The first thing I touched was light.
Not fire, not glare — but warmth.
Filtered, golden, living light, slipping through the green lattice of canopy above.
It kissed the tip of my shell as I crept past the final outcropping, inching forward like a worm that had dreamed of sky but never seen it.
The second thing I touched was soil.
Warm, soft, sun-cooked.
I burrowed instinctively — not to hide, but to feel it against me.
The clay was loose here, filled with ancient roots. Some as thick as branches. Some as soft as threads.
I slipped beneath one wide root bent in a gentle arch, and curled up there.
Not in fear.
Just… wonder.
Wind passed through the forest.
Not in gusts.
But in waves.
It shimmered through the canopy like breath through silk.
Leaves rustled in slow conversations above, while insects clicked somewhere in the distance — a new language I had never heard before.
And then…A leaf fell.
It landed beside me, wide and soft, the color of late summer.
I crawled over it slowly.
Its veins were like rivers.
Its shape like a cradle.
I nestled into it.
Breathed.
Then — gently — I took a bite.
Crunch.
[Item Consumed: Sunleaf – Early Fall Variant]
[Stamina Restored +2][Hunger: Satisfied]
[Scent Memory Acquired: "Sunbark & Stonegrass"]
[Ambient Mana Detected – Trace Healing Quality]
It was the best thing I had ever eaten.
Not because of power.
But because it tasted like peace.
For a while, I did not move.
I listened.
A bird called once, far away.A lizard's claws scraped bark.
Something large exhaled beneath a fern.
I stayed beneath the root, quiet as thread, silk inside me humming faintly.
This was not the dungeon.
This was not home.
This was not war.
This was the world.
And I was in it.
Alive.
I let out a breath.
A small one.
"Hey… Syrri?"
"Mhm," she replied, distant and soft, like she too was listening.
"Is this what being free feels like?"
A pause.
"No," she whispered. "This is what being small feels like."
"But it's good, isn't it?"
"Yes," she said. "It's good."
I looked ahead.
Beyond the root arch, the forest opened like a green cathedral.No paths.No names.Just possibility.
My mandibles twitched.
I did not want to conquer it.
I just wanted to crawl through it.
So I did.
One inch at a time.
Biting leaves.Tasting bark.Trailing silk when I felt like it.Breathing.Living.
A larva.
With a scarf.
The forest pulsed with quiet.
My body was still pressed beneath the root — warm, shaded. I had already eaten my second sunleaf, and I felt so full, I thought my chitin would split.
I could've slept there for hours.
But something moved.
Plop.
Plop-plop.
Not feet. Not paws.
Not claws.
Something bounced.
I crawled up from the soil and peeked out.
And there, in a shallow hollow framed by moss…
It shimmered.
Wobbling gently. Light blue. Transparent.
A slime.
I froze.
No.
Wait.
That shape—
That bounce.
That little ripple as it trembled under the sunlight—
"No way…"
My human memories stirred.
Like a video flickering back to life after years of static.
"Rimuru," I whispered.
Not aloud. Just in my head. But the name echoed with childlike joy.
"A slime. An actual one."
I stared at it.
It didn't notice me. Or maybe it didn't care.
It bounced once more. Slid gently over a patch of moss. Then stopped beside a fallen flower and… wobbled.
Was it eating?
I leaned forward, eyes wide.
It was small. Maybe the size of a melon. No eyes. No mouth. Just a gentle pulse inside, like some soft blue heart beating beneath jelly.
And in that moment…
My mouth watered.
"No," I said.
"Absolutely not."
But my stomach twitched. My mandibles clicked.
"But it's just one bite…"
I remembered Rimuru again.
The anime posters on my wall. The dozens of light novels half-read, half-finished.
The fan theories I used to scroll through at 3 a.m.
The games I never told anyone I played.
The quiet escape into other worlds that no one in the office ever noticed.
"...For the culture," I whispered.
I lunged.
Silently. Cleanly.
A gentle crunch.
[Foreign Entity Consumed: Forest Slime – Juvenile Variant]
[Digestive Analysis Underway…]
[Trait Sampled: Elastic Composition (0.8%)]
[Skill Fragment Acquired: Fluid Form (LOCKED)]
[Reaction Detected: Body Temperature Shift – Delirium Risk]
[Mental Status: Giddy]
I rolled back under the root and lay there, giggling to myself.
Or at least… the larval equivalent of giggling.
The slime wobbled in my stomach, still soft, still jiggling.
"I can't believe I actually did that…"
"Syrri?"
"...You are an embarrassment to the system."
"I don't regret it."
"You devoured the most harmless thing in the forest."
"It was tradition."
And then I lay there, eyes blinking toward the canopy.
A slime in my belly.
The wind brushing my scarf.
And for the first time since waking in this strange world—
I didn't feel like a monster.
I felt like a player.