The alley smelled of stale curry and regret. It was Arjun's preferred scent. It was the smell of Varundal—a city that had given up on its dreams and was now just trying to get through the day. He could relate.
He cornered his quarry against a moss-slicked wall. It quivered, a perfect, translucent blue blob of existential dread. Or maybe just jelly. It was hard to tell with slimes.
"Right," Arjun muttered to himself, his voice a dry rasp. "The grand quest for Arjun Nath, F-Rank extraordinaire: Execute one gelatinous blob. Try not to mess this up."
This was it. The final test. The Adventurer's Guild, in its infinite mercy, had given him one last chance to prove he wasn't a complete waste of oxygen. His guild registration was on the line. If he failed, he'd be out on the street, and his quiet, miserable corner of the guild dormitory would be lost. His plan to find a nice, affordable, and peaceful death would be ruined.
He drew his dagger. It was a sad, chipped thing he'd bought for three copper pieces. The merchant had laughed at him.
The slime jiggled with the profound menace of a discarded pudding.
Arjun took a deep breath, trying to channel the warrior spirit he'd read about in cheap novels. He was supposed to be swift, decisive, a whirlwind of deadly grace.
He lunged.
And immediately slipped on a patch of what he sincerely hoped was just old grease.
His lunge turned into a graceless, flailing stumble. His dagger, instead of piercing the slime's core, missed entirely and struck the brick wall behind it with a pathetic clang. Sparks flew.
The slime, startled by the noise, did what slimes do best: it hopped.
It was a small, innocent hop. A hop that, on any other day, in any other alley, would have been meaningless. But this was Arjun's alley, and fate, the cruelest comedian of them all, was on a roll.
The slime landed directly on a small, discarded glass bottle tucked away in the refuse. The bottle, filled with a shimmering, volatile-looking purple liquid, was probably the failed experiment of some back-alley alchemist.
Arjun, still trying to regain his balance, windmill-ed his arms and his boot kicked out, connecting squarely with the bottle. There was a sharp crack. The potion-like substance gushed out, drenching the slime.
For a moment, nothing happened. The slime just sat there, now a rather fetching shade of violet.
Arjun sighed in relief. "Well, that was—"
The slime began to bubble.
It swelled violently, like a water-skin being inflated by a furious god. A low hum filled the alley, and the air grew thick with the smell of ozone and burnt sugar. The violet light intensified, casting Arjun's terrified face in a demonic glow.
"Oh, for the love of all the gods I don't believe in," he whispered.
The resulting explosion wasn't just a boom. It was a deep, guttural WHUMP that tore through the fabric of the evening. A wave of force, smelling vaguely of blueberries, slammed Arjun against the opposite wall. The world went white, then black.
...
When his senses returned, the first thing he registered was a high-pitched ringing in his ears. The second was that he was covered in sticky, warm goo. Slime guts. He'd technically succeeded. He'd killed the slime.
He pushed himself up, his bones groaning in protest. Smoke, thick and acrid, filled the alley. Where the brick wall had been, there was now a gaping, jagged hole. Beyond it, he could see the splinters of what looked like tables, overturned chairs, and the shocked, wide-eyed faces of several men in dark leather armor who were, a moment ago, probably enjoying a quiet evening of plotting assassinations.
"My boot," Arjun groaned, looking down. The explosion had shredded the cheap leather, and something sharp and metallic was stuck right through the sole. He grunted, stumbling forward out of the alley and into the bustling main street, his silhouette framed perfectly by the billowing smoke behind him.
He tripped on a piece of rubble. "Agh, damn it."
Instinctively, he bent over, grabbed his ruined boot by the ankle, and lifted his foot to inspect the damage. The object was a dagger, its blade a wicked, curving crescent of obsidian metal that seemed to drink the twilight. It pulsed with a faint, crimson light.
He didn't notice the sudden, dead silence that fell over the street.
He didn't see the dozens of onlookers—merchants, city guards, other adventurers—staring at him with their jaws agape.
From their perspective, a silent, soot-covered warrior had just emerged from an impossible explosion that had annihilated the hidden headquarters of the infamous Night Viper Syndicate. He walked out of the carnage without a scratch, and with a casual, almost contemptuous air, raised the legendary cursed dagger, the Crimson Tear, as if it were a mere trinket.
A gasp rippled through the crowd.
"That... that's the Night Viper's den!" a merchant stammered, pointing with a trembling finger. "It's been wiped out!"
"Look at his blade!" a young adventurer shrieked, his eyes wide with hero-worship. "That's the Demon King's dagger! I've only seen it in textbooks!"
"Who is he?" a woman whispered in awe. "To walk out of that hell alone... and so calmly?"
The whispers grew into a roar of assumption, each person adding another layer to the instant legend.
"He didn't just cause an explosion... he must have fought them all."
"An entire assassination syndicate..."
"Soloed."
"What kind of monster is he?"
Arjun, still focused on his foot, finally managed to pry the cursed, soul-devouring artifact from his boot. It was heavier than it looked. He held it up, squinting at the dark, elegant craftsmanship.
Internally, only one thought echoed through his mind, a testament to his truly dire situation.
"Great," he sighed, his shoulders slumping in defeat. "Now I need a new pair of boots."