The Dissolver of Bonds had been walking through these damn corridors for what felt like hours, and honestly, the dramatic stalking was starting to hurt his feet. But he couldn't just walk normally—not anymore. Every step had to carry the weight of his transformation, the burden of his tragic past, the promise of terrible vengeance to come.
His black and white hair kept getting in his eyes, which was annoying but looked absolutely devastating in the torchlight. He'd spent a good twenty minutes that morning arranging it to flow just right, practicing the perfect windswept look in a puddle's reflection. The rusty dagger at his side caught the light with each movement, and he was pretty sure it was gleaming with bloodlust. Or maybe rust. Probably rust, but he chose to believe it was bloodlust.
"Come forth, creatures of shadow," he whispered to the darkness ahead, his voice echoing off the stone walls in a way that he found deeply satisfying. "Let your pain feed my ascension into power."
That was a good line. He'd been working on that one for days, practicing different inflections while he walked. The key was to make "ascension" sound really ominous, like he was climbing a ladder made of screams.
Around the next corner, a group of slimes came bouncing into view, and Kenji felt his heart skip with anticipation. Finally! Enemies to defeat! Darkness to unleash! Power to—
The slimes took one look at him and immediately started what sounded like excited chittering. Which was weird, because he'd expected cowering. Or maybe respectful fear. Definitely not whatever this was.
"Oh great," the lead slime was saying, though to Kenji it just sounded like a series of melodic blurps. "It's another one."
The smaller slime next to it bounced nervously, its translucent body jiggling with what appeared to be anxiety. "Another what?" it asked, its voice a higher-pitched bloop.
"Edgelord," the lead slime replied with the weary patience of a customer service representative who'd dealt with this exact situation many, many times before. "We get one every few decades. Remember Darkblade McShadowfang from forty years ago?"
There was a collective groan from the older slimes, the kind of sound you might hear in a break room when someone mentions the office's most annoying recurring client.
"Oh yeah, that guy," another slime chimed in, its membrane rippling with what might have been laughter. "Spent three months down here dramatically monologuing and 'brutally slaying' us for experience points. Remember how he used to pose with our remains?"
"At least he was creative with his victory speeches," added a slime near the back, sounding almost nostalgic. "This new one looks like he's still working on his material."
The Dissolver of Bonds, meanwhile, was hearing all of this as a chorus of increasingly aggressive monster roars. His pulse quickened with battle fever, and he raised his dagger high above his head, feeling the weight of destiny settle upon his shoulders like a really dramatic cloak.
"Your time has come, foul beasts!" he declared, his voice cracking slightly on "beasts" but recovering admirably. "Witness the birth of a legend written in blood and shadow!"
He charged forward with a battle cry that started strong but sort of devolved into a strangled yelp when he nearly tripped over his own feet. Still, he recovered with a roll that looked almost intentional, coming up in what he hoped was a menacing combat stance.
The slimes watched this display with the kind of professional interest that veterinarians might show when observing a particularly energetic puppy.
"Classic opening," one of them commented approvingly. "Good recovery on the stumble. I'm giving it a seven out of ten."
"Generous," another replied. "Did you see how he telegraphed that battle cry? Darkblade never telegraphed."
The lead slime sighed—a sound like air slowly escaping from a balloon—and activated what they had long ago dubbed "Vacation Protocol." With practiced efficiency, half the group immediately sat down and began pulling out their knitting supplies. Slimes, as it turned out, were surprisingly gifted at crafts, possibly because their malleable bodies made excellent tools for manipulating yarn.
"Marjorie, are you still working on that scarf?" one of the knitting slimes asked conversationally.
"Oh yes, it's coming along beautifully. I think the cerulean blue really brings out my translucency."
The other half of the group, meanwhile, began preparing for what they called "The Show." This was the part where they had to pretend to be fierce monsters instead of what they actually were: dungeon employees with excellent healthcare benefits and a very understanding union.
The most theatrical slime in the group—a natural performer who'd once considered a career on the surface before settling into steady dungeon work—bounced forward with all the menace it could muster.
"RAAAWR!" it roared, managing to sound genuinely intimidating despite the fact that it was essentially a sentient blob of cleaning solution. "I SHALL DEVOUR YOUR SOUL, MORTAL!"
Kenji's eyes lit up like Christmas morning. "Yes!" he screamed back, dodging what was clearly a halfhearted swipe with more drama than strictly necessary. "Fight me with all your fury! Let your hatred fuel my transformation!"
The slime had to admit, the kid had enthusiasm. It made a few more swipes, being careful not to actually connect with anything vital. The last thing any of them wanted was to actually hurt the clearly unhinged human. The paperwork alone would be a nightmare, and the union rep would have their membrane for putting a civilian at risk.
