It was a noisy morning.
As the sky began to whiten, soldiers in armor began to walk along the streets, and as the sun began to rise, magicians joined them.
While the mothers at home prepared breakfast, the soldiers walked around busily, and by the time the streets were lined up with stalls, knights began to stand everywhere in the capital, keeping watch.
It was a strange sight, but also a familiar one.
When the demon king was still alive, the royal capital was not as large and vast as it was now, but even so, there were knights and soldiers everywhere in the elven capital, and every day they were on guard, ready to intercept the monsters who would attack at any time.
However, since the demon king was defeated, the frequency of such attacks had decreased, and these days, there were only soldiers patrolling regularly to mediate between thieves and quarrels.
It was because the world had become peaceful that the residents rarely saw soldiers and knights, but this morning was different.
It was normal for a city to be noisy, but there were soldiers on patrol, knights in armor, and magicians in thick robes.
Even unfamiliar people who work at the royal castle were quickly monitoring the streets of the capital, carefully observing not only the busy streets, but also the back alleys where there were few people, and the abandoned houses where people no longer lived, and frustratingly walked away with nothing.
This was a very unusual situation.
They were also impatient.
The other day, one of Queen Leticia's maids disappeared inside the castle.
The culprit was thought to be a bandit or someone who broke into the castle, but the appearance of the monster in the castle yesterday made Leticia realize who the culprit was.
She blamed herself inwardly for being too late, but even so, her actions from then on could be called fast.
That day, she called the knights together, told them what had happened, and doubled the number of guards at night. And today, she ordered them to mobilize not only the soldiers and knights but also the magicians to search for traces of the monster this morning.
The monster that had appeared in the castle and attacked Leticia's daughter, Meltia, and had been defeated by Leticia―― a slime.
The slime that appeared in the Mithril Mine somehow made its way to the Elven country of Fonteau, and not only that, it invaded the castle.
Moreover, they did not know their total number.
They did not know if it was just the one that was subdued yesterday, or if there were still more of them.
Leticia, who had heard about the characteristics of the slime from Fiana and Alfira, who had gone to the Mithril Abandoned Mine to kill them, was wary of them, thinking that there must be multiple of these slimes.
In fact, there was more than one slime.
In the first place, they wondered if the concept of them "working as one" could be applied, but it would be difficult to say.
The soldiers and knights ordered by Leticia― their boss, the Commander ―walked around the royal capital from the morning, running around, breathing hard, sweating, asking questions to the residents of the capital.
The magicians were on the lookout for places where the flow of mana was abnormal, and they took turns monitoring the entire capital.
Even so, no traces of the slime could be found, and time passed by.
However, the case of ten people going missing since the other day.
It was thought that the culprit was someone with a mental disorder, but the knights decided that the fact that the culprit was a monster was good information.
Now they could kill the culprit without hesitation.
Whatever the culprit was, if it was a person, they would feel guilty, no matter how small or large it was. If it was a person who had killed a fellow human being, no matter how big of a sinner that person was, they would only feel disgusted on that person on the back of their minds.
But if it was a monster. If it was a non-human being.
There was not a trace of guilt, not even a shred of mercy in killing it.
"Tch. I can't wait to find it."
One of the knights muttered it under his iron helmet. Every time the knight walked, his iron armor clattered and scraped, making a deafening sound.
The helmet, the full body armor, the cloak, and the sword at his waist. Some of them were carrying not only swords but also spears. The weight of these things was tremendous, but just because they were slimes, didn't mean they were stupid enough to go up against a monster without armor.
The knight, sweating under his armor, was looking for something to vent his fatigue and anger on.
There were three of them in their group. In groups of three, they were searching all over the capital. Every group consisted of two knights and a mage.
The mage was looking for a suspicious flow of mana and the knights were following the trail.
This country was the land of elves. The people who lived in the capital also use magic, and there were traces of it everywhere. Therefore, they often mistakenly look for traces of magic used by the people―― well, many of them were traces of magic used by the people, but even so, they didn't have a choice but to go through it.
They didn't know where the slime was, and where it lived...... they didn't know anything about it.
So the best thing they could do was to look for anything suspicious.
It was inefficient and would take up too much time. That was the reason why the knights were so irritated and frantic, and even though they know that their presence was making the people uneasy, they walked wildly along the streets.
Perhaps sensing the inner feelings of the knights, the streets were not as lively as usual, and the atmosphere was somewhat overwhelming.
The atmosphere was strange and uncomfortable.
It was only a slime.
That was what the knights and magicians who had heard Leticia's story thought of.
That was because the Demon King was not in this world. The demon king had been defeated and the monsters were already on the decline.
