Falc absolutely needed to make the most of the slime aspect, and he had so much to do with it too. He had a lot more to do actually;

  First of all he had to experiment with slime mana, then he had to see what would happen with different aspects as weaves, then he also had to experiment with whatever happened with that 'Slime slime prototype', he'd have to test out if he could give a slime a 'Slime-affinity' with the slime aspect, then if he actually could give a slime a slime affinity he would then need to see the effect of as well.

  Along with a lot more, so much more to do. And with his aspectual issues solved, he couldn't help but feel excited at the possibilities.

  And more importantly, he wanted to see what it could do so very, very, very much.

  But what to do, what to do... So much to do but without knowing how much time he was free to spend. But he was sure he had to start with his new aspect, what if it got angry at him ignoring it or something?

  It was [Uncommon] so it had to be more powerful than mere [Common] aspects, right? Elder slimes were better than normal slimes and they were [Uncommon], so the pattern had to remain the same, or else it just wouldn't make sense.

  But still, he needed a few moments to think of what to do next. But it was inefficient to not do anything, so he started to siphon some mana for future experiments.

  He shook his preverbial head after more than a thousand mp had been accumulated, he had started all of this just to find out what an affinity was in the eyes of the shop. While he had indeed abandoned his obsession with it before, but... Now that the answer was just laying there for him to discover, why not?

  It was just a bit troublesome to make slime mana, so he had to make sure that it wouldn't be able to escape his design into the gentle arms of genuine water. So first he made a single base slime, and then struggled to transmute a single point of mp into slime mana. And just as he suspected, the normally obedient and filial mana raged against him.

  He could understand not wanting to be associated with slimes, no matter how biased he was, but he would not show mercy.

  Then the now down trodden former attributeless mana was dragged above the regular weave of mana and given life along side it and the genuine water, and then Falc waited for a moment. Though he did believe that the mere presence of a weave below it would be enough, one could never be too prudent when dealing with an unruly aspect.

  Examining its innards, it seemed that his trusty buffer weave method hadn't let him down! He told the slime to stand proud and become an elder slime, mostly just because he was in a good mood, and because he wondered what an mp of slime mana would do if a slime rose to elder status.

  Now, all that was left was to once again create a new base slime template and struggle to make 2.6 mp of slime mana, before then putting it atop the regular weave and then forming it into a weave of slime mana. He then gave it life once more, gifting the first true slime slime to the slime plains. And it seemed pretty stable, at least it didn't seem as if the slime mana would fall through the underlying weave and create whatever slime-genuine water would be made.

  -He'd decide on the name later.

  Before he went to pay the ultimate conartist for a skill, he felt it would be prudent to see the effects of the slime weave in action. Thus, he commanded with his right as its creator 'Jump.'

  And it did with savage efficiency, all the information about its leap being recorded and then compared with a standard slime. And looking at the facts, Falc came to the conclusion that it was greater than its brethren in every conceivable way. It was faster to jump, its jump held a higher velocity, it jumped farther, it jumped higher. It was all around greater than the standard slime it had diverged from, though there was a slight little problem.

  The improvements were kind of mediocre, about a... 3~4% enhancement. It was basically the same as , but better probably. He wasn't going to waste 4 mp just to see that, he felt that instead that slime mana was a lot more economically viable. It had costed not a single extra mote of mana to get the improvements it offered, he only needed to put in the effort to aspect some mana to the long honoured slime aspect.

  He wondered what would happen if he gave it more slime weaves, so he tested it out. Later, reaching the amount of weaves he could maintain at once without getting into compression or interfering with any of his current automated processes for a grand total of 3. He could probably get around 5 or 6 with any of the base elements, but for some reason slime mana was just... More... Willing to dissipate into nothingness, if that made sense.

  Anyways, from his inspection of the triple slime weave with one buffer weave slime he was satisfied. Each of them had added an extra few percent of enhancement, so it seemed that slime mana had a linear progression instead an exponential or the reverse of exponential. But maybe that'd change when he got a few D-100 slime weaves from his production lines, not that was happening any time soon.

  With that noted for future experimentation, he formed what he had termed as a 'Basex1-Slimex1 slime'. He wasn't sure about how he would manage weaves that were used to keep skill weaves like the dust in line, nor was he sure what to use for unaspected uncompressed mana. Still, a name was needed for ease and clarity of reference.

  Anyways, now all that he had to do was define the compressed mana stockpile as his source of payment and then designate the created slime as the target, and told whatever gave skills to his creations the go ahead. 354 mp was lost in an instant, and a certain amount of mana appeared on the still lifeless slime slime mid-production.

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  It was... A heavy amount of mana. But strangely even though it had gone uncompressed, he could still keep the strange mass of string afloat in the all consuming waters of reality.

  It was different than the skill weave of the other skills he had purchased- which he held hegemony over and

  which he had long ignored- Not defined by the weave it was attached to. If one were to consider the weave a plane of two dimensions, and then the layering of weaves as that of the 3rd dimension, then... bridged the layered weaves with it strange patterns and weird ways of instating mana for a certain part of the weave.

  If Falc had to compare it with something, then it'd be similar to the nuclei of an elder slime. But it was only similar, the principle behind it was almost certainly different. He'd have to see how it functioned in a practical situation, given the fact he'd probably be able to see it operate.

