"Oi! New blood?" a voice boomed from behind the counter.
Keiji barely had time to turn before a burly man with a half-buttoned shirt and a mug the size of his head ambled over, sloshing ale with every step. His beard was braided in loops, and his left boot was missing. He grinned like a bear who'd just found an unguarded honey stash.
"I'm Jarn, Guildmaster of this here merry band of degenerates. You're joining, or just lost?"
Keiji blinked. "Neither?"
Rina gave him a helpful jab to the ribs. "You are joining. Trust me, soloing past Level 5 is death-by-squirrel out here."
Jarn slammed the mug down beside him. "Then welcome! Name?"
"…Keiji."
"Adventurer name?"
"K.G."
Jarn squinted. "What's that stand for?"
"...Kinda Garbage."
The guildmaster roared with laughter. "Ha! You'll fit in just fine."
After a very informal initiation involving a warm tankard of something that tasted like burnt licorice mixed with dragon tears, Keiji found himself seated on a creaky bench next to Rina and two other guild members.
Across the table sat Mira, a bookish mage girl with dark circles under her eyes and ink stains on her fingers, and Bark, a silent, shirtless swordsman who had the build of a blacksmith and the social grace of petrified wood.
"So what do you do?" Mira asked, flipping through a spellbook that sparked ominously whenever she turned a page.
Keiji poked at the empty air in front of him until a faint interface shimmered into view.
"Uh… Novice. No subclass. No skills. Weapon: Stick."
Mira stared. "You're literally a starter tutorial NPC."
"Wow," Rina muttered. "You're not just underpowered. You're practically conceptual."
Bark gave a single grunt. Whether it was in agreement or pity, Keiji couldn't tell.
"I didn't choose to start this way," he said defensively. "I woke up like this."
"Sounds like a curse," Mira said, now scribbling notes. "You're not cursed, are you?"
"Not officially."
The guild board clattered as Jarn tacked up a fresh parchment.
"Alright, newbies! Low-rank quest time!" he shouted.
A dozen heads popped up from various corners of the hall like prairie dogs sensing danger.
Jarn waved the quest paper. "Local farmer's got his cabbage field overrun by forest slimes. Wants someone to clean it up without burning down the crops this time."
Mira coughed awkwardly and hid behind her spellbook. Rina raised her hand with enthusiasm.
Keiji slowly raised his twig.
"Good. You three—and the quiet one." Jarn nodded at Bark, who was already sharpening his sword with the intensity of a man polishing a lifetime of regrets.
"You've got until sundown. Bring back proof of kill and, uh… try not to traumatize the farmer's daughter this time."
Rina made a finger-gun gesture and winked. "No promises."
----
The field wasn't far. A modest cabbage patch with a wooden fence, a small tool shed, and a nervous-looking farmer who greeted them with a shovel in one hand and a pitchfork in the other.
"They're multiplying like rabbits in a potion lab," he grumbled, pointing to the glistening blobs oozing across his crops. "Every time I squash one, two more pop up."
The slimes were about knee-high, translucent green, and very much in love with trampling vegetables.
Mira clutched her spellbook. "Alright. Controlled frost magic only. No explosions above Grade 2."
Rina rolled her shoulders. "I'll flank. Slash and dash."
Bark said nothing, already moving toward the nearest slime like a silent executioner with a grudge against gelatinous creatures.
Keiji... had no idea what to do.
He gripped his twig tightly, scanned for anything vaguely tutorial-esque, and finally settled for shouting, "HEY!" before charging the nearest slime.
He tripped over a cabbage.
The slime boinged cheerfully onto his face.
You have been slimed!
Status Effect: Mild Suffocation (Duration: 00:30)
Damage Taken: -2 HP
A flash of silver. Bark cleaved the slime in two. It dissolved in a fizz of goo and a satisfying pop.
Keiji coughed, wiped his face, and staggered upright.
Rina pointed at him from across the field, doubled over with laughter. "That was the most heroic cabbage-related failure I've ever seen!"
"Shut up and kill yours," he wheezed, spitting out slime residue.
Despite a rocky start, the group found a rhythm. Mira cast glimmering beams of frost to freeze slimes in place, her fingers leaving trails of blue light. Rina zipped between enemies with the ease of a seasoned rogue, blades flashing in the afternoon sun. Bark didn't say a word, just waded into the fray like a quiet wall of death.
Keiji... mostly served as bait.
He drew the slimes' attention, waved his stick, and lured them toward the others. When he managed to smack one just as Mira cast a finishing spell, he earned a shared EXP bonus that made his interface chime pathetically.
It wasn't glamorous, but it worked.
For the first time since waking up in this world, he felt... useful.
