The next day.
Alia, Paulen, and Gracie headed to the research lab that the Tower Master had prepared, bringing the sli with them.
Inside the lab were various tools for magical experints, scrolls with magic circles, and magic stones—everything that gave off the clear atmosphere of a wizard’s laboratory.
“Welco, Saintess Alia, Paladin Paulen.”
“Are we going to examine Jiggly here?”
“That’s right. Even I think this sli is quite fascinating. It could very well be a new species of sli.”
“Jiggly, a new species of sli…”
“First, could you hand over the sli?”
“Yes.”
Alia handed the sli over to Brooks Vessilja with both hands.
[Noblesse Fire] ▶ What exactly are they trying to examine?
▶ At most, they’ll find out it’s just a bounce sli, right?
▶ Ahahaha, dumb humans don’t even know the Squishy types properly, lolol
[Thread-Lady] ▶ Maybe they’ll just end up realizing how cute Squishy really is?
▶ As if!
[Squishy Queen] ▶ How dare a re human attempt to identify my kin! Insolent and outrageous!
▶ So what exactly are you going to do about it?
[Squishy Queen] ▶ You impudent rascal! Why hasn’t this constant troublemaker been banned already?!
▶ Ahahaha
▶ Ahaha, unless soone’s insulting them, they go, “It’s fair~”
Brooks Vessilja placed the sli in the center of the magic circle he had prepared beforehand.
“Examine? How?”
Understanding the conversation, the sli was growing more and more curious about how they planned to examine it.
Boing!
“Stay still. Everything will go smoothly then.”
‘Is he talking to !’
‘Stay still!’
Seeing the sli stop bouncing and remain still, Brooks Vessilja was once again convinced that the sli was truly intelligent.
‘It’s a sha, but it can’t be helped. Beco the sacrifice for my happiness.’
Stepping back from the magic circle, Brooks Vessilja spoke to the three others.
“Step back a little further.”
As he spoke, Brooks extended his hand toward the magic circle and sent out his mana to activate it.
Wooooong!
A hemispherical barrier ford with mana at the center of the magic circle.
“What is that barrier for?”
“It’s for safety. Originally, this magic circle was made to investigate unidentified living monsters.”
That was a lie.
This magic circle was one Brooks Vessilja had made just yesterday, specifically for today.
“Let’s begin the examination.”
After the hemispherical barrier was established, the magic circle began to emit light.
‘Woooow!’
The sli stared curiously at the glowing magic circle on the floor.
▶ Ah, tone down the light!
▶ What could they possibly learn with sothing like this?
▶ IDK?
While the viewers were also watching with great interest—
Crackle! Crack-crack!
An ominous sound, like electricity sparking, began to emit from the magic circle.
“Th-this can’t be!”
Right on cue, Brooks Vessilja began to act shocked.
“What’s going on?!”
“This makes no sense! Why is the magic circle going out of control...!”
Brooks Vessilja pretended to be unaware of the cause.
At this mont, no one present could tell it was all an act.
“What did you say?!”
“Ji-Jiggly!”
“Stop! You can’t go near it now! You could get caught in it!”
“......! Saintess!”
Paulen, hearing Brooks Vessilja’s warning, grabbed Alia’s arm to stop her from approaching the magic circle.
“Paulen! Let go! Jiggly is in danger right now!”
“Tower Master! Isn’t there anything I can do to help?!”
“Gracie! Stay where you are! If you interfere now, it could get even worse!”
Since Gracie might accidentally stabilize the mana flow and expose his own sche, Brooks Vessilja shouted to keep her from getting involved.
“An explosion? No way!”
▶An explosion?
▶Wait, is Squishy in real danger right now?
▶ Lolol is this a death-by-explosion ending?
[Squishy Queen] ▶ No! my kin! Get out of there right now!
[Thread-Lady] ▶ Kyaaaa! Squishyeeee!
[Noblesse Fire] ▶ Hey! Break that stupid barrier and get out of there now!
[Just Slam First] ▶ Slam it! Break that barrier and get out of there right now!
[Gothic Luxury Bone] ▶ Squishy! It’s dangerous!
In the midst of the urgent situation—excluding the trolls—the monsters who regularly watched the sli’s stream started shouting warnings.
‘Break it?’
Seeing the chat, the sli tried to bounce-tackle its way out of the barrier.
Boioioing!
However, even with the sli’s bounce tackle, the barrier did not break.
‘It’s useless! That’s a barrier that can even withstand an A-rank monster’s attack!’
The sli tried the bounce tackle multiple tis, but the barrier wouldn’t break.
“Break the barrier! Please, release that barrier now!”
“If I do that, this whole room will go up in flas! As long as we keep the barrier, only the sli will be affected!”
Crackle! Crackle!
The ominous sound was growing louder.
“No! Jiggly!”
‘Perfect. Ti to trigger the explosion.’
Just as Alia let out a scream and Brooks Vessilja grinned inwardly in satisfaction—
Wooooooooong!
A black void appeared directly above the hemispherical barrier.
“W-what is that?!”
A dark space appeared out of nowhere.
Caught completely off guard, Brooks Vessilja was flustered.
A skeletal hand erged from the black space.
The mont the hand appeared, a powerful wave of death energy flooded the room.
‘This energy…?’
It was death energy.
The kind emitted by undead.
