A/N: hope you've all enjoyed so far. I've certainly had fun writing this.

Let's begin.

As I stomped into the clearing, I noticed a large, but thin puddle of slime covering the ground. My eyes widened as I realized what that was.

Sam's mother's corpse.

"Hey. Who the fuck are you?" I heard an obnoxious voice ask.

I turned around, shaking with rage.

There was a man sitting by the campfire. I noticed that he had a machete strapped to his side. It was covered in slime goo.

I decided to give him the benefit of the doubt.

"Did you kill this slime?" I asked, gesturing to the puddle.

In response, he laughed. LAUGHED!

"Yeah. You shoulda seen her little girl run! Shame she got away, I would've had some fun with he-ACK" I cut him off by closing my fist around his throat. I yanked him into the air, and threw him onto the ground.

Before he could get up, I placed my foot on his chest. He reached for his machete, but I grabbed it first.

I raised it into the air, but stopped as I heard his pleas.

"Please! Don't kill me!" He cried.

Something in me snapped. He had the nerve to ask for mercy? After what he'd done?

This fucker was gonna die slow.

I checked that the machete was sharp. It was incredibly sharp. The craftmanship was excellent, as well. He likely stole it from Enrika, or somewhere similar.

With little effort, I stabbed it into the ground, with the blade facing towards his crotch. With my preparations complete, I grabbed him by the legs, and slooowly started pulling. He seemed catch on pretty quickly.

"No! NO! PLEASE! SOMEONE HELP!" He cried. He tried to claw his way forwards, but he couldn't compete with my strength.

I smiled under the mask as his flesh met the blade. It passed through his crotch with relative ease. The screams started almost immediately, raising in intensity as the machete passed through his intestines.

He thrashed around, spraying blood everywhere. He was already doomed. Didn't he understand that?

I felt some resistance as I pulled his legs forward. I looked down in confusion, before realizing that I'd hit the ribs. I pulled with a little more force, and felt his them give way. I continued onwards, slicing up into the neck.

His screams and sobs turned into coughs and gags once I was halfway through his trachea. Blood was pouring out of his mouth, nose, and eyes.

Content to let him sit there, I grabbed the machete, and pulled it out of the ground.

As I slipped it onto my belt, (I really just put the blade beside my leg, in my pants) I turned to the corpse.

This was about the time when the red veil of rage was lifted from my mind.

My eyes widened at the realization of what I'd just done. I just killed him. No remorse. That was such a torturous way to go, too.

What sickened me was the fact that I didn't care at all. His life was meaningless to me. It had been so easy.

I shook my head. What's done is done. He deserved it.

... It felt odd to not care. Most of my decisions in life were impacted by empathy, and to so callously dispose of someone's very existence... It was just wrong.

But... That felt kinda good.

What's the harm in his death? That was justice. I'm in the right here! All I did was end some scumbag's existence. I did this world a favor.

I shouldn't feel bad for him.

...

...

...

What was I doing earlier...

Oh, right. Sam.

I turned, and trudged back through the forest.

Hope she's okay. The rain is really starting to pick up.

Thankfully, she was waiting for me by the tree.

Wait... How do I tell her that her mother died?

Fuck.

WELP! TIME TO WING IT!

"Hey Sam." I said.

"D-did you find my mother?" She asked.

I sighed, and knelt down beside her, wrapping her in a hug. She understood pretty quickly.

I held her, as she sobbed uncontrollably into my shoulder. I unconciously hugged a little tighter.

"I'm sorry." I said.

Empathy is a funny thing. I couldn't give a crap about that dude I just killed, but here I was, holding a little slime girl while I myself was on the verge of tears.

I don't know how long we were there. It could've been a few minutes, or it could've been hours.

Finally, after an unknowable amount of time, I got up.

"Sam." I said, hiding my sadness. "Do you have any family? Anywhere I can take you?"

"M-m-my mom's sister. She lives a couple hours from here." Sam stuttered.

"Alright then. Lead the way." I said.

*LINEBREAK*

The journey only took about an hour and a half. Nothing of intrest happened, other than more of Sam sobbing, so I'll spare the details.

She led me to an abandoned house. It wasn't necessarily in bad shape, it was just overtaken by plant matter.

