Chapter 97 - Defeat
The air shifted.
The Infinity Slime Boss still hovered above, suspended in the air as if caught in a Space-and-Time anomaly.
Even the swirling galaxy within its body was frozen.
Unmoving.
Only one thing had changed.
Its core.
The twin cores had fused into a single, ominous mass. Something about it radiated danger.
Looking at it made Lucien's skin crawl.
It was the only thing moving within the frozen Infinity Slime... and now it began to rotate.
Slowly at first...
Then with deliberate intent, it traced a circular pattern.
Lucien's instincts roared.
Danger.
'Guys… toward me. Now!'
His pets didn't hesitate.
They bolted straight for him.
And then it happened.
A black hole ripped into existence before the Infinity Slime.
The pull was instant and merciless. It was far stronger than the warp from earlier.
Everything was dragged toward it.
Even Korrak and Vyrran strained against the force.
Lucien reacted without hesitation.
He dropped to the ground.
Summoned MONSTERDEX.
And swept his pets into the landscape for safety.
In a blink, he stood alone.
But the danger didn't stop there.
He yanked a Warped Jelly from his INVENTORY and slapped it beneath his small boots.
Lucien then finally felt the pull.
An invisible force dragged him toward the black hole.
But the Warped Jelly held firm. Its grip was absurdly strong, anchoring him in place and defying the relentless force.
A spark of relief flickered in his eyes. He shifted his stance, lowering his center of gravity to ease the strain on his body.
Then he looked around, scanning the battlefield…
Then came the second shock.
The dungeon walls and ceiling...
Their painted cosmos that looks alive with flickering stars... began to unravel.
One by one, the glowing stars were torn free, swallowed by the black hole's gaping maw.
Lucien's eyes widened as the last of the starlight vanished.
Darkness.
Then...
The black hole collapsed into nothing.
The only light left came from the singular core glowing inside the frozen slime.
Lucien narrowed his eyes and channeled divine energy into them. The darkness peeled away and shapes began taking form once more.
He moved.
In a flash, his pets were summoned again.
Oreo reacted first.
With a flick of magic, the gloom dissolved, bathing the area in a dim but usable glow.
Lucien's eyes lit up.
"Attack!"
His pets surged forward, unleashing their full arsenal at the suspended Boss.
Lucien remained rooted... literally. The Warped Jelly's grip hadn't faded yet. The adhesiveness was temporary but so absolute it felt as though he'd been glued to another reality entirely.
The Infinity Slime registered the incoming assault but it didn't even flinch.
It hung motionless in the air.
Untouchable.
Spell after spell slammed into its body.
Every hit connected.
Yet... nothing happened.
It was as if time and space themselves wrapped around the creature, shielding it from all harm. No outside force could touch it.
"Damn! That's too OP!"
Lucien's eyes narrowed as he studied the Boss.
He searched for the tiniest flaw.
Any irregularity in its frozen form.
Then...
He noticed something. Something that made his eyes narrow in recognition.
But before he could act...
The singular core twitched and began to move in a rhythmic pulse.
That's when it happened.
From the ceiling above, stars began to bloom one after another.
The glowing spheres of light quickly broke free and plummeted toward the battlefield.
Korrak reacted instantly. He leapt forward to intercept one.
The moment he touched it, the truth hit them.
This wasn't ordinary light.
These were gravity orbs.
Korrak was slammed toward the ground by a crushing force.
The impact crushed Korrak downward, pinning him to the ground under a suffocating weight.
Fortunately, his body could withstand the strain. He forced himself upright but every movement was heavy.
The others scattered, weaving between the falling orbs.
Lucien's mind worked in overdrive.
Using Perfect Calculation, he measured the speed and trajectory of each sphere. He mapped out the safe zones in an instant.
'Move to these spots. Now!'
His pets obeyed without hesitation, darting toward the areas where no orbs would land.
They moved with precision, slipping past the crushing gravity.
Luckily, none of the spheres targeted mini Lucien's position. Even better, the Warped Jelly's hold finally wore off.
He was free again.
But the Boss wasn't done.
Mirrors shimmered into existence all around the dungeon walls. Their surfaces rippled like liquid.
Within the glassy surfaces, Lucien saw his pets reflection.
They were... preparing to attack.
Korrak and Vyrran's blasts.
Oreo and Skittles' magic and slime shots.
Sparkle's concentrated beam.
The next moment, the spells burst out of the mirrors.
Stronger.
Sharper.
They lanced toward Lucien's group.
The mirrors flashed again, replaying the assault in rapid succession.
"The hell… it can even summon past attacks from others!?"
The team sprang into action. They weaved between the incoming onslaught.
Oreo raised a tendril and twisted the air, redirecting several spells away from the group.
Lucien's eyes lit up.
'Right… Eclipse magic.'
He locked eyes with Oreo.
He asked Oreo to cast a certain spell.
It was costly and slow to cast but its utility was undeniable. Oreo began weaving the complex spell.
It was forming a Yin-Yang pattern in the air.
The Boss noticed.
Its singular core started spinning.
Lucien recognized the pattern instantly.
'Shit! It's summoning again!'
Lucien barked fresh orders.
'If a rift opens... blast whatever comes through!'
The pets readied their magic, beams and blasts aimed at the unseen threat.
Then...
A rift tore open.
A slime clone emerged... only to be obliterated the instant it appeared.
But then another followed. And another. And another…
Lucien's pulse quickened. The battlefield was filling with copies.
His pets fought without slowing, striking each new target the moment it emerged.
But the copies kept coming.
The numbers swelled.
Even with flawless teamwork, the tide was rising.
Finally…
Oreo finished the Yin-Yang in the air.
Two shimmering chains erupted from its seeds.