That was why the people have already recognized that monsters were not a threat, they were already weak, and if people gather together, the monsters would be easily defeated.
They were unconcerned because the slime was the weakest monster
......That was natural, everyone thought so.
"I want to get this over with and go home and relax."
"That was true."
One of the knights muttered and the magician agreed.
While listening to those words, the other knight... the man who was the leader of their group.
"So, magician-dono? Where's the next place?"
"Um. It's just up ahead."
With that, the magician led them to the alleyway. The two knights followed him into the alleyway.
A pungent, rotten smell reached their noses.
It was a smell from the vomit that had dried up over time.
"Tch"
One of the knights clicked his tongue. In contrast, the magician did not seem to be bothered by the smell and continued to move forward.
A residue of mana, invisible to the knights. They were following it. They didn't hesitate and just gazed at the empty sky.
Even though it was daytime, the dim back alley was creepy because monsters could have jumped at them at any moment, and the two knights walked while watching their surroundings.
How far had they walked?
In one of the corners of the alleyway, the magician stopped.
It was the place where Tiana and Freia were being violated by the slime the other day.
"There's something... here"
"……Here?"
The three of them looked around.
A crate and an empty barrel. The crate was filled with empty bottles and the lid of the barrel was left open. There was dried vomit that had stained the ground, leaving a dried black circle.
There was nothing unusual about it.
The two knights thought that it wasn't unusual, but the magician knelt down and traced the black stain on the ground with his finger.
"This is it"
The magician then looked around again, while squinting his eyes, he spotted a drainage ditch leading to the sewer, so he sat up and looked into it.
Of course, even in the daytime, it was pitch black in the drain, and no human eye, even an elf's, would be able to peer into the depths.
But the eyes of the mage. His eyes could see the flow of mana.
If it was a normal slime, it would be impossible, but the Black Ooze and the children born from the Black Ooze's semen have mana in their bodies, and even if they move, they would leave a residue of mana.
There were only a few magicians who could see the residue of mana and knew that the slime they were looking for could use magic, so only a limited number could be sent out to search.
"I'm sure the slime has been here before."
"Here, huh"
He looked around again. But there was nothing unusual in the surroundings.
Then, he knocked over the empty crates and barrels and searched every corner, but he couldn't find any other traces of the slime.
They were looking at the corners of the wall and empty crates. At best, they would only find small animals such as mice.
They saw several drainage ditches, but it never occurred to them that it was deep inside.
The slime was a soft-bodied creature, but it had a certain size and mass.
At least in the time when the Demon Lord existed, the slime was at least the size of a puppy, and the drainage ditch was not large enough for a human arm to pass through.
They had a preconceived notion that an ordinary slime would not be able to pass through it.
The reason they appeared all over the capital was that they were in the sewers, kidnapping people and increasing their numbers, but they didn't think it was possible.
The other knights thought the same way.
Even though they found several traces of slime, they couldn't get to them.
In the back alleys, in abandoned houses, in the hidden parts of monasteries, and in the castle, the slimes left traces on those places, but they couldn't think where they had disappeared to. The only thing they could think of was that the slimes moved on the ground.
Therefore, time passed by without finding where the slime lived or even how they could travel all over the capital without being seen.
The search for the slimes began before the sun began to rise, but it was already almost noon without producing any results.
The temperature was rising, and the inside of their armor was so hot.
Sweating under their helmets, the knights left the alleyway.
They were in pursuit of yet another mana residue.
Even if there were traces of the slimes, but beyond that, they didn't get any other information.
In the royal castle of Fonteau. In the throne room, Leticia was frustrated.
Without expressing what she was thinking, she put her weight on the back of the chair and sighed heavily while looking up at the ceiling.
Last night, she ordered the magicians to observe the capital using remote magic, and from the time the sky began to turn white, she had mobilized the knights and soldiers to search the entire capital.
Even so, they were unable to locate the whereabouts of the slime, or even to see it.
It costs a lot of money to move the knights or the magicians.
Equipment for the knights and magicians. A monster was a monster, even if it was only a slime. It was dangerous to search without using the right types of equipment, and if they got hurt, treating them would also cost money.
It was true that the number of knights who would risk their lives to protect the country had decreased due to the peace, and the number of knights who only worked just to earn money had increased. The more they work, the more wages they demand, and that puts pressure on the country's finances.
The country of Fonteau was not so poor that the country's finances would shift greatly due to that, but――.
"This has become troublesome, my queen."
"Yes, it has."
When the man's voice in front of her, a nobleman, who was one of the people responsible for the country's finances, reached her ears, it brought Leticia back to reality.
