Slime Evolution

Chapter 387 - Publicity

The sun of the Upper Zone didn’t ask for permission to come in, it simply flooded Lohan’s suite through the panoramic windows of his bedroom, letting the soft golden light settle over the silk sheets, completely unlike the dark, cold room in the Lower Zone he used to live in.

Lohan woke up with an incredible mental clarity, feeling that his sleep got even better each day. With his mind clearer and more fluid after each evolution, the amount of sleep needed to rest kept decreasing while the quality of that sleep only kept rising.

His body no longer felt the weight of gravity as oppressively as when he was thin and weak, on the contrary, now every muscle fiber seemed to be in a state of vibrant readiness, even right after waking up from a night’s sleep.

He got up and walked to the inner balcony of his penthouse, watching the clouds floating below the level of his apartment.

As he activated his personal holographic terminal, the first thing that appeared in Lohan’s view was a flood of notifications from Syn.

The interview video of Ignis, the Legendary "Dragon" of the Dragon Soul guild, had infected the global network.

In under twelve hours, the buzz had gone viral, dominating trending topics across every sector, from the Upper Zone down to the deepest suburbs of several planets.

Lohan frowned as he analyzed the numbers.

Ignis’s personal profile and Dragon Soul’s official profile combined had crossed the 3 million follower mark at a speed that defied the logic of organic growth.

It was obvious the Soul Group was pumping in at least a few million into marketing and possibly engagement bots to sustain that meteoric rise.

By comparison, Astralis Requiem’s profile sat at a far higher tier, with 20 million followers now after enormous growth driven by word of mouth caused both by the guild’s achievements, but mainly because of the recruitment process.

However, Astralis’s growth had slowed down over the past few days. Lohan and Lisa had chosen to go quiet again while focusing on the guild’s infrastructure and the investigation into the Broken Suns.

Followers on a social network could grow at any moment, but the guild’s development steps shouldn’t be skipped out of greed or ego just to watch that number climb.

"Twenty million is a solid base, but in a game with billions of Players, we’ve still barely scratched the surface of the total audience..." Lohan murmured to himself, as he scrolled through the engagement charts.

He knew the mystery surrounding Astralis was his greatest asset, but the real world audience was fickle and hungry for faces and displays of raw power, something Ignis was handing them on a silver platter.

A notification from Dylan popped up in the corner of his screen.

The recruitment report was ready. Lohan opened the document and realized that if Dylan hadn’t imposed strict restrictions on the first phase of applications, the guild’s vanguard would be buried in bureaucratic work for the next century.

Even with the restrictions, applications remained open for exceptional talent, and the quality of the candidates was staggering. Dozens of Epic Base Players had submitted their profiles, seeking the prestige of belonging to the guild that cleared the first dungeon.

What really caught Lohan’s attention in the report was the mention of a Legendary Base Player who had tried to infiltrate them.

Dylan detailed that, after a thorough investigation by his real world team, it had been confirmed the individual was a spy from a rival conglomerate, possibly tied to the Noctis Group.

’A spy with a Legendary Base...’ Lohan thought, feeling a pang of concern.

The damage a piece like that could cause within Astralis’s structure was incalculable.

Someone with a legendary base would find it far easier to gain access to any organization’s inner circles in a short time, earning prestige and power much more easily than Players with lower bases.

If they didn’t have an intelligence team as sharp as Dylan’s, Astralis could end up being eaten away from the inside out before it was too late, causing unimaginable damage.

Lohan decided to dive into Ignis’s profile to understand what was causing so much of a stir.

The man was turning his daily routine into a reality show.

The public was in ecstasy, watching every step of a Legendary Player as if he were some new god, and Ignis seemed to be loving every second of the attention, showing himself off more and more in videos with cinematic editing.

Lohan opened the most recent video, titled "The Flame of Power," a title that made Lohan roll his eyes.

The footage started with Ignis walking through a volcanic zone in Elysium, the heat of the environment distorting the air around him.

The Draconian wore no heavy armor, his black scales gleaming under the light of the lava, serving as a natural defense superior to any ordinary metal. In the video, Ignis ran into a group of Level 13 Ogres, putting on a display of raw strength and showmanship.

Ignis didn’t just attack, he humiliated the monsters, putting on a show for the recording.

He gripped an ogre’s neck with a single hand, his claws piercing the creature’s thick skin, while his other hand closed into a fist wrapped in intense red flames.

With one direct punch he set off an explosion of fire that incinerated the upper part of the beast’s torso. The movement was fluid, but loaded with an arrogance that Lohan found fascinating from a tactical standpoint. Ignis relied almost entirely on his race’s physical superiority, ignoring evasion tactics or damage mitigation. He trusted that nothing at that level could scratch his scales, and he was probably right about that.

’The problem is when he runs into something that can actually pierce that defense...’

At the end of the video, Ignis looked directly into the camera, his slit eyes gleaming with a golden light. "A lot of you keep asking me about Astralis Requiem," he said, his voice deep and loaded with mockery. "I don’t understand your fear. Astralis is a guild of weirdos hiding in the shadows. Halon? He’s a ghost who doesn’t have the guts to show his face. The true elite of Elysium doesn’t live in the dark, it shines like fire. If you’re after real glory, join Dragon Soul. Don’t waste your time with people afraid to be seen."

Lohan let out a harsh laugh, the vibration of his core echoing through the silent room.

The constant hostility Ignis kept showing was an obvious PR move, but an irritatingly effective one.

The whole time the man used Astralis as a verbal punching bag to boost his own importance. Lohan, however, didn’t take the attack personally. He opened his tactical notepad and started logging every detail he’d picked up from Ignis’s displays.

"His combat style is focused on thermal bursts and physical anchoring," Lohan noted mentally. "He has a 0.8 second delay between building up Mana in his lungs and releasing the breath. The joints beneath the tail, though atrophied by the humanoid form, are still low scale density points. Ignis... thanks for posting your own weaknesses online of your own free will. That’s going to save me a lot of scouting work down the road."

Lohan then started reading the comments under the video.

The general public was a bit skeptical, with many pointing out that despite the light show, Dragon Soul still hadn’t accomplished anything significant, hadn’t officially cleared any high level dungeons.

[Where’s his sovereignty seal? All this bravado from someone who hasn’t conquered anything so far?] one comment asked.

[Wow, he shoots out some really pretty fire, shame that apparently it’s useless when it comes to raiding dungeons, right?] said another.

However, a legion of blind fans, or possibly front accounts controlled by the Soul Group, answered every criticism with an almost religious ferocity.

[You guys don’t understand anything! They’re still low level! Wait until Ignis reaches full integration!]

[When his Dragon Race awakens, he’s going to slaughter any shadow guild!]

Lohan paused at those words: "Dragon Race."

He analyzed the video frames again, zooming in as far as possible on the texture of the scales and the bone structure of Ignis’s face, and the Slime let out a mental sigh loaded with disdain.

"People really do believe whatever marketing tells them," Lohan murmured. "From what I can see in these videos, Ignis isn’t a dragon. His structure is clearly that of a Draconian. If he were a real dragon, his race wouldn’t merely be legendary, he’d have a Mythic Race and his size would be ten times bigger even at level 1. A Draconian is just the biological residue of a dragon bloodline. He’s strong, sure, but calling that a ’Dragon Race’ is an exaggeration bordering on false advertising."

However, despite being bothered by it, Lohan had no intention of personally doing anything about the matter; given the hostility Dragon Soul harbored toward Astralis, it was only a matter of time before the conflict between them escalated, making victory a far more satisfying response when the time came.