When Jiang Chen woke up and stepped out of his tent, the first thing that caught his attention was the wet, constant, almost enveloping sound of thousands of slimy bodies moving in unison.
When he lifted his gaze, his eyes opened slightly wider than usual.
In front of him, spreading out like a living sea, were nearly eight thousand Slimes devouring everything in their path.
Destroyed houses, posts, furniture, goblin corpses… everything was absorbed and dissolved without leaving a trace behind.
The village no longer looked like a village; it had become a giant puddle of remains and tirelessly working Slimes.
The sight filled him with a sense of satisfaction and calm.
"With this amount… I feel much safer," he muttered as he sat down on a clean rock.
Three days had already passed since the Secret Realm had opened.
Only four days of exploration and survival remained.
That meant it was time to stop being cautious: he needed to become more aggressive.
But he also had to be smart. The appearance of the Goblin Shaman had taught him that he couldn't underestimate any creature.
There could be other goblins with special abilities, or leaders stronger than ordinary warriors.
He took a deep breath and began planning:
Search for villages.
Destroy them.
Expand his army.
Repeat.
Until he devoured the entire Secret Realm.
Once he finished organizing his thoughts, he stood up and began distributing his Slimes in various directions as small scouting squads.
With such numbers, he could afford to cover large areas without compromising his main force.
After a while of waiting for signals, one of his Slimes had died.
Without wasting time, Jiang moved in that direction, accompanied by a wave of Slimes flowing behind him like a viscous river.
When he arrived, he found another student.
His race… was a type of living tree.
They both observed each other cautiously.
"It seems your Slimes are… a lot," the boy commented, not daring to get too close.
"And your trees look pretty sturdy," Jiang replied, keeping his distance as well.
They spoke briefly, exchanging superficial information.
However, neither let their guard down for even a moment.
Both knew that in the Secret Realm, any alliance could turn into betrayal.
Eventually, without forming any agreement, they each went their own way.
The boy only muttered under his breath, watching the endless number of slimy creatures following Jiang Chen:
"How the hell does he have so many…?"
As exploration continued, the Slimes detected structures in the distance.
Soon, they found a new goblin village.
It was similar in size to the first one: small huts, wooden fences.
It looked nearly unprotected.
Jiang Chen smiled.
"Attack."
The Slime Shaman moved forward first.
His gelatinous staff glowed with a reddish hue, and in an instant a fireball shot out, exploding against one of the huts, raising flames and goblin screams.
Immediately, the tide of Slimes surged forward like a living tsunami.
But among them, camouflaged, moved the four evolved Slimes, blending into the viscous mass.
The goblins reacted too late.
Their leader, the Goblin Warrior, rushed out brandishing a spear, but it was useless.
Neither his strength nor his endurance could stop the tide that engulfed him and devoured him alive as he screamed.
The battle ended in less than an hour.
The village was completely destroyed and absorbed.
After the complete destruction of the Doblee Village, he repeated the same method that had worked before: organizing groups and sending Slime squads in different directions.
However, this time he noticed a problem he had ignored during the first days:
He had no way to communicate with the Slimes from afar.
It wasn't that Slimes completely lacked awareness;
they simply didn't have the intelligence required to relay information.
They were excellent at following simple orders and fighting, but useless as advanced scouts.
"In the future…" he sighed, "I need to evolve some Slimes to be real messengers or scouts."
But that was a challenge for later.
For now, he had to work with what he had.
As he analyzed the explored routes, something caught his attention:
a portion of one of his squads had been completely destroyed.
His mental connection with those Slimes had simply vanished.
Without hesitation, he gathered all the nearby Slimes and moved toward the area where the connection had been severed.
What he found left him stunned.
Standing before him was a goblin fortress, far larger and more developed than any village he had seen so far.
The walls were made of thick stone rather than wood; there were well-built towers with archers standing guard; and the activity inside showed advanced organization far superior to that of the Goblin Shaman and his tribe.
This isn't a village… it's practically a military town, he thought, hidden among the trees.
He immediately understood that attacking that fortress head-on would be suicide.
It was an enemy far too powerful for him to face alone at the moment.
So he decided to retreat and plan for a future assault.
As he began to withdraw from the goblin fortress's territory, a figure slipped between the trees. The movement was so fluid and silent that anyone would have thought it was water taking human shape.
Jiang Cheng tensed, but when the light filtered through the leaves, he recognized the face.
Mira?
Mira looked at him for a second… and then her expression completely changed when she saw what was moving behind him. Hundreds of small gelatinous bodies advanced in orderly rows, vibrating with a soft, wet sound.
"What the…?" Her eyes widened. "Jiang… how many Slimes do you have right now?"
Jiang Cheng smiled, a bit proud.
"A few thousand."
She took a step back, genuinely surprised.
"This… isn't normal. Most of us don't have that many at this stage. How in the world did you get so many?"
"My Slimes are good at dividing, and they've been devouring everything in their path, so I've just let them eat as much as they can."
Mira opened her mouth, stunned.
"All right… I won't deny it, I'm impressed."
They both moved away from the goblin fortress to speak calmly. They stopped several hundred meters away, hidden in a safe area among trees and bushes.
"My race is the Water Elementals."
"How many do you have right now?"
"Fifteen.
They can control water, create high-pressure projectiles, form shields, shape liquid weapons, or become denser to hit harder.
They can even infiltrate through small cracks."
Jiang analyzed the information.
Elementals were definitely better than Slimes in precision and mobility. But his… relied on overwhelming brute-force numbers.
"Is it possible to attack the fortress?"
Both looked toward the distant stone wall.
The goblin fortress was huge, well-defended, and full of activity.
"Attacking it head-on is impossible," Mira said, crossing her arms.
"But if we combine our armies… we might be able to open a breach."
Jiang Cheng was thinking the same thing.
"I have the Slime Shaman. He can launch a pretty strong fireball. If it hits a weak point in the wall…"
"…it'll create a crack," Mira continued. "And then my elementals can widen it using high-pressure water.
While that happens, your Slimes can charge through the opening to widen it even more."
"My evolved Slimes will slip in among the normal ones to attack from the inside. They can handle the warriors and archers."
"And my elementals will support from outside and from within. Their pressure attacks can wipe out large groups of goblins and clear areas," she explained.
Both fell silent for a few seconds.
It was dangerous.
It was ambitious.
But it was also possible.
When they finished discussing every detail, they looked at each other with a mix of tension and determination.
"Ready?" Yangsheng asked.
Mira raised her hand, and droplets of water began swirling around her arm like tiny living spheres.
"I was born ready."
The Slimes began gathering in silence, spreading across the ground like a living blanket in the night.
The Water Elementals lined up beside Mira, moving like vibrant blue shadows.
The Slime Shaman stepped forward, his small staff formed from his own body trembling with energy.
Jiang Cheng raised his hand.
The battle… was about to begin.