.》
What the… Okay, that came through smoothly this time. But setting that aside —
So what happens if I DO use the skill?
《Answer. Effects of the Unique Skill — Predator:
Predation — Absorbs the target into the body. However, if the target possesses consciousness, the success probability is drastically reduced.
Targets are not limited to organic or inorganic matter — the skill also works on Skills and Magic.
Analysis — Analyzes and researches the absorbed target. Enables creation of craftable items.
If the necessary materials are present, copies can also be created.
Successful analysis of a formula enables the acquisition of the target's Skill or Magic.
Stomach — Stores predation targets. Also capable of storing materials created through analysis.
Items stored in the stomach are unaffected by the passage of time.
Mimicry — Reproduces an absorbed target and grants the ability to use equivalent powers.
Limited to targets whose information has been successfully analyzed.
Isolation — Stores harmful effects that fall outside the scope of analysis. Renders them harmless and converts them into magicules.
These five are the primary abilities.》
Huh… Huh?
I'm shaken. That sounds like an incredibly powerful ability… Not something a lowly slime should really have access to.
But hold on — before that —
This voice that answers my questions — what is it? Is someone there?
《Answer. This is the effect of the Unique Skill — Great Sage. With the skill now fully established, responses can be carried out promptly.》
The Great Sage, huh… I was lamenting getting mocked for having it, but now it's genuinely reassuring. I'll keep relying on it from here on out.
Honestly, at this point, I don't care what it is.
If it can ease this seemingly endless loneliness, that's enough.
Maybe this "voice" is just an auditory hallucination I've created myself. But even if it is — that's fine.
For the first time in a long while, I felt my heart lighten.
——— Status ———
Name: Mikami Satoru
Species: Slime
Title: None
Magic: None
Skills: Unique Skill — Great Sage
Unique Skill — Predator
Slime-Intrinsic Skills — Dissolve, Absorb, Self-Regeneration
Resistances: Thermal Fluctuation Resistance EX, Physical Attack Resistance, Pain Nullification, Electrical Resistance, Paralysis Resistance