Girl in the Box: Please tell me why I was reincarnated as a mimic monster!

Ugh... I'm so sleepy...

I woke up in unfamiliar surroundings. I looked around and realized it wasn't my old hospital room. It didn't seem like a dream after all...

I shifted my body, stretched my limbs out of the box, and stood up.

Actually, being a mimic is quite safe; by disguising yourself as a treasure chest, you won't be attacked by monsters. Of course, the chances of being attacked by humans are much higher.

I don't want to fight anyone...

As I was thinking this, a jelly-like object fell from my head. Ah, I remember now, there was also a slime, my companion.

Ugh...

It was sleeping soundly, showing no signs of waking up at all, which was quite adorable.

Wake up! Our fulfilling day is about to begin!

I gently nudged the slime's body with the pliers, trying to wake it up. Its jelly-like body twitched, as if it had awakened.

It weakly climbed up my pliers to my head, looking quite cute in its half-asleep state, but it was probably too grumpy in the morning.

I reluctantly set off with it, hoping it would fully wake up before we encountered any battles. Although Slime-chan is not strong enough, its intuition is very accurate.

Our team composition is roughly like this: Slime-chan is in charge of reconnaissance and support, while I'm responsible for combat. When we encounter monsters that are easy to deal with, I'll suppress them and let Slime-chan kill the monsters.

Over time, Slime-chan will definitely become stronger... uh... probably.

Walking through the unchanging maze, I encountered several different monsters.

A skeleton, just a complete skeleton wandering around, I don't know its name, and there are no words in it, so I avoided fighting the skeleton for safety's sake.

A pangolin-like monster with rough, scale-like markings on its exterior and a pair of enormous claws. I happened to witness it fighting a skeleton.

The pangolin encountered a skeleton that was walking along. The skeleton had a small shield and a short sword, which were very suitable as weapons and armor.

The pangolin seemed to be threatening the skeleton because its path was blocked. To be honest, its aura was a bit intimidating to me, who was just watching the show.

The skeleton let out a silent roar and swung its short sword at the pangolin. The pangolin quickly curled into a ball, using its scales to block the attack.

With a clang, the short sword that had struck the scales broke off. The pangolin triumphantly returned to its original form, but the skeleton didn't care what it did and could only raise its other hand to slam it down heavily.

This time, the pangolin didn't passively take the beating. Instead, it stood on its hind legs, freeing its proud hands and claws, and then, with a speed that my eyes couldn't keep up with, sliced ​​the skull into pieces.

That's terrifying. Luckily, I wasn't fighting it.

As I was thinking this, I headed in another direction. The radar above my head, Slime-chan, reacted; it seemed she had finally woken up.

The slime immediately jumped off my head and then pointed me in a direction with its elastic body, emphasizing the direction.

Let me guess... what does that mean?

The slime jumped around to emphasize its presence, and I roughly knew what it was going to say.

In other words, he found his kind in the maze.

Hmm... a slime? Well, it would be nice to kill it and get some experience, but slime-chan definitely wouldn't agree to that.

In short, let's follow Slime-chan's lead for now.

Chapter 6 The Mischievous Slime

Following the slime's guidance, I ventured deeper into the room and arrived at a very spacious room with a high ceiling, which gave me a somewhat unclear feeling.

When we reached the doorway, Slime stopped, quickly climbed onto my back, and stuck there. Why is she hiding there this time?

Leaving the slime aside for now, I cautiously entered the room, and that's when I discovered the towering mounds of earth. Come to think of it, these mounds of earth look familiar…

This room is filled with these earthen mounds, they are huge, and you can't see the top of them at a glance... Why did Slime-chan bring me here?

As I stared at these earthen mounds, wondering what they were, the subtitles appeared.

"A giant dragon ant's nest, a place where giant dragon ants congregate. It is hierarchical, swift in movement, and ferocious in nature. The larger the nest, the more dragon ants it contains."

Oh, oh, oh, oh, is it similar to an ant from a past life?