By the time the sun began to dip, the field was clear, the cabbages were mostly safe, and Keiji was coated in at least three layers of slime.
The farmer handed over a small pouch of silver and three fresh cabbages as a bonus.
"Your friend's got guts," he told Rina, nodding at Keiji. "Took a slime to the face and didn't run once."
Keiji gave a tired thumbs-up, his arm dripping with green residue.
Rina nudged him with her elbow as they walked back toward the road. "You're not bad, Gramps."
"I have slime in places I didn't know existed."
Mira flipped through her spellbook, murmuring, "Statistically speaking, you should have died. Twice."
"Thanks for the confidence."
Bark gave a low grunt. That one sounded almost... respectful.
---
The guildhall was quieter that evening. Most of the members were out, and the dwarf girl at the bar had finally woken up long enough to serve something resembling stew.
Keiji sat at the corner table with a warm bowl, Rina and Mira beside him. Bark remained in his usual corner, silently sharpening his sword. Again.
Rina tossed a cabbage leaf into her mouth and leaned back. "Not a bad first quest, huh?"
"I didn't die. That's my current metric of success."
"You're a decent tank," Mira added. "Even if your weapon is a stick with identity issues."
Keiji set down his spoon. "I was a logistics manager for forty years. Herding slimes is weirdly familiar."
That got a chuckle from both of them.
"Wait," Rina said slowly. "You're actually sixty?"
"In real life. Or was."
She tilted her head. "That's... kind of awesome."
He blinked. "Most people call that depressing."
"Nah." She grinned. "You've got life experience. We've got knives and trauma. Good trade."
Mira sipped from her bowl. "Honestly, you're less annoying than most new players. You don't flirt, panic, or brag about your DPS."
"Mostly I just want a nap and a pension."
"You're basically our guild dad," Rina said cheerfully.
Keiji groaned. "No. No, absolutely not."
"Too late. It's canon now."
"I refuse—"
"—Dad."
Bark looked up from across the room. Nodded solemnly. "Dad."
"...This is harassment."
Rina threw an arm around his shoulder. "Get used to it, Pops."
As laughter echoed through the hall, something stirred quietly in the back of Keiji's mind. A flicker. A faint glimmer of a status window—only visible to him.
It blinked once, then vanished.
Hidden Trait Activated: "Legacy Echo"
[Initializing Profile...]
[Linked Data Found – Character ID: K.Takahashi – Level: MAX]
[Reconstruction in Progress...]
----
The next morning, Keiji woke to shouting, banging, and the unmistakable sound of something crashing through drywall.
"This place has zero insulation," he mumbled, rubbing sleep from his eyes.
His room in the guildhall was modest: a wooden cot, one window that wouldn't close all the way, and a wardrobe full of moth-eaten cloaks. But for all its quirks, it had a roof and didn't smell like slime.
He shuffled downstairs in a borrowed tunic and pants slightly too tight in the thighs. The scene in the main hall resembled a low-budget circus: Rina was standing on a table, arguing with Mira, who was waving a scroll like a rolled-up newspaper. Bark stood at the door with his usual unblinking silence.
"What fresh madness is this?" Keiji muttered.
Rina spotted him and lit up. "Dad! You're up!"
He gave her a flat look. "Stop calling me that."
"You're the only adult here. I mean, look at us."
Mira turned, hair wild from whatever experiment she'd just failed. "She mixed two quest scrolls and now we're registered for a dungeon and a community gardening event."
"It's not my fault the guild board doesn't use spell-protected forms!" Rina protested.
Bark grunted. It might have been agreement. Or indigestion.
Rina hopped off the table and pointed dramatically at Keiji. "Anyway, now that Dad is here, he'll sort it out!"
"Stop. Calling me—" Keiji paused, then sighed. "Fine. Dungeon it is. Cancel the gardening."
Mira folded her arms. "You sure? The old lady promised us fresh rhubarb."
"I just survived a field full of slimes. I am not dying surrounded by produce."
They headed out by mid-morning, following a trail that wound through the outer woods to a dungeon marked only on Mira's quest scroll: The Wet Caverns.
"Sounds romantic," Rina joked, waggling her eyebrows.
"It's definitely a slime dungeon," Mira said, scanning the scroll. "Low-tier. Lots of water hazards. Poor ventilation."
Bark drew his sword, the metal gleaming dully in the filtered forest light.
Keiji eyed the entrance with suspicion. A jagged hole in the earth, dark and faintly glowing around the edges. The air smelled damp, with just a hint of something fungal.
"Why are the beginner areas always caves?" he muttered.
"Because building haunted castles is expensive," Rina replied, already climbing down.
They entered cautiously, torches lit, weapons drawn.