It was a nobleman who managed the wages paid to the knights.
The fact that the nobleman was in front of the throne, was because of the cost of moving the knights and magicians.
In fact, this was something that should be discussed in the conference room in one part of the castle, but now that monsters had already invaded the inside of the royal capital, Leticia, who could not move freely due to her position as a queen, stayed in the throne room at all times and received reports from the head of the knights and magicians.
And she also needed to listen to the nobles while on the throne.
"Let's talk about it after the matter is settled."
"Well...... I hope it's done by the end of the day."
"I hope so――"
Leticia muttered and turned her gaze to the two commanders, knights and mages.
The leader of each group was also unable to move freely because they were the ones who would relay the information to the queen after getting them, so they were currently glued to the castle.
In the first place, they had risen to the position of the leader of each group and were now fifty years old of age. They didn't have the physical strength to walk around the capital in their armor.
Leaving the search to the younger generation, the older generation used their brains and knowledge to find the slime.
However, most of the information that the knights and mages brought with them was the same.
Traces of slime were found everywhere in the royal capital.
There was a noise in the back alley last night.
A woman in the neighborhood went missing.
The soldiers who were searching disappeared.
and so on.
They couldn't find any traces of the slime from those places that could lead to its dwelling place, and the truth on those pieces of information was unknown.
They were frustrated that they had spent half a day gathering only that much information, and when Leticia was asked about it, she let out an exasperated breath.
So half a day.
Another half and the day was over. How could she say to them that she had achieved nothing?
"You're so smart."
"?"
Leticia, who had been sighing, muttered.
Her gaze remained fixed on the ceiling, not looking at anyone else in the room.
In her mind, she was not counting the money she would pay the soldiers and knights, nor was she wondering where the slime was.
Pure thinking.
Wondering that after mobilizing so many people and spending so much time, they still couldn't find it.
It was as though the slime had anticipated their actions.
It was as though the slime understood how they would behave.
Above all, it was not aiming for the knights and mages who were skilled and would take time to kill. It was targeting soldiers with only a moderate level of skill, or the residents living in the royal capital. The fact that they were being attacked was frightening.
It was a problem, Leticia thought.
The slime existed somewhere in the capital.
They didn't show themselves, only leaving their traces, and they hunt down only the "weak" who were caught in their traps.
It was like a person, she thought.
Just like the elves who lived in the forest, they lured their prey into traps and attacked them after they were no longer a threat.
They would break their fangs, crush their claws, take away their strength and concentration, and kill them with arrows when they were helpless.
That hunting style.
It was similar, she thought.
At the same time, she also thought that the slimes couldn't possibly have that kind of intelligence.
Slime. A soft-bodied monster.
She remembered the words of her husband, a hero from another world.
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Slimes were stupid, slow, and weak.
As he said, they were slow and weak. Swords and spears didn't work on them, but they were even afraid of the flame from a torch and could be easily burned to death by fire magic. Because of their soft body, they were also vulnerable to ghosts and could be neutralized by freezing.
However, the slime that was attacking the capital was not stupid.
They were smart. They were leaving traces of mana everywhere so it was difficult to pinpoint where they were, and they were targeting the weak.
They knew how to hunt.
Besides, from what Leticia knew from the fight yesterday, that the slime was not normal. She had told that to the soldiers, but when asked how strong the magic she used to get rid of it, had made an impression that it was really the weakest monster.
Because they knew they were weak. Because they understood that. That was why they thought that they would be defeated easily.
"Let's bring back the soldiers, knights, and mages."
"We have not yet achieved anything significant..."
"If we don't, the casualties will only increase. I'm changing my mind."
Leticia said and stood up from her throne.
Light poured down from the stained glass ceiling and colored the floor of the throne room.
"I'll be away for a while―― We'll be busy again in the evening, so rest your body and mind until then."
The knight commander and the chief of the magician's group looked at each other for a moment, and then kneeled down on the floor and bowed their heads.
A few of the nobles who were present also bowed their heads in the same way.
Leticia left the throne room without looking at them. She walked away with her back straight, chest out, and a firm stance.
Her silver hair swayed and spread out as she walked, it was like a thin silky veil glimmering through Leticia's back.
A white dress with a wide opening in the back. Her skin was as white as snow, her waist was curvy, and her buttocks swayed from side to side as she walked. The dress was made of a thin fabric that showed off the shape of her buttocks, and every time Leticia's legs moved, it created a lewd crease in the valley of her buttocks.
The peach-colored hair maid who was waiting at the entrance followed Leticia.
"You should also rest."
"――Are you sure?"
"It's going to be busy in the evening... The maids might move as well."