Wait, something's not right... a giant... dragon ant?!

"Giant Dragon Ants, giant ants blessed by the Dragon King, possessing some characteristics and abilities of the dragon race."

Is it that strong?! Fighting such a troublesome thing right off the bat?! In terms of classification, shouldn't this be a member of the Dragon King's retinue?!

Just as I was complaining, a red wave suddenly appeared on the mountaintop, rapidly approaching me. No doubt, it must be dragon ants.

Slime-chan was trembling behind me. What's going on? You're the one who brought me here, okay?!

I was fully aware of the situation, so I immediately chose to run away. It was the same reason I ran away after encountering the goblins yesterday; I couldn't possibly defeat a whole group by myself.

Besides, I don't know how strong or weak the dragon ants are.

bake--!

Several fireballs grazed past us and landed on the ground not far away. This was definitely an attack from the dragon ants! Wait, was that dragon breath?! They even have such a dangerous ability?! Is the goddess a complete waste?!

Compared to me, who has the blessing of the goddess, the dragon ant is obviously much stronger. Is the treasure chest monster really that weak?

Suddenly, Slime jumped out from behind me and ran away faster than I could. Wow, that's not fair!

I did my best to keep up with Slime-chan's pace, gradually moving away from the terrifying dragon ant room. And, there were no pursuers.

I'm starting to have doubts about Slime-chan. What is it trying to do by taking me to that room? Is it trying to kill me?

The slime was sprawled out on the side, resting. I was considering whether to take care of it now... but I decided against it... I couldn't bring myself to do it.

After resting for a while, Slime seemed to have regained its strength, and then it looked at me as if it was eager to try again.

The slime started pushing me to go somewhere again. To be honest, I'm not very trusting of it now, but this time it seems very confident.

I'll trust you one more time... but next time I won't care about you anymore.

This time, I seem to remember where that road leads... It's where we just encountered the pangolin and the skeleton. What exactly is a slime...?

Returning to the "crime scene," no bloodstains were found. That was to be expected; the skeleton's attack couldn't penetrate the pangolin's scales, and the defeated skeleton was nothing more than a skeleton—it wouldn't leave any bloodstains anyway.

In contrast, there were many broken bones left on the ground. The slime had no interest in those and was groping around for something.

It was cautiously searching for something, as if it had some strange intention. Are slimes really this intelligent?

I stayed a little further away, and since I didn't know what the slime was thinking, I couldn't help it. Besides, I had a bad feeling, so I figured it was better to run away.

As expected, Slime-chan ran back in a panic, this time completely ignoring me and not even running towards me. I watched its tiny body disappear into the distance, wondering what it had done this time.

"Wuhuhu——"

A terrifying sound came from the other side of my field of vision, and warm breath blew on me, but I felt cold all over.

Without a second thought, I took off running, even faster than when I was being chased by the dragon ants. This must be what they call the fire effect.

As for what was behind me this time—ah, it was a pangolin, of course!

God knows what the slime did to make it so enraged; I felt the floor beneath my feet groaning, and a terrifying roar came from behind me. The best course of action was to run.

I caught up with the slime almost instantly. I didn't care about it at all and ran away without hesitation.

"Whoosh?!"

Slime-chan made a sound like she was surprised, looking like she had been betrayed. So, it's this side that's been betrayed!

Suddenly, the slime-chan unleashed unprecedented power and slammed into my back. I was actually knocked several meters away, and it still stuck to my back!?

It showed no remorse whatsoever, clinging tightly to my back. I had absolutely no desire to escape with it, but there was no time to think; I had to run first.

Chased relentlessly by the terrifying pangolin, I ran until I saw the familiar dragon ant nest room, and then I remembered that I had escaped along the slime's escape route.

Do I still subconsciously trust it?!

I stopped at the doorway, surrounded by a large army in front and pursuers behind; I was completely trapped in a dead end.

Then, the slime left my body again, and I saw it; it seemed quite confident.

