Despite how being chased by him may have looked to Ichigo, Rimuru wasn't the type of monster that liked preying on other living creatures. He simply disliked the way that creatures would fear being eaten by him since he was a slime monster.

Their terror literally left an intensely bad taste in his mouth.

So, he truly wasn't lying when he told someone that he was definitely not the type of slime monster to just up and eat someone out of the blue.

But even he reveled certain aspects and instincts that had been bestowed upon him upon his reincarnation into this world as a monster. And one of the things that he had discovered earlier on that brought him a great deal of joy and satisfaction- was his ability to play and be mischievous.

In his previous life as a human, he hadn't been nearly as playful or had nearly as much fun. He had been a serious and reliable person that never stepped a toe out of line, and never caused anyone any trouble if he could absolutely help it.

But in this life...

He loved playing, and teasing others. Occasionally stepping a toe out of line and making waves was something that felt nearly too overwhelming for him to just pass up without doing something. As long as his antics were within reason, then everything was fine.

And of course, his playfulness often turned everything that he did into a game of some sort.

Which was basically how he thought of his chase of Ichigo.

To him, it wasn't just about running her down and catching her. To him it was like playing a game of tag. Right now, he was it and she was trying to not get caught by him. But as playful as he was, he also tended to use that part of him as a means to evaluate others and their abilities since simply asking tended to often be a pain in the ass.

So, he had found that this was one of the best ways to go about it since his 'partner' never really realized what he was doing to begin with.

At the moment, he was having a blast chasing after the girl.

Her ability to evade each of his attempts to capture her was remarkable for a mere human. And bespoke of the possibilities of perhaps having some magical sense or ability that allowed her to be able to move faster than normal humans could as well as being able to tell ahead of time when and how he was going to try and get her.

They were gaining a lot of attention with their game at the moment, but he couldn't really be bothered to care about that since he was having so much fun.

He dogged her steps, easily keeping up with her pace as she made her way all the way through the entire town to the forest where he continued to follow her until he reached his first actual hurdle.

An article of her clothing, a jacket, had been stripped off and dropped carelessly to rest on the forest floor.

He paused long enough to check it for any hint of a trap of some kind. Then once that was done and he realized that there was no trap attached to it scowled at it and wondered what the hell her game was, and then picked it up and kept going.

After that, he lost track of time since his game didn't end for a nonstop seventy-eight hours straight. Normally he would have captured his 'partner' and ended the game before then, but he got distracted several times when he kept finding pieces of Ichigo's clothing littering the forest floor.

That is, until he found her bra by a stream and simply froze up from the mental images of a sort of naked human girl running wild and free in the forest.

Usually, Rimuru would have panicked if he'd been stuck in a similar situation with someone else under his rule. But in this case, there was simply something oddly appealing about it. Something that sent a thrill of wicked delight through him.

So much so that like any other idiot mesmerized by lace and the images of naked boobs dancing around in his head- he would have followed the girl anywhere just to see how things ended.

Like he mentioned a second ago, he was an idiot.

But for those seventy-eight hours that it took him to figure that out, he had the time of his fucking life. Ichigo as he learned during that time, was a diabolical genius. One that he could only tip his hat too.

She not only proved that she could evade him easily, without stopping or rest of any kind. But she also proved to be able to outwit him, lead him into natural traps created by nature itself. And she certainly proved that she wasn't the least bit afraid of using her nakedness to distract him either.

The whole thing was goddamn glorious.

Even if he did wind up tripping over his own feet once he caught sight of her naked body a few times here and there and running into tree trunks and falling down ravines while still trying to get his hands on her.

When the game finally came to an end, Rimuru was thoroughly convinced that Ichigo was hiding a great deal of combat ability. As well as the ability to strategize while in constant motion. And her stamina was nothing to sneeze at either.

Especially since she seemed to have frighteningly terrifying amount of the first two things mentioned.

But what he found even more starting than each of those discoveries, was the fact that Ichigo wasn't exactly as human as she seemed. In fact, he was beginning to suspect that she wasn't even human at all.

And the thing that seemed to drive this point home for him, was the fact that she ended the game while he was chasing her.

He wasn't really sure how she managed to split herself into two separate bodies. But she did, and it was fascinating enough for his quick mind to come up with some ideas. And also, to prevent him from reacting quickly enough to evade being caught himself and then promptly body slammed onto his head, rendering him unconscious for a little while.

When he woke up, he was lying in his bed back home totally confused because he couldn't really recall much of anything. What the hell had happened to him?

Ichigo was ambushed the second that she walked through the front door by Chad. Her friend was sitting in her living room, looking at what looked like one of the books that Rukia had borrowed from her a month ago. And from the way that he kept cringing and holding the thing further and further away from him, you would think that the pages had just grown fangs and bitten him.

Rolling her eyes, she called out. "It's a book on childbirth, Chad. Not the Kama Sutra." Causing her friend to jump and toss the book across the room where it hit her wall- and went through it.

"Shit." He muttered as he eyed the hole that he'd just made in her wall before then sliding his dark gaze to her and raising a brow at her state of...nudity? As he then asked, "Where the hell have you been?"

"Out." She said with a smile as she sauntered past him.

"Out where?"

"What are you, my dad? Why all of the weird questions?" She asked curiously as she opened a closet and pulled a nice blanket out and then wrapped herself in it so that she could go back and flop herself down on the couch next to him.

"You've been missing for the past few days, and no one knew where you were. Now, where were you?"

"In the forest."

"Naked?" He prompted.

She stretched her arms up over her head and popped her back and then leaned up against his side as she said. "Not at first. I had to sacrifice my clothing for the cause."

"I know that I'm probably going to hate myself for asking this later on." Chad muttered more to himself than her, eliciting a giggle from her as he wrapped an arm around her shoulder and then asked, "What cause?"

"Tempest and I were playing a game in the forest."

"Tempest? You mean the lord of this place?"

She hummed and tipped her head back so that she could look at him as he gaped at her before slowly begging her, "Please don't tell me that the two of you have been fucking like bunnies the past few days."

"Okay, I won't tell you."

He groaned and covered his face with his hands as she grinned evilly.