  He blessed the weak creature with life, allowing it to exist in the abyss of sightlessness. And for a moment, just watched it exist. It didn't really do anything specifically, it didn't ponder or anything either. But that wasn't expected of it, it was more interesting to watch the seemingly sagging submerged mana.

  It seemed as if it were being dragged instead of being a part of the slime itself, though in a way all the parts of the slime were being dragged by the other parts. It seemed that the mana beyond the realm of regular mana was not directly attached to the weave or the genuine water, even if he couldn't really see it that well it was connected directly to the skill weave below in the middle between the two weaves at 14 points.

  All the string that made up the skill weave seemed to lead to those points, and he could indeed see a pattern between them. Half of them were a point were countless parts of the skill weave seemed to intersect and the other half seemed more like a place where important parts of the weave gathered but did not intersect... Of course he could see obvious inefficiencies as well, the monster skill seller was a scammer like always.

  The strings that lead from those points all went to the same rough location, and though he did not see it as clearly as he'd like, Falc could see that whatever had formed there in the deeper end of the pool called... Uh... Spirit realm? No, no, spiritual... Land? Dungeon? Cave? Plains? Layer, yes, spiritual layer- In the deeper end of the pool called the spiritual layer, the threads of mana formed- What seemed to be- A knot of sorts.

  But it was frustrating, it was annoying that he couldn't see it perfectly. If he didn't know how it was set in place, how could he possibly evade the fee he would normally have to pay?

  Still, as long as the skill wasn't sub-par, he could bear with these anti-reverse engineering measures. So, he commanded it simply 'You, use your skill.'

  Falc watched with his curiousity rising to a degree far higher than usual, him doing the unusual act of watching the flow of mana through the slime. He saw both the mana of the underlying weave and the weave of the mana move from the strings and towards the skill weave, leaving the strings that they had left a slight bit destitute.

  As the mana churned within the skill weave, leaving all affected parts of the slime less saturated than before, every single drop of it led to the knot at the core of the weave. The mana entered through the intersecting points and for some reason leaked out of the points which did not.

  It made him wonder, if he recreated the skill weave and mana flow, could he use the skill directly without the monster being used to support it?

  But what amazed him most was the result, the blob of something similar to the acid created by . It was a slime, it looked like one, it existed like one, and it jumped like one as well. Just one thing, he couldn't command it to do something.

  A bit worrisome, but nothing too troublesome. Maybe authority of it had been placed in the slime that created it? Not that he could be certain, all he could be certain of was that the thoughtless slime could not be ordered to order the evoked slime- Which was named after the of course, though whether 's acid would be dubbed as 'Evoked acid' was still to be seen.

  He did wonder, however, about how long the slime would exist as it had been said to be 'Temporary'. And he did the same, but far more intensely, for what would happen if he started to compress the weave's mana.

  's acid became more powerful, so would 's slime become more powerful, or would it make more slimes, or do something entirely different from those two possibilities?

  Then another idea popped into his head, so he left a bit of himself- Less than a 1/100th of self- And created a new slime, a Basex1-Slimex2 slime. Then also gave it , wondering if the extra slime weave would affect how it manifested itself, it did not and 300+ mp went down the drain.

  At least he could keep accumulating mana for as long as he liked with the ancient method of compression, and could use said compressed mana for skills, or else his time experimenting would've been so much more tedious and/or stressful.

  The juvenile core of aberrant crystal did not really know for sure what to do next, he could look towards that weird phenomena with slime mana entering genuine water, or he could continue his research into a skill he wasn't certain was a subpar waste of time or not yet. How would he even continue looking into it? It was obvious he would need to get a good look at the submerged mana before he could copy it, otherwise it would be mad to think that the skill would even work...

  He did exactly what he just thought about, madness was the new trend and he was its pioneer!

  If he didn't know how to make the knot submerge or even what the knot looked like, then he'd just wing it with a non-submerged knot. It would probably work itself out anyways, it was a mere 177 mp- Half of the price of the created skill being the fee for a certain fraudster's help- Such a small amount could easily be sacrificed.

  Bringing the creature into the living breathing world, he did not pause for even a moment and told it with grave tone to do like its forefathers and use its skill.

  A bit disappointingly, though not surprisingly, randomly copying half-assedly hadn't worked. Whatever had been coughed out of the slime was technically a slime, and it seemed to be something that was evoked from what he could see, and it definitely tried to be like one. The weird splotch absolutely tried to gather into the refined and plump form of a slime created by he himself, not that it could though. And that was all it tried to do-

  Oh, it seemed that the properly evoked slime had dissipated to the wind, in a mere 1/288th of a cycle.

  ...He felt that if he just kept iterating he could probably get a normal-ish slime, but was that even something he wanted to try? This probably wouldn't be worth anything, a regular slime wouldn't change a thing. Especially if it couldn't see, and even more so if it also didn't have a skill. And it just so happened that the slimes that were evoked by were the kind that were useless, blind, useless, dumb, not to mention useless.

  He couldn't really see a reason to put more time and hard earned mp into it, but... He had time and mp to spend...

  He stopped himself, this was a waste of time, there were better things to test out.

  There were so many things to experiment with that weren't probably going to fail miserably.