The first chamber was wide and slick with condensation. Luminescent moss glowed faintly across the ceiling. A pool of water shimmered in the center, and on the far wall, a dozen small, blue slimes blinked slowly with gelatinous eyes.
Mira whispered, "Keep your distance. These ones split when hit too hard."
Rina drew a throwing knife. "So don't hit too hard."
Keiji held up his twig. "Excellent. That's literally my specialty."
The battle was controlled chaos.
Rina flanked and distracted, her knives flashing in the dim light. Mira sniped with careful frost bolts that crystallized slime edges. Bark crushed the stronger splits with brutal efficiency, his movements surprisingly graceful for someone so large. Keiji ran distraction—again—using carefully timed twig taps to aggro slimes just long enough for the others to finish them off.
Midway through the second chamber, Mira slipped on a patch of moss and nearly fell into a slime pit.
Keiji caught her by the back of her robe just in time, yanking her backward.
"Careful," he said, pulling her up. "Those look particularly hungry."
She blinked. "That's the second time you've caught me today."
"I'm starting to think you're doing it on purpose."
She flushed slightly. "No comment."
Rina grinned from a few steps ahead. "Oooooh. Flirting in a slime cave. How scandalous."
"Focus on the dungeon, Rina."
"Just saying, this has romantic subplot potential."
Keiji groaned. "Not in a cave called the Wet Caverns."
They reached the third floor by midafternoon. The path narrowed to a steep incline, and the walls pulsed faintly with blue light, casting eerie shadows across their faces.
As they descended, a faint humming grew louder, vibrating through the stone.
"Boss room," Mira whispered, clutching her staff tighter.
Keiji tightened his grip on the twig. "I'm still using a stick."
"You're bait," Rina said sweetly. "Just run in circles and look delicious."
The chamber opened into a massive underground grotto. Stalactites hung like frozen daggers from the ceiling. In the center was a massive slime—twice the size of the others—sitting atop a stone dais. Unlike its smaller kin, this one had a crown made of bone and what looked like a monocle stuck to its gelatinous surface.
🐣 You have encountered: Slime Monarch – Level 10 [Unique Variant – Rare Drop Chance Increased]
Rina whistled. "Well. He's regal."
Keiji took one step forward.
The monarch slime honked.
Then it bounced—high, impossibly high—and slammed into the ground, sending shockwaves that knocked them off their feet.
The battle that followed was... messy.
The monarch slime could split into mini-monarchs, each with tiny crowns. It launched acidic projectiles that sizzled against stone, and worst of all, could bounce with terrifying velocity. Bark tried to tank but got yeeted into a wall with a sickening thud. Rina's knives stuck but did little damage, embedded in jiggling blue mass. Mira's magic barely slowed it down, her frost bolts melting almost instantly.
Keiji found himself standing alone between the boss and Mira, who was pinned under a rock after a minor cave-in.
The slime honked again, bouncing high. Its shadow grew larger on the ground where Mira lay trapped.
Time slowed.
Instinct—not logic—kicked in.
Keiji dropped his twig, charged forward, and threw his entire body at Mira, rolling them both out of the impact zone just as the slime crashed down.
The floor cracked. The slime bounced again, this time straight into Bark's waiting blade, which had appeared from nowhere.
A wet splat echoed through the chamber.
The slime burst into sparkles that rained down like blue confetti.
🎉 Boss Defeated! Party EXP: +220 Rare Drop Obtained: Crowned Slime Core (Unique) Keiji leveled up! Class Unlock Available: Veteran (Hidden)
They sat in silence for a long moment, breathing hard, covered in slime residue.
Rina was the first to speak. "Okay... that was insane."
Mira nodded, still stunned. "You saved me. Again."
Keiji winced. "I think I bruised my everything."
"Totally worth it," Rina said, holding up the glowing slime core. It pulsed with inner light, illuminating her grin. "This thing will sell for a fortune."
Bark gave a single approving grunt and helped Keiji to his feet with one massive hand.
As they made their way back to town, Mira walked quietly beside Keiji, boots squelching with each step.
"You're weird, you know that?"
"Thanks?"
"I mean it in a good way. Most new adventurers are cocky idiots or terrified babies. You're just... calm. Like you've done all this before."
Keiji smiled faintly. "Maybe I have."
She narrowed her eyes at him. "That sounded suspiciously cryptic."
"I've had enough weirdness this week. I'm allowed a little mystery."
She rolled her eyes. "Fine. But if you turn out to be a secret hero from a forgotten age, I'm going to be so annoyed."
"...Noted."
As they approached Veldenrook's gate, bathed in the golden light of sunset, another notification flickered across Keiji's vision.
Profile Reconstruction: 38% Subclass Memory Restoring... Passive Unlocked: Tactical Insight (Lv.1)