Following the sound, Leon spotted a round, green, ball-sized blob bouncing toward him from the far end of the corridor. As it got closer, he noticed a slimy tentacle sprouting from its head, with a tiny green ball dangling at the tip—like a miniature version of the sli itself.
Leon instantly pulled out his Galaxy Waterlon Knife, ready for battle. But the green Sli completely ignored him and kept hopping in the other direction. Just as Leon was wondering what was going on, he saw another green Sli chasing after it. The strange thing was, the tiny ball atop this second sli’s head was heart-shaped.
“Is this… courtship?”
Watching the two green Slis hopping in a ga of tag—one with a heart-tipped tentacle—left Leon dumbfounded. This was the first ti he’d seen sothing so absurd yet oddly reasonable.
Even monsters have the nerve to flaunt their romance in front of a single guy? Is there no moral baseline anymore?
Determined to help this yet-to-be-paired couple, Leon lunged forward and swung twice.
The blade was fast, the Slis were soft, but one clean slice still cut them neatly in half. Neither of them ran. They didn’t even resist. It was as if chasing love—or escaping unwanted attention—was more important than survival itself.
When the two green blobs were split and their bodies disintegrated into nothing, three translucent, jelly-like blobs were left behind on the ground.
“Sli Jelly (Monster Drop): A lump of gel with no scent and a faint glow.”
Though a bit repulsed, Leon recalled that the Oil Maker required Sli Jelly as a crafting material. And if he ever got bored enough to raise Slis in the future, he’d need large amounts of it as raw material for compression. So he picked it up.
However, the mont he held it in his hands, his opinion changed. It really had no sll, felt delightfully squishy, and was surprisingly resilient. No matter how much he squeezed it, it didn’t break. The texture was… dangerously addictive.
“Hiss—”
After absentmindedly kneading the Sli Jelly for a long while, Leon suddenly snapped back to his senses. He sucked in a cold breath and quickly stuffed the jelly into his System Backpack.
While he’d been fiddling with it, so very questionable thoughts had popped into his mind. And while they weren’t completely unspeakable… it was better to just say they were.
Putting the jelly away, Leon resud his rock-smashing work. He cleared one tunnel of stones, then turned back and worked on another. After breaking rocks in two whole tunnels without finding the hole to the next level, fatigue began to set in.
Even with the convenience of the System Tools, it still drained his own stamina. After so long smashing rocks and tangling with rock crabs and Slis, he decided to rest for a while.
He opened a packet of bread, stuffed the empty wrapper into his backpack, and did the sa with his empty water bottle. Even though no one was around, Leon had his standards. Besides, his gut told him that leaving trash in the mines could lead to bad things.
After a brief rest, with water and food replenished, Leon felt much better. He stood up and moved to the third tunnel to continue mining. At this point, aside from the crab dropped by the Rock Crab and the Sli Jelly dropped by the green Slis, he had 106 stones in his backpack.
Looking at his haul, Leon couldn’t help but grimace. If he’d known it would be this ager, he wouldn’t have over-prepared and cleaned out his backpack space.
But since he was already here, even if all he got was stone, he’d keep going. After all, stone was a basic resource. He’d need plenty in the future for building farm structures, upgrading houses, and crafting various recipes—all of which required mountains of the stuff.
The third tunnel yielded no stairs, so Leon moved on to the fourth. This ti was different. He spotted more than a dozen rocks with a distinct brownish hue.
The sight made his spirits lift. He went to the nearest brown rock and swung his pickaxe.
The mont the pick struck, he heard a different sound than the usual rock-cracking noise. The feedback in his hands was also stronger. As soone already familiar with the feel of breaking rocks, Leon instantly recognized this difference and grew even more excited.
These brown rocks also took more than one hit to break. With each strike, cracks spread through the surface. After five or six solid blows, the rock finally split apart, revealing two irregular, gray-gold chunks of ore, while the rest of it rged back into the surrounding rock.
“Copper Ore (Resource): A common ore that can be slted into copper bars.”
“Finally, sothing other than plain stone. I was starting to think this wasn’t a mine at all—just a damn quarry.”
Holding the palm-sized copper ore in his hands, Leon nearly teared up. After over an hour in the mine, all he’d gotten was stone. If not for his goal of reaching the fifth floor to unlock the elevator, he might’ve given up.
At least now he’d found sothing different, which gave his morale a huge boost.
Knowing this type of rock produced copper ore, Leon didn’t hesitate. He raised his pickaxe and went after the rest of the brown stones.
When he was done, he’d collected twenty-one pieces of copper ore. As he put them into his backpack, his gaze landed on the stairway to the third floor, now revealed where the last copper-bearing rock had been.
With practiced ease, he climbed down, sliding into the third floor of the mine.
This level was huge, with a large patch of brown sandy soil taking up most of the space. He saw few rocks, mostly regular stone, but with so copper ore mixed in.
Of course, the place wasn’t without its hopping Slis.
But Leon knew there was more here than Slis—because he caught a whiff of a foul, fishy stench in the air. It was sharp, overpowering, and not the sll of rot. It was more like the reek of raw sewage.
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