"Understood"
After walking for a while and reaching an empty hallway, the head maid bowed and left Leticia's side.
There was no sound.
Even though she was wearing leather boots and the hallway was made of stone, the head maid disappeared without making a sound from behind Leticia.
Leticia did not look back.
The maids she hired were all talented.
That was why it was strange.
Tiana, one of the maids, had disappeared. It was hard to believe that she was outdone by just a slime, and it was also hard to believe that there were no traces that she was attacked, if something happened, she should be able to leave some evidence.
No matter how good a person was, they were not perfect. Failures sometimes happened.
However.
Against a monster. It was not like her to not leave anything behind when her life was in danger.
If it was a human, it would still be the same, but a slime had neither intelligence nor wisdom.
Leticia knew information about slimes. When she was still traveling with the hero, and even earlier than that.
When the Demon King still existed in this world, there were so many slimes in the world.
However, these slimes were powerless and only moved forward without thinking anything.
These eyeless monsters only thought of moving forward, melting and eating the grasses and insects in their path, and if they were lucky enough to find a village, they would enter it.
And if a person was unfortunate enough to block its progress, the person would be absorbed, melted, and eaten.
That was all it could do.
So, if someone saw a slime, don't interfere with its progress.
Go around the side and burn it with fire. That should be enough.
That should be.
However――.
(The slime that had appeared in Meltia's room...)
Remember it, that slime was strange.
It instantly saw the barrier's weak point that Leticia had set up and it entered from below, where the area she was not protected.
Until now, she had thought it was just a hunch, an instinct, but what if it moved that way because it understood magic?
She had doubts.
Perhaps because she once thought that it was smart, she thought that it was a possibility.
Fiana had said that the "slime in the abandoned mine" could use magic.
In the middle of the hallway, she stopped. She put her slender fingers, wrapped in white gloves, on her chin. And she looked out the window...... she could see the courtyard where she burned the slime yesterday.
The figure of the slime that was burnt to death came to her mind.
If, what if.
What if―― the offspring of that slime could also use magic? What if it could read the flow of mana like a talented magician?
What if it was setting up a trap by leaving a trace of its mana behind?
Above all―― how many slimes were being born right now?
"Fu"
Leticia sighed.
She shook that unpleasant possibility out of her head.
"The slimes were increasing their numbers, but that doesn't mean it's unlimited."
She knew. The food that a slime absorbed would convert to its mass. The more food it absorbed, the bigger it gets, but even the light and heat from the sun would cause it to evaporate and shrink.
This world was not friendly to the slimes.
The only way for the slime to continue to grow was to continue to hunt on places like the depths of abandoned mines, where the light could not reach, like the place Fiana and the others had gone to.
――There was no place in the capital where the light could not reach.
Even at night, the country was brightly lit due to its population. It was the most prosperous country on this continent.
The country that the hero from the other world made, her husband.
There was no place for the slimes could live here.
That was why Leticia walked down the hallway without thinking any further. Her purpose was to go to Maria's room, her second daughter, where her daughter Meltia was resting.
Yesterday, her beloved daughter was attacked by a slime. Her room was stained with mucus and was not in a state where someone could rest, so she heard that the two of them slept together in Maria's room last night.
In fact, she wanted Leticia to sleep with her, but she chose the safety of this country over comforting her two beloved daughters.
Because she had heard from Fiana that the slime could impregnate a woman, which was why she had them both take a break from the academy today and stay in their rooms.
She was only in her underwear and covered in mucus―― She was just a young girl.
She wanted to let them rest for a while in the castle's safety, by her side. The thought of her being attacked again when she was out of sight was enough to make her heart stop beating.
"Are you okay, Meltia?"
When she arrived in front of her beloved daughter's room, she took a deep breath to calm herself down and knocked lightly on the door.
"Ah, yes"
A bright voice replied.
She relaxed her mouth a little and opened the door slowly.
In the room, a beautiful girl with silver hair and red eyes, who looked a little younger than Leticia, was sitting on the bed. A beautiful girl with dark hair and eyes was sitting on a chair beside her, holding a stuffed animal on her lap.
The girl with silver hair was Meltia, the eldest daughter. The girl with black hair was Maria, the second daughter.
Leticia thought that her second daughter, who inherited the blood of her husband, the hero, looked good with the cute sewn fruit in her dress, which was a little unreliable to be the hero's daughter.
She didn't want her daughters to do anything bloody like slaying monsters, and she wanted them to just hold a stuffed animal and smile.
Seeing her two daughters, Leticia relaxed her shoulders.
"Did it... increased again?"
Looking inside the room, Leticia said.