Meanwhile, the slime's core—a microscopic speck of crystallized consciousness about the size of a dust mite—remained safely tucked away in the deepest part of its body. Even if this overly dramatic teenager managed to completely obliterate its physical form, it would just regenerate in a few hours with nothing worse than a mild headache and some amusing stories to share at the next shift meeting.
Kenji's combat technique had definitely evolved since his first encounter. Gone were the days of aggressive hugging (though honestly, some of the slimes missed that phase—it had been oddly endearing). Now he was all about what could charitably be described as "enthusiastic flailing."
He windmilled his arms like he was trying to fly, kicked at empty air with the passion of someone fighting invisible ninjas, and made sound effects that would have impressed the voice actors in the cheapest anime ever produced.
"HAAAAAH!" he screamed, spinning in a circle for no apparent reason. "TAKE THIS! SHADOW SLASH OF DESPAIR!"
His rusty dagger actually connected with the slime's membrane this time, which was more luck than skill, but the creature immediately launched into its dramatic death scene. After forty years of practice, the dungeon slimes had turned dying into an art form.
"Nooooo!" the slime wailed, its voice carrying the perfect note of tragic defeat. It began to dissolve with Oscar-worthy flair, its form becoming less solid with each passing second. "How could I be defeated by such... such overwhelming darkness! Tell my children... tell them I died with honor!"
It managed to work in a subtle wink to its friends in the knitting circle, who paused in their yarn work to applaud politely.
"Your sacrifice feeds my power!" Kenji declared, completely oblivious to the theatrical nature of the performance. He struck a victory pose that involved flexing muscles he didn't really have while pointing his dagger dramatically at the ceiling.
The knitting slimes exchanged glances.
"Better than Darkblade's victory dance," one of them admitted grudgingly.
"Lower your standards, Gladys," another replied, not looking up from its stitches. "That's not saying much."
"Still," Gladys continued, "there's something almost charming about his complete lack of self-awareness. Remember how self-conscious Darkblade got toward the end? Always asking if we thought his monologues were too long."
"This one's definitely more... authentic in his delusion," agreed another slime, watching as Kenji began what appeared to be an interpretive dance about the nature of power and betrayal.
The "deceased" slime was already beginning to reform in a quiet corner, keeping its regeneration subtle so as not to break the kid's immersion. Rule number one of dungeon monster work: never break character while the adventurer is still in the room.
Kenji, meanwhile, was riding the high of his "victory" like it was the best drug ever invented. The rush of power, the satisfaction of conquest, the way his hair looked absolutely perfect in the torchlight as he delivered his post-battle monologue—it was everything he'd dreamed of during those long, bitter hours after his classmates had betrayed him.
"Do you see?" he asked the dungeon walls, his voice trembling with emotion. "Do you see how the darkness has embraced me? How it flows through my veins like liquid shadow?"
The walls, being walls, did not respond. But Kenji nodded as if they had whispered words of dark encouragement.
The slimes watched this one-sided conversation with the kind of fond exasperation usually reserved for particularly eccentric relatives.
"He's talking to the walls now," observed one of the knitters.
"They all do that eventually," replied another. "Give it a week, and he'll be having full conversations with his own reflection."
"Remember when Darkblade started dating that stalagmite?"
"We don't talk about the stalagmite incident."
As Kenji began to move deeper into the dungeon, carried away by his fantasies of power and transformation, the slimes settled back into their normal routine. The knitting circle resumed their work, the "dead" slime finished reforming and joined a friendly game of cards, and everyone began placing bets on how long this new edgelord would last before he either moved on to the next floor or had his inevitable psychological breakdown.
"I give him two weeks," said Gladys, not looking up from her scarf.
"Optimistic," replied another slime. "Did you see how he was looking at Gerald's remains? I'm thinking three days before he starts getting weird about it."
"He's already weird about it," Gerald pointed out, having fully regenerated and somehow acquired a small top hat. "Did you see him try to smell my dissolution? That's not normal victory behavior."
"Nothing about these edgelords is normal, dear," Gladys said comfortingly. "That's rather the point."
And so the cycle continued, as it had for decades and would for decades to come. The dungeon had seen heroes and villains, saints and sinners, chosen ones and tragic anti-heroes. But edgelords? Edgelords were a special category all their own, and the monsters had long ago learned to simply weather the storm and wait for them to either move on or evolve into something less dramatically unstable.
In the distance, they could hear Kenji's voice echoing off the stone walls as he practiced new monologues and victory speeches. The sound was both ridiculous and oddly endearing, like listening to a particularly enthusiastic child playing pretend.
"At least he's having fun," one slime commented charitably.
"That's what worries me," replied another.
But they settled in to wait it out, as they always did. After all, they were professionals.