"Is this the place?" I asked.

"Yeah." Sam said, sadness in her voice, no doubt left over from the little emotional episode earlier.

By now, It was the dead of night. Thankfully, this body seems to have come with night vision, which made things much easier.

Sam probably had some form of night vision as well, seeing as she led me perfectly, without any mess ups.

I knocked on the door.

For a moment, there was silence. Then, the door opened.

The slime who opened the door looked at me, her eyes scrunched in disdain. It was understandable, seeing how late it was. However, when her gaze fell upon Sam, her eyes widened to the size of dinnerplates.

She quickly ushered us inside.

"Sam, honey." She said. "Go sit in my room for a bit."

As Sam left, her aunt turned to me.

"Who are you?" She asked.

"My name's Jason." I said.

"I'm Melissa." She said.

A moment of awkward silence passed between us.

Melissa pulled a chair from under the table, and sat on it. I did the same, pulling out a chair and sitting on the opposite side of the table.

"So... What's with your body?" She asked.

"Skin disease." I replied.

"Oh." She said. "Is it contagious?"

"No." I said.

"Oh. Good." Melissa responded.

This conversation was SUPREMELY awkward.

"So... What happened?" She asked.

I described to her the bare bones of what happened. I purposely left out what I did to the man. It was pretty messed up, after all.

When I was done, Melissa had her head in her hands, and I could hear her softly weeping. After a moment, she looked up at me, a sad smile adorning her features.

"Thank you. If you hadn't come along, I would've probably lost Sam as well as my sister." She said.

"Bringing her here was the least I could do." I said.

"W-... What happened to the man that killed her?" She inquired, wiping tears from her eyes.

"Bastard got what was coming to him. Rest assured, he can't hurt anyone anymore." I said, anger leaking into my voice as I thought of him.

Melissa nodded, and sniffed.

"That's good, at least." She said.

"...I'm sorry for your loss." I said grimly.

"Thanks. That m-means a lot to m-me." She stuttered.

Awkward silence has returned.

I sighed, and then got up from the table.

"Goodbye, ma'am." I said.

As I turned to leave, Melissa stopped me.

"Where are you going?" She asked.

"My plan is to find work in town... But I'm very lost." I said.

"Oh." She said. "Iliasburg isn't far from here. Just go straight until you hit the main road, and then turn left. If you keep going left, you'll reach it in less than 3 hours. If you don't stop along the way, you can probably make it there before sunrise."

"Thanks." I said, smiling under my mask.

As I opened the door, I felt her hug me from behind. I stood there for a moment, letting her finish. Then, I left.

Following her directions, I went left at the main road.

The main benefit of traveling at night, it seems, is that you almost never get into confrontations at night. Most monsters wait until daytime to ambush people, so, if you travel at night, you're unlikely to encounter any monsters.

However, by pointing that out to you, I've invoked a literary convention, which means I will encounter a monster.

Any second now...

Any second...

...

...

Huh, guess I was wro-

"Hello huma- WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOUR BODY?!"

There it is.

I turned to the woman, and cringed when I saw her. She was some strange, grotesque half-worm half-human. She was oddly slimey. It was disgusting.

I know I'm not one to talk, but EW!

"You haven't answered the question." She said.

"Hmm?" I questioned. Well, I guess that was more just... The implication of a question, rather than an actual inquiry, but whatever.

"Whatever." She said. "Soon, I'll have you writhing in-" I cut her off.

"I'm gonna stop you right there." I said. "I have places to be. I also have no qualms about killing you. Please kindly fuck off, before I snap and stab you."

The worm girl was about to say something, but she quickly noticed all the blood on my clothes. After a moment, she dove into the ground, and tunnelled away.

"Thank God." I muttered, before continuing on the path.

I would get to Iliasburg before sunrise, damnit.

Not because I needed to, but because I wanted to bypass early morning traffic.

I miss my world. When you were in traffic there, you were all seperated by cars. Here, you're shoulder to shoulder with people. I don't like that.

Welp, onwards to Iliasburg!

A/N: Both chapter 3, as well as this one were written back to back. It's currently 6:44 A.M. I'm about to pass out.

This is probably the longest chapter I've ever done here. My limit is usually around 1K. This one's over 2K.

Hope you enjoyed.