Eclipse Chain.
It shot toward the original Infinity Slime with deadly speed.
The singular core trembled.
But before they could connect, the copies threw themselves into the path.
The white chain struck one, coiling tight... but the copy resisted the energy drain.
Its body contracted sharply, slipping free from the bind.
The black chain lashed next, only for another copy to conjure a Spatial Mirror in its path.
Oreo cut the spell instantly before it could be turned against them. The chains dissolved into nothing.
Lucien's gaze swept the battlefield.
More copies.
Dozens of them.
'Oh shit… here we go again.'
But Lucien had already found the weakness.
Singularity Destabilization.
Now, he understood what it meant.
The original Infinity Slime Boss was locked in Space and Time. Its body was untouchable and unable to act directly.
Only the singular core was active.
He'd felt it earlier...
The pulse. A steady, rhythmic beat like a heart with a perfectly stable frequency.
If that rhythm could be broken, the core would destabilize.
Oreo's earlier attack had confirmed it.
The Boss had ignored every other spell they'd thrown at it... but against the Eclipse Chain, it had done everything possible to avoid being hit.
The Eclipse Chain could disrupt skills, cancel magic and drain energy. No wonder the core feared it.
If it landed, the core's stability would shatter.
The problem was reaching it.
The battlefield now swarmed with the interfering copies. Each one will throw itself into the path of their attacks.
Lucien's pets noticed it too.
Their focus shifted. They started cutting down copy after copy to clear a path... but the enemy just kept coming.
That's when Skittles hopped forward.
It circled Oreo, bouncing with an almost impatient rhythm. It looks as if it was trying to suggest something.
Lucien caught the excitement radiating from it. It was the same energy it had back when it pulled off something unexpected.
Oreo seemed to understand. It hopped in reply.
Meanwhile, Lucien's other pets kept up the pressure. They shred through the weaker copies with practiced precision.
They'd already learned the patterns. Each one fell faster than the last.
Then Lucien glanced back at the two slimes.
And saw it.
Oreo's gelatinous body stretched forward, enveloping Skittles completely.
Skittles didn't resist.
The moment the last ripple of its body vanished inside Oreo... both began to glow.
Light spilled and folded over them until their shapes blurred.
When it faded, a single entity remained.
Slime Merge.
This was nothing like when Lucien had used the skill. These two hadn't just combined... they had truly become one.
It was massive and it radiated a dense, overwhelming presence.
Its appearance defied description. Imagine a living rainbow streaked with shifting black and white spots. The colors bended and refracted in impossible ways.
Lucien's eyes lit up.
He could still sense both their emotions yet their thoughts moved in perfect synchronization.
Two minds working separately but in absolute harmony.
Like Parallel Thoughts...
And then, the anomaly occurred.
The merged slime moved.
But what happened next caught Lucien completely off guard.
As it advanced, it began… painting.
A perfect Yin-Yang pattern was blooming in the air behind it.
Lucien couldn't help but laugh.
It was casting Eclipse Chain while moving.
Even he couldn't pull that off...
Of course.
Two minds.
Two streams of focus.
Perfectly synchronized.
'If I learned Parallel Thoughts… could I do the same?'
The possibilities spun in his head, each one more dangerous than the last.
The merged slime surged forward.
Skittles' fluid maneuvers and Oreo's formidable magic.
It was... in perfect harmony.
Lucien's other pets fell in line, blasting apart any copies that dared approach. They cleared a straight path through the battlefield for their advance.
Finally, the Yin-Yang was complete. Its energy coiled... Just waiting to be unleashed.
Then with a wild and almost reckless maneuver, the merged slime surged forward.
And against all odds… it broke through.
It was right in front of the Original Boss.
Lucien's eyes flared.
Eclipse Chain.
From the Yin-Yang's seeds, chains of pure shadow and light erupted.
They snapped through the air and wrapped tight around the Infinity Slime Boss that was still locked in Space and Time.
The battlefield went silent.
A single heartbeat echoed.
The singular core twitched. Its steady pulse faltered.
The once-perfect frequency now stuttered.
Cracks spread.
And then...
Like a mirror smashed under a hammer... Space and Time itself shattered.
The Infinity Slime Boss crashed to the ground.
But it wasn't over yet.
The Infinity Slime Boss still clung to life.
Its copies surged in, desperate to shield it from the merged slime's assault.
One massive strike was about to land...
...but the merged slime split apart at the last instant.
The attack whistled through empty space.
Skittles and Oreo stood there once more. Unscathed.
Without hesitation, Oreo's magic washed over Skittles, layering it with buffs.
Then...
Hop.
Skittles leapt onto Oreo's quivering body, using it as a living springboard.
Another hop.
This one launched it high, far above the battlefield.
And then...
Target locked.
The Infinity Slime Boss was still reeling and disoriented. It couldn't move.
The other pets kept the remaining copies tangled in a wall of fangs, spells and claws.
No one could reach the Boss in time.
And so...
Skittles dove.
Slam.
The impact rang out like a thunderclap.
Cracks spiderwebbed across the singular core.
Then...
Shatter.
A shrill screech tore from the Boss as its essence unraveled.
The rifts hanging in the air winked out and every copy of the Infinity Slime disintegrated into nothing.
Silence.
But Skittles wasn't done.
It snatched up the broken core. It spun in midair and hurled it straight toward mini Lucien.
Auto-Collect activated.
The core vanished into his INVENTORY.
Lucien laughed.
"Haha Skittles isn't taking any chances!"
Suspicious to the end. Exactly how he liked it.
He beamed with pride. His chest puffed out as his gaze swept the battlefield…
…and then he saw them.
The drops.
A golden cube.
And a golden card.