She could see a lot of stuffed animals in her line of sight. There was a lot of different variety of stuffed animals, such as dogs, birds, dragons, and manticores. Animals and monsters of all kinds were displayed on the shelves and in the bed.
There weren't that many before, but since she started attending the same magic academy as Meltia, the number of stuffed animals had been increasing rapidly.
Leticia was thinking that she was probably buying things that she saw as she passed by the street on her way home from school.
That in itself was not a problem. She was the daughter of a noble family, a royalty.
Once they reach adulthood, they would have very few opportunities to interact in public, so it made sense that they were learning how to spend money on their own.
Nowadays, in noble households where the old customs still carry on, she heard that many of their daughters did not even know how to do shopping before they get married.
This was the result of Leticia's travels around the world with the hero, broadening her knowledge.
That was why she gave Meltia and Maria an allowance and allowed them to buy whatever they wanted within that range. Well, since they were traveling between the castle and the school by carriage, they only knew the stores on the main street when it comes to shopping.
"Isn't there any changes, since then?"
"No, mother."
"...No monsters had come."
"I'll take care of the monsters right away."
She smiled reassuringly and sat down on the bed next to Meltia. The bed creaked and shook slightly, and the reaction caused Meltia to shift her position so that she would lean towards Leticia.
Leticia's right hand gently embraced Meltia's head.
"It's all right."
"……Yes"
She muttered in her ear to reassure her once again, stroked her fingers through her beautiful silver hair, which was the same color as her mother's, and embraced her head to her chest with a little more strength.
Maria, who was watching her, hugged the stuffed animal on her lap to her chest as though she were jealous.
She had small breasts compared to her mother and sister. The head of the stuffed animal that was held by her twin mounds which were small only distort it a bit.
"Fufu―― Come here, Maria"
Leticia called her name. Then Maria got up from her chair and sat down on the opposite side of her sister Meltia, as she was called, and was held in Leticia's chest as well.
"Fufu. You are both my treasure. I won't let anything happen to you two."
She muttered and put her strength into her arms that were embracing her two daughters.
Meltia and Maria's faces were buried in her ample breasts. She combed their hair gently, to calm the two girls. And in doing so, Leticia's displeasure also eased.
Her heart calmed down.
Leticia felt as though the warmth of her daughters' bodies calmed her own heart.
A few minutes passed.
The reason why the two daughters didn't say anything was that they too felt Leticia's hardship...... and frustration with the current situation.
Leticia is the queen.
Before she was a mother to them, she was a queen.
She had to stand in front of people, stand firm, and give priority to her position as a queen over her position as a mother.
The fact that their mother visited them while she was at work.
That had never happened before, not even when they were children.
That was why they sensed something was wrong with their mother, and without saying a word, they were being held like this, just as she wanted.
They thought it was because it would calm her down.
A mother who loved her daughters, and the daughters who loved their mother.
The scene was precious and dazzling.
The sun shone through the window. The coolness of the wind shook the curtains. Silver hair repelled the light, and black hair absorbed the light.
The furnishings in the room, the cute stuffed animals.
It was like a painting, like a sanctuary that no one could violate.
"...I'm sorry, both of you."
After a while, Leticia muttered.
In the end, it was a matter of time before the two of them were released from the hands that had been embracing them and their hair was a little disheveled.
"No"
“…………”
Meltia shook her head, and Maria leaned her head back to her ample chest, wanting to be held a little longer.
Even though she was a mother of two children, her breasts were still as firm as they were when she was young―― when she met the hero. No, it had become softer and richer over the years, as though it had a soft, sweet scent like a cake being sold at the royal capital.
When Maria buried her face in her chest, her breasts swayed greatly despite being wrapped in her dress and underwear, creating deep creases in her cleavage.
Perhaps amused by such a change in the richness of her breasts, the younger girl wrapped her hands around Leticia's waist and hugged her tightly.
Perhaps she felt Leticia's anxiety.
Leticia understood it and was at the mercy of Maria's sweetness. With her open hand, she adjusted Meltia's hair, which was disheveled by the hug she just received.
"Mother, please be careful."
Maria said as she buried her face in her chest.
She couldn't see her face, but she could hear the anxiety in her voice.
"It's okay, it's just a slime, you know."
Leticia said it so strongly, without showing the slightest hint of the anxiety she had just felt.
It was only a slime.
Even though it was somewhat intelligent and could use magic, it was no match for Leticia just like the slime she fought yesterday.
It didn't matter if there were tens or hundreds of them.
No problem. That was what she thought. That was what she was thinking.
In the first place, do slimes even have the concept of "working as one"?
No one in this world had the answer to that question.