What is it trying to do?

Ughhhhh! Oh well! Let's see what it does! It's going to die anyway!

I gave up thinking and chose to follow the slime's instructions.

Chapter 7 The Slime Plan √

However, the slime betrayed my trust and rushed into the room without looking back.

Hey! Are you trying to get yourself killed?!

My thoughts didn't reach the slime; it ran away without looking back, while the pangolin was already close behind me.

Aaaaaaahh ...

I don't know why I gave up on myself and followed the slime to the underworld. The end.

What the hell?! Hey?! Dragon ants have even come out?!

Not just from the top of one nest, but from every nest in the entire room, swarms of dragon ants poured out. This black army was advancing toward us with overwhelming force.

The slime charged straight into the dragon ant army and disappeared. Crushed by such an army, even the slime would be dead by now…

"Pfft!"

Suddenly, the dragon ants split into two paths from where the slime had rushed in, creating a path in the middle. The slime was jumping around there, as if calling me to hurry up and go.

What’s going on…?

The dragon ant ignored the slime and me, charging straight at my back. If I remember correctly, the thing behind me was a pangolin, right?

Then I heard the pangolin roar and the sounds of battle. Turning around, I saw the dragon ants doing their best to stop the pangolin's advance, while the pangolin was desperately killing the surging black army.

Could it be that... we are not as much of a threat as the pangolin, so they are ignoring us?

I dared not linger and rushed to the slime's side as quickly as possible. I didn't know whether the pangolin or the dragon ant army was stronger, but there must be a limit to how much they could fight.

If one side loses, the next ones to die will be me and Slime-chan, right?

Is this really something a slime could do? How cruel... But life forces us to act, and society is treacherous.

But then again, so that's how it is...

At first, Slime-chan brought me to the room to lure the dragon ants to the pangolin, but that failed. Then, she changed her approach and tried to lure the pangolin to the dragon ant nest.

Simply put, it means leveraging power, using something powerful to counter something else powerful.

Do slimes, monsters that live on the edge of life and death at all times, develop such intuition and wisdom?

I feel a little sorry for my slime-chan...

Slime-chan lifted itself high, as if showing off its achievement to me, looking like it wanted to be praised.

I'm sorry... I can't properly convey my gratitude and praise to you right now...

I could only gently brush its body with pliers; that's all I could do as a mimic.

Slime seemed a little unhappy after receiving my praise. It rammed my pincers away with its body, then climbed to the entrance of the dragon ant nest and hopped around there.

Does that mean we have to go down? Wow... I feel so scared...

I followed it to the edge of the entrance, which was a wide hole with a bottomless darkness below. Then the slime jumped down.

Eh?! Are we just going to jump like that?! We'll die, won't we?!

I panicked as I stood at the edge of the hole. Would I die if I went down like this? Slime-chan just jumped down like that?

A cold wind brushed against my body, and the roar of battle echoed behind me. I weighed the pros and cons... No matter how I looked at it, I was going to die anyway, so I might as well continue to fight alongside Slime-chan.

I jumped up like a slime, retracting my limbs and pincers into the box, covering myself tightly for protection. Actually, it just gave me a little psychological comfort—I have very little confidence in my current shell.

I really can't figure out who's stronger, me or the slime...

This trivial thought popped into my head, and I let my body fall deeper into the dragon ant nest under the influence of gravity.

Chapter 8: Nothing ventured, nothing gained (mistakenly)

Click?! Whoa whoa?!

The corner of the box hit the ground directly, and the impact spread inside. Wow, honestly, it really hurt...

The HP bar in my field of vision has dropped by half. That's terrifying. If it had been any higher, I probably would have died.

"Pfft!"

The slime-chan bumped into my shell, anxiously checking if I was alive or dead. I'm not dead, so please stop bumping into my shell like that.

I stretched out my limbs and opened my eyes, and there it was, slime-chan, right in front of me. It looked so superior, as if to say, "I've been waiting for you for a long time."