But not the kind you’d get from a common undead—this was at least on the level of a Death Knight.
Even Paladin Paulen felt a chill run down his spine.
“Saintess! Miss Gracie! Step back behind !”
Paulen stepped forward, pulling out his sword and shield from his inventory to brace himself.
“Paladin Paulen! What are you doing…?”
“It’s the aura of death, Tower Master! And it’s at least from a Death Knight or higher!”
“W-what did you say?!”
‘Why the hell is an undead showing up all of a sudden?!’
The situation had shifted so drastically that Brooks Vessilja couldn’t even detonate the magic circle and was left just watching.
Then, the skeletal hand pointed its index finger downward at the hemispherical barrier.
A beam of black light shot straight from the fingertip.
Chiiiinnng!
The black light instantly shattered the hemispherical barrier, then split into several streams and scorched the magic circle.
Bzzzzzt!
“Grrgh!? Aaaaaagh!”
The magic circle was seared with such ferocity that it seed like it was being punished.
But the effect wasn’t just to stop the circle from exploding—it also caused Brooks Vessilja’s mana, which was connected to the circle, to backfire.
Wracked with pain from the sudden mana backlash, Brooks Vessilja scread and collapsed to the floor.
“T-Tower Master!”
As the black light faded from the index finger, more of the skeletal figure began to erge from the black space.
The reaching hand extended downward—
It was reaching toward the sli.
“Ji-Jiggly!”
“Saintess! Don’t move forward recklessly!”
“But Jiggly is…!”
Paulen also wanted to run in and secure the sli.
But the being before him was far too powerful and mysterious for even a Paladin like him to handle lightly.
‘What is its intention? Is it targeting Alia?’
Especially with the undead's deathly aura, he couldn’t rule out the possibility that it was aiming for Alia, the future Saintess.
What if, while he ran toward the sli, it took that opportunity to attack her?
As a Paladin, he couldn’t let that happen.
‘Woooow!’
anwhile, the sli gazed at the skeletal hand approaching it with pure curiosity.
The hand didn’t look particularly threatening to the sli.
After all, whether it was a human hand or a skeletal one, they were all the sa shape to the sli!
▶ What even is that?
▶ Is the explosion-ending over? That was anticlimactic.
[Squishy Queen] ▶ Are you safe, my kin?!
[Noblesse Fire] ▶ Hey, bones—was that you?!
[Gothic Luxury Bone] ▶ How am I supposed to travel from this continent to the Derxia continent?!
[Just Slam First] ▶ So what’s the deal with that skeleton now?
▶ Isn’t this the ti for an explainer to show up?
▶ Wait! Even I don’t know what’s going on.
▶ You don’t know what’s going on? Lololol.
▶ Ugh, co on, lololol.
The skeletal hand continued downward and eventually grabbed the sli with one hand.
Then—
Squish squish.
The fingers began kneading the sli.
‘?’
As the kneading continued for more than ten seconds, everyone in the room had question marks floating above their heads.
‘Squish squish!’
Only the sli was enjoying being squished like usual.
That’s when it happened.
[Squishy.]
The sli heard a voice that sounded like a system prompt.
[It’s . It’s Troll.]
‘Troll!’
A monster the sli had only ever seen in the chat.
Hearing the voice identify itself as Troll, the sli was startled.
[I have a favor. Can you turn the stream off?]
‘Turn off the stream? Why?’
The sudden request to shut off the broadcast made the sli tilt its body in confusion.
Troll felt the sli’s curious reaction through the hand bones and quickly followed up.
[I don’t want the other viewers to see what I’m about to do. It’s embarrassing.]
‘Embarrassing!’
It was an emotion the sli had never personally experienced—embarrassnt.
But after living at the Ludendion Count’s estate and observing human life up close, the sli at least understood the concept.
More importantly, it was a request from Troll, who had helped and been kind to the sli many tis.
‘Okay!’
The sli imdiately ended the stream.
Once the stream was confird to be off, Troll expressed his gratitude to the sli.
[Thank you, Squishy.]
Then, Troll fully revealed his form from the black void.
He was a skeleton wearing a tattered robe.
But he radiated intense death energy and mana that made the air tremble, floating weightlessly in midair.
The lich who had once been the mage Ventus Frail.
Troll removed his hand from the sli.
At the sa ti, he used mana to gently lift the sli into the air.
‘Woooow!’
Feeling his whole body surrounded by mana and floating, the sli was delighted and awestruck.
He settled softly on top of Troll’s upturned skeletal palm.
“No way...”
The intense aura of death and mana.
The robed skeleton.
Not only could he levitate himself, but he could also use magic to lift others with perfect control.
Alia knew of only one being capable of such feats.
“A lich!”
A monster known as the fallen version of a great mage.
A creature from legend, appearing hundreds of years ago only to be hunted down—never seen again since.
A lich.
She had never seen one in real life, but the skeleton before her radiated an overwhelming presence.
“A-A-A lich?! That’s the stuff of legends!”
At the ntion of “lich,” Paulen instantly gathered mana into his body to fortify himself.
Just in case the lich attacked, he would be ready to protect Alia.
Then Troll’s jawbone moved, and an eerie voice echoed through the room.
—I sensed rare mana and ca to check it out. Never thought that energy belonged to a sli. And to think the Saintess and Paladin would both be here too.
Troll’s performance had just begun.
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