Gun Chapter 20: Pulled the Trigger (Patreon)

After putting the extractor away, Wakasha wiped off the small bit of yellow slime residue that had gotten on his fingertips. His fingers still felt sticky, but he didn’t pay it much mind. Tightening his grip on Deathbird, he continued deeper into the marsh.

He spread out his perception once more. The surrounding life signatures appeared in his mind like scattered points of light—some faint, some slightly stronger—spread across puddles, reed beds, and deeper patches of mud. They were all different kinds of slimes.

He didn’t get greedy or rush ahead. He stayed cautious, keeping his steps light, placing each foot carefully on dry clumps of mud or reed roots to avoid sinking into the muck and making noise.

After all, slimes might be weak individually, but they were social creatures. If several of them attacked him at once, even low-rank slimes could trap him in place just by layering their sticky mucus together.

After moving forward another dozen meters or so, Wakasha’s perception suddenly picked up an extremely faint life signature. It was just to his left, behind a clump of reeds not far away. The presence was so weak it almost blended into the surrounding aura of grass and vegetation. If his Perception weren’t at 6—well above an ordinary person’s—he never would have noticed it.

His heart stirred. He slowed his pace even more, circled carefully around to the side of the reeds, and cautiously peeked over.

In the shadows of the reeds lay a transparent slime, even smaller than a green slime. Its body was completely clear; if you didn’t look carefully, you could barely see it at all.

It was slowly wriggling along, its body secreting an extremely thin layer of transparent slime that clung to the reed leaves with almost no visible trace.

“A transparent slime?”

Wakasha murmured softly.

Based on similar settings he remembered from novels in his previous life, this kind of slime specialized in concealment. They usually lived in dark, damp places. Their slime wasn’t especially sticky, but they were incredibly hard to spot, making them good at ambushing anything that came too close. Their combat strength was the weakest, but the threat created by their stealth actually made them more dangerous than ordinary slimes. If one stuck to you without you noticing, it could easily affect your performance in later fights.

So Wakasha slowly raised Deathbird and aimed at the transparent slime. He gathered a bit of mental power and formed a basic-power mental bullet.

There was no need to waste extra mental power on maximum output. Against a small, fragile transparent slime like this, a basic-power shot was more than enough to kill it in one hit.

Holding his breath, he gently pulled the trigger.

Pfft.

The snow-white bullet shot out at high speed and struck the transparent slime right in the center of its body.

The transparent slime jerked, its clear body instantly losing its sheen and turning cloudy. Then it shriveled up and collapsed into a thin puddle of transparent slime spread across the reed leaves, almost impossible to distinguish.

[Monster Killed: Transparent Slime. Gained 1 EXP

Talent: Law of the Jungle activated. EXP x10. Actual EXP gained: 10

Concept Armament: Deathbird gained 10 Skill EXP. Current LV1 (52/1000)]

The system notification sounded right on cue. Wakasha understood immediately: although transparent slimes were stealthy, they were the weakest kind, so the EXP and skill EXP they gave were the same as an ordinary green slime.

He stepped forward, checked carefully to make sure the transparent slime was completely dead, then took out the extractor and carefully collected the remaining slime.

At this point, the extractor held 4 portions of slime. He still had quite a long way to go before reaching the commission requirement of 20.

Wakasha put the extractor away and kept moving. He spread out his perception again, and this time he caught a relatively concentrated cluster of life signatures near a large puddle not far ahead. There were around five or six of them, all matching the aura of ordinary green slimes, with no stronger monsters mixed in.

Wakasha’s spirits lifted. A cluster of slimes meant he could collect slime more quickly and save time.

He slowly crept closer to the large puddle. Even from a distance, he could see five green slimes lying at the edge of the water. They were about the same size, each wriggling along slowly. They weren’t far apart, and each was secreting mucus to trap the tiny microorganisms near the puddle’s edge.

Wakasha didn’t attack immediately. Instead, he hid behind a tall patch of reeds and carefully observed how they were positioned.

The five green slimes were spread out around the puddle’s edge. Three of them were relatively close together, while the other two were more separated. The farthest one was slowly wriggling toward the center of the puddle, as if planning to slip into the water.

“Take out the two separated ones first, then deal with the cluster of three. That’ll keep them from swarming me all at once.”

Wakasha finished forming his plan in an instant, then slowly raised Deathbird and aimed at the farthest green slime, the one heading toward the center of the puddle.

He gathered mental power, formed a mental bullet, and pulled the trigger.

Pfft.

The bullet struck true.

That green slime instantly shriveled and collapsed into a puddle of green slime, sinking into the muck at the edge of the puddle.

The other four green slimes were startled by the disturbance. They abruptly stopped wriggling and turned toward the direction the bullet had come from. Their murky bodies trembled slightly, as though they sensed danger—but their intelligence was too low to tell where it had come from. All they could do was squirm around in confusion, making faint sizzling noises.

Wakasha didn’t give them time to react. While they were still panicking, he pulled the trigger again, aiming at the other separated green slime. Another mental bullet shot out and killed it cleanly.

[Monster Killed: Green Slime. Gained 1 EXP

Talent: Law of the Jungle activated. EXP x10. Actual EXP gained: 10

Concept Armament: Deathbird gained 10 Skill EXP. Current LV1 (62/1000)]

[Monster Killed: Green Slime. Gained 1 EXP

Talent: Law of the Jungle activated. EXP x10. Actual EXP gained: 10

Concept Armament: Deathbird gained 10 Skill EXP. Current LV1 (72/1000)]

The remaining three green slimes grew even more frantic. They huddled together, secreting more mucus across their surfaces as if trying to use their numbers to defend themselves.

Seeing that, Wakasha’s lips curled into a faint smile. Targets clustered together like this were actually easier to kill in batches and cost less mental power overall.

He adjusted his stance and aimed Deathbird at the center of the three gathered slimes. Gathering a bit of mental power, he formed another mental bullet. He didn’t aim to kill them one by one this time—instead, he lined up his shot through the gap between them, hoping to hit two at once.

He pulled the trigger.

The bullet flew out at high speed, pierced through the bodies of two green slimes, and killed them instantly.

The last green slime trembled violently in fright, then turned and tried to flee toward the center of the puddle, hoping to hide in the water.

Wakasha wasn’t about to give it the chance.

With a slight twist of his wrist, he trained Deathbird on the slime’s back and pulled the trigger again.

The bullet hit cleanly, and